http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/09/sports/serena-williams-loses-bid-for-23rd-major-and-her-no-1-ranking.html 2016-09-09 03:10:32 Serena Williams Loses Bid for 23rd Major and Her No. 1 Ranking Williams lost to Karolina Pliskova and second-ranked Angelique Kerber will ascend to the top spot. Williams also remains tied with Steffi Graf with 22 major titles in the Open era. === The semifinal stage of the Perhaps the pressure of trying to win all four major tournaments in one year was the culprit, or perhaps it was merely the unexpected brilliance of Roberta Vinci on that sunny day. A year later, there was less pressure on Williams, but even more brilliance from her opponent. Karolina Pliskova, the No. 10 seed playing in her first semifinal of a Grand Slam event, showed no nerves and none of her inexperience in defeating Williams, 6-2, 7-6 (5), in a shocking semifinal of the U.S. Open in Arthur Ashe Stadium Thursday night. By summoning some incredible poise to handle the moment, she became the first Czech woman to reach the U.S. Open final since Helena Sukova in 1993. “I don’t believe it,” Plikova said in an on-court television interview. “Actually, I do believe it. I always knew I had a chance to beat anybody when I am playing my game.” There was no historic Grand Slam on the line this time because Williams lost at the Australian Open and the Williams was also looking to earn a spot in her 29th major final, and a record seventh U.S. Open championship, which would have broken a tie with Chris Evert. Instead, she lost her No. 1 ranking to No. 2 Angelique Kerber, who played the unseeded Caroline Wozniacki in the second semifinal later on Thursday. Pliskova, a big server with powerful groundstrokes to match, has been seen by some as an underachiever so far in her career, but on Thursday she achieved the biggest win of her life. “The biggest challenge is to beat Serena,” said Patrick Mouratoglou, Williams’s coach. “There is no bigger challenge than this one.” Pliskova was remarkably poised playing in a U.S. Open semifinal against the crowd favorite in Ashe at night. She won the first set in 26 minutes and did not crumble even when Williams screamed in her face at net. It happened during the first game of the second set. With both players at the net, Williams drove a forehand right at Pliskova, who got her racket on it in self-defense. The ball deflected wide. Williams made a fist, turned in Pliskova’s direction and yelled, “Come on,” with more than her usual ferocity. Williams won that game to hold her serve, but Pliskova held her nerve and broke serve at 2-2. Williams pounded a good serve up the middle at 30-40, but Pliskova saved it. After several strokes by each player, Williams hit a ball wide. Pliskova stretched out wide with her forehand and saved the ball, hitting it back deep to Williams’s backhand, and Williams return was long. Pliskova, perhaps prematurely sensing the finish line, may have gotten ahead of herself because she faltered on her serve and Williams broke right back, then held to take the advantage, 4-3. As they moved into the latter stages of the second set, Pliskova seemed to wobble a bit, and Williams held serve to take the lead, 5-4. But the tension remained, and it could be seen even on the face of Venus Williams, Serena Williams’s sister who watched the match from the stands. Pliskova was not only winning points with her serve and powerful ground game, but she was using her court sense, as well. She held her serve in the 10th game of the set by returning a drop shot with a slice drop shot of her own, changing her grip on the racket and placing the ball just over the net with Williams back at the baseline. At 5-5, 30-30, Williams moved up to attack a second serve, but hit hit it long and Pliskova held with an ace to set up the tiebreaker. Pliskova won the first three points but then showed some signs of the feeling the moment. She hit two consecutive unforced errors and then Williams earned a mini break when Plikova double faulted for only the seventh time in the match. The scoring went back and forth in the tense tiebreaker until Williams hit a backhand long at 5-5, producing a yell from Pliskova. Then Williams, one of the great servers in the history of the game, double faulted and Pliskova advanced to her first final, after her first semifinal, after her first quarterfinal, and so on.