No.19 seed Madison Keys saved one match point to stun No.2 seed Iga Swiatek 5-7, 6-1, 7-6[8] in the Australian Open semifinals, advancing to the second Grand Slam final of her career following the 2017 US Open.

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Keys had won just one of five previous meetings with Swiatek, with all four losses coming in straight sets. The Pole served for a fifth victory at 6-5 in the decider but missed a match point with a netted backhand. Keys trailed most of the way in the ensuing super-tiebreak and was down 7-5, but found her best serves when she needed them to claim the final three points, converting her first match point after 2 hours and 35 minutes.

So tightly contested was the third set that Keys had no idea whether she had faced a match point.

"It was so up and down, and there were so many big points and break point chances that neither one of us got," Keys told Casey Dellacqua in her on-court interview. "Did she have a match point? I feel like I blacked out at some point and I was just out there running around. Just to be able to stay in it, keep fighting, and then a 10-point tiebreak for an extra-dramatic finish."

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The result extends Keys' winning streak to 11 matches, following her ninth career Hologic WTA Tour title two weeks ago in Adelaide. Keys' current run now stands alone as the longest winning streak of her career, going one better than her 10-match streak in 2022. Then, Keys also won Adelaide and reached the Australian Open semifinals, where she fell to Ashleigh Barty.

The American will face a similar dynamic in the final against No.1 seed and two-time defending champion Aryna Sabalenka, who leads their head-to-head series 4-1. That includes all four of their hard-court meetings and both their Grand Slam encounters. Keys' only win in the series was a 6-4, 1-6, 7-5 victory in the second round of Berlin 2021 on grass.

In the final, she will be aiming to become the fourth player this decade to defeat the World No.1 and World No.2 in the same tournament, following Sabalenka at the 2022 WTA Finals Fort Worth (beating Ons Jabeur and Swiatek), Barbora Krejcikova at Dubai 2023 (beating Sabalenka and Swiatek) and Elena Rybakina at Indian Wells 2023 (beating Swiatek and Sabalenka).

The defeat marks Swiatek's second loss in as many Australian Open semifinals. In 2022, she fell at the same stage to another big-hitting American, Danielle Collins. Her loss means that Sabalenka is guaranteed to retain the World No.1 ranking following the Australian Open.

"I guess at the end Madison was kind of brave with her decisions, and she pushed me when she needed to," Swiatek said in press. "Yeah, I would say I wasn't feeling as free as on previous matches to also push in the important moments."

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Third-set twists and turns: The match opened with four consecutive breaks of serve, but it was Swiatek who settled first. With her commitment and execution at net, where she won five of seven points in the opener, particularly impressive, she leapt out to a 5-2 lead.

A backhand error squandered her first set point in that game and allowed Keys to level, though. Swiatek was able to regain control of the set from 5-5 with a slew of backhand winners in the last two games, but the stage had been set for a breathtaking second set from her opponent. In it, Keys dropped just six points behind serve, while Swiatek only won six points behind hers. Indeed, Swiatek did not win a single point on her second delivery in the second set.

"Even though I lost the first set, I felt like I was playing some better tennis at the end of it," Keys said afterward. "To be able to kind of run with that second set and really just settle, that was really nice."

Momentum shifted back and forth throughout a tense decider, and ultimately it was Keys who was best able to shake off her missed opportunities. She missed two break points to lead 5-3, but recovered from triple break point down in the subsequent game to go up 5-4.

Keys came within two points of victory in that game, but Swiatek escaped courtesy of a punishing forehand and terrific backhand pass. At 5-5, Keys dipped at an unfortunate moment, double faulting and then going for an ill-judged drop shot down break point -- which Swiatek swatted away easily to go up 6-5.

Serving for the match, Swiatek squandered match point with another untimely backhand error, then double-faulted to send the contest into a super-tiebreak. There, Swiatek led most the way, and at 7-7, she came up with the best shot of the match, a remarkable reflexed volley winner off a full-blast Keys forehand.

But though the scoreboard, the momentum and their head-to-head history all pointed toward Swiatek at this point, Keys went back to basics to snatch it from her grasp. An ace was followed by a service winner to bring up her first match point, and in the ensuing rally it was Swiatek's forehand which broke down first.