Sofia Kenin had just beaten Ashleigh Barty, the world No. 1, to reach the final at the Australian Open last January. Still in her tennis clothes and seated on a bench in the locker room next to her friend and doubles partner, Bethanie Mattek-Sands, Kenin glanced at her phone and put her hands to her mouth.
“Andy Roddick just tweeted. Oh my God, Oh my God,” Kenin said as she read aloud the former world No. 1’s message. “‘This girl has become the goods,’” Roddick wrote, urging her to win the title.
“I will,” Kenin yelled into her phone.