WTA Finals Previews: Iga Swiatek vs. Daria Kasatkina; Coco Gauff vs. Caroline Garcia

Iga Swiatek vs Daria Kasatkina

This may go down as the first year of the Iga Era in women’s tennis: Can the tour’s No. 1 player close it out in style, with a title at the year-end championships? With all due respect to the other seven women in the draw, a Swiatek victory lap in Fort Worth makes sense.

If there’s anything that defines Swiatek’s season, and the huge strides she has made over the last 12 months, it’s her matchup with Kasatkina. Before 2022, they had played once, at Eastbourne the previous summer, and Kasatkina had won in three sets—she took the last two 6-0, 6-1. What a difference a season made. This year the two women have played four times—including at two Slams, the Australian Open and French Open—and Swiatek hasn’t lost more than three games in any set. The mix of speed and spin and finesse that has worked so well for the Russian against most other opponents in 2022? Swiatek has cut right through it with her two-sided attack, and exposed Kasatkina’s vulnerability to anyone who can hit with consistent pace.

Swiatek’s four wins came on clay and outdoor hard courts. There’s no reason to think the result won’t be the same when they move indoors on Tuesday. Winner: Swiatek

Coco Gauff vs. Caroline Garcia

This one has the feel of a revenge match, even if the woman taking her revenge doesn’t see it that way.

Last month, Gauff and Garcia met on a big stage: The US Open quarterfinals in Arthur Ashe Stadium. Despite the best efforts of the pro-American crowd, Garcia proved to be the better player on the day, blitzing past Gauff in hyper-aggressive style for a 6-3, 6-4 win. That was her first victory in three tries over the Floridian, but it was by far the most important of their meetings.

Has anything changed since then? Well, kinda. At the time, Garcia was the most in-form player on the tour, having won three titles on three surfaces in three months, including the WTA 1000 in Cincinnati, and she hadn’t dropped a set in her first four matches at the Open. But Garcia’s win over Gauff would prove to be her peak. She lost badly to Ons Jabeur in the semifinals two days later, and she’s 1-3 since, with two first-round losses. She has also split with the coach, Bertrand Perret, who helped take her into the Top 10.

Gauff hasn’t been on fire herself since the Open. She went out in the quarters in Guadalajara and San Diego, where she was soundly beaten by Swiatek. But she’s not in rapid-descent mode the way Garcia seems to be, either. This seems like a regression-to-the-mean moment for their matchup, with Gauff using her superior steadiness to win. Winner: Gauff