U.S. tennis star Sofia Kenin wins her first Grand Slam title at Australian Open - CBS News

This, essentially, was where Sofia Kenin was going to win or lose the Australian Open final: She was down love-40 while serving at 2-all in the third set against two-time major champion Garbiñe Muguruza.

Kenin came through in spectacular fashion. She won the next five points, each with a winner – one an ace, the others clean groundstrokes to cap exchanges of 11 shots or more.

The American wouldn't lose another game on her way to earning a Grand Slam title at age 21.

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The 14th-seeded Kenin won the first major final of her career Saturday by coming back to beat a fading Muguruza 4-6, 6-2, 6-2 at Melbourne Park. She is the youngest Australian Open champion since 2008, when Maria Sharapova won the hard-court tournament at age 20. 

"This is my first speech, but I'm going to try my best," Kenin said during the trophy ceremony at Rod Laver Arena, where the retractable roof was shut because of rain much of the day.

"My dream has officially come true," she told the crowd. "Dreams come true. So if you have a dream, go for it, and it's going to come true." 

Sofia Kenin celebrates during her Women's Singles final match against Garbine Muguruza on February 1, 2020 in Melbourne, Australia. Getty Images

Kenin was so magnificent when it mattered the most, saving 10 of 12 break points she faced, while converting 5 of 6 that she earned.

Muguruza, meanwhile, seemed hampered in her movement and, in particular, her serving: She helped Kenin by double-faulting eight times, including three in the last game, one on championship point.

Kenin immediately covered her face with both hands.

For quite some time, she was overlooked and underappreciated, drawing much less attention than other young tennis players from the U.S., such as 15-year-old Coco Gauff. Maybe it was because Kenin is only 5-foot-7. Maybe it was because she went into last season with this resume: ranked outside the top 50, yet to get past the third round of a major, yet to win a tour-level title.

Kenin will be taken more seriously now. By everyone.

Kenin is expected to rise to No. 7 in Monday's WTA rankings, the youngest American to make her debut in the top 10 since Serena Williams in 1999.

Kenin was born in 1998 in Moscow to Russian parents; they had moved to New York in the 1980s, but returned to be with family for the birth of their daughter. A few months later, they returned to the U.S.; Kenin grew up in Florida and still makes her home there.

"This was the best two weeks of my life. I thank my team, my dad, everyone who made this possible - my mom back home, who's probably watching this speech. I love you, Mom," Kenin said. "We worked so hard, and I'm so grateful for this." 

Sofia Kenin kisses the Daphne Akhurst Memorial Cup after winning against Spain's Garbine Muguruza in their women's singles final match on February 1, 2020. Photo by SAEED KHAN/AFP via Getty Images

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2020-02-01 13:42:00Z
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Kobe Bryant death: LeBron James didn't deliver a win in Lakers' return to court, but he gave us so much more - CBS Sports

LOS ANGELES -- LeBron James didn't lead the Los Angeles Lakers to a win Friday night in their first game since Kobe Bryant's death. And no matter. He did something bigger, and more lasting, and ultimately more important.

He offered all of us a path forward on a night that reminded us in beautiful and brutal detail not just what is lost but what we have to hold on to as we move forward.

"Now," LeBron said before the game, having wiped away tears, "I know at some point we will have a memorial for Kobe. But I look at this as a celebration tonight. This is a celebration of the 20 years of the blood, the sweat, the tears, the broken-down body, the getting up, the sitting down, the everything. The countless hours, the determination to be as great as he could be. Tonight, we celebrate the kid that came here at 18 years of age, retired at 38 and became probably the best dad we've seen over the past three years, man.

"Tonight is a celebration."

And it was. Something clicked in that arena, something that for the first time all week felt as close to right as we were going to get at this point. For me, personally, it struck me that the media seat I had was the same one I sat in for Kobe Bryant's last game as a Laker. And that, the last time I was at Staples Center, in November, I watched Kobe beam at his daughter, Gigi, and thought of my own daughter. 

Again and again, the night -- not the game, per se, but this gathering of those dealing with Kobe Bryant's death -- became about his absence and the ways big and small he shaped this city and this sport.

There was every single Lakers starter introduced, again and again, as Kobe Bryant. There was Lakers coach Frank Vogel sending a message about family by making sure every Laker played before the first half was up. There were the thousands of Lakers jerseys -- Nos. 8 and 24, of course -- draped on every seat in Staples Center, a gift to a fan base suffering. There was the 24- and 8-second shot clock violations to begin the game, and Usher's rendition of "Amazing Grace," and two empty seats for Gigi and Kobe with their jerseys draped where they should still have been sitting, and LeBron's speech, and so, so much more. 

One man cried in front of his son for the first time in his life. Others, later in the night, chanted Kobe's name over and over and helped fuel a late, if incomplete, Lakers fourth-quarter run. LeBron wiped away tears before the game began, then gave that pregame talk. Others turned to strangers and said, "This night, man, this is special."

LeBron honored Kobe with that impromptu moment.

"I decided for me personally I needed to let the words flow from my heart, and whatever comes out there's all truth to it," he said.

It was heart-wrenching, and it was beautiful.

"This week has been more about life than wins and losses," Vogel said afterward.

He's right, of course. There will be time enough ahead for wins, and there will be many of them. This Lakers season will be imbued with the meaning and the pressure of making it about Kobe Bryant. But there's time for that later. On this night, a Lakers loss did not, and should not, have mattered.

Yes, Kobe was a stone-cold winner, and a win would have been a marvelous way to remember him. But he was more than that, too. That point resonated when he made it himself in the pregame tribute video: We like to put athletes in boxes and say what they can and can't be. 

And the thing about Kobe that has resonated so deeply for so many goes beyond the basketball player that was lost. It's more about the basketball player who became so much more: The father, the competitor, the complicated human being who first won his legacy and then won over so many of his detractors, the consummate Angeleno, all of it.

That kind of multifaceted man -- and the added grief that his daughter died with him, and that other families lost loved ones in that helicopter crash Sunday -- required more than a mere win in a basketball game. To honor a great man, maybe, you have to honor as many parts of him as you possibly can.

That happened Friday night. 

It happened with LeBron's words. It happened with the tears that came pregame, from so many. It happened with Rob Pelinka, Lakers general manager and Kobe's close friend and former agent, watching the game with his own daughter, a nod to who Kobe was beyond the basketball player. It happened over and over again in so many ways that the final score wasn't what mattered at all. It happened with Portland guard Damian Lillard, also mourning the loss, dropping 48 points Mamba-style in Mamba's house. 

LeBron said it best before the game even began: "In the words of Kobe Bryant, 'Mamba out.' But in the words of us, 'Not forgotten.' Live on, brother."

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2020-02-01 13:45:00Z
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Kenin v Muguruza - Women's Final Trophy Ceremony | Australian Open 2020 - Australian Open TV

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2020-02-01 12:52:30Z
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Sofia Kenin vs. Garbiñe Muguruza - Match Highlights (F) | Australian Open 2020 - Australian Open TV

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2020-02-01 10:56:22Z
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LeBron James pays tribute to Kobe Bryant as Lakers return home: 'Live on, brother' - Fox News

A darkened Staples Center was pierced by shouts of “Kobe! Kobe!” on Friday night as cellist Ben Hong accompanied a self-narrated video tribute to Los Angeles Lakers legend Kobe Bryant with an instrumental “Hallelujah.”

Bryant’s own words then filled the arena.

"Once upon a time, there was a young basketball player who had dreams of becoming one of the greatest basketball players of all time," Bryant said at the beginning of a moving montage of his words, career and life that ended with Bryant telling fans, 'Mamba out!'"

KOBE BRYANT FANS GATHER OUTSIDE STAPLES CENTER BEFORE LAKERS' FIRST HOME GAME SINCE COPTER CRASH

The Lakers held a 24.2-second silence to honor Bryant, his 13-year-old daughter Gianna, known as "Gigi," and seven others who died when the helicopter he had chartered crashed into a Los Angeles County hillside Sunday. The length of the silence represneted Bryant’s Lakers uniform number, 24, and Gigi's youth basketball number, 2. Two courtside seats draped with their jerseys were left vacant as well.

Carmelo Anthony, a close friend of Bryant's with the visiting Portland Trail Blazers, sat out the game, reportedly still too emotional about the tragedy to participate.

Usher sang "Amazing Grace," Boyz II Men performed the national anthem and every Lakers starter was introduced as Kobe Bryant.

Wiz Khalifa and Charlie Puth also performed “See You Again” at halftime.

Outside the arena, legions of fans who didn’t have tickets to the game -- the Lakers' first since the tragedy -- watched the tribute on TV screens.

“I grew up with Kobe. I’m not a very emotional person but I’ve been crying all week,” Daniel Torres, who was wearing a Bryant jersey, said. “I can’t believe the outpouring and how many people loved him.”

But when Lakers star LeBron James stepped into the spotlight, the gravity of the moment came together.

Emotional and raw, James threw his prepared notes away.

“I’m going to go straight from the heart,” he said to cheers. “We’re all grieving, we’re all hurt, we’re all heartbroken.”

James said before he became a Laker he’d heard how Laker Nation was a "family."

“Everybody that’s here this is really truly, truly a family, and I know Kobe and Gianna and Vanessa and everybody thanks you guys from the bottom of their heart as Kobe said," James told the crowd. “Tonight we celebrate the kid that came here at 18 years of age, retired at 38 and become probably the best dad we’ve seen over the last three years, man.

“So, in the word of Kobe Bryant: ‘Mamba Out,’ but in the words of us: ‘Not forgotten.’ Live on, brother.”

During the game, both teams took violations – one for 24 seconds and one eight seconds – in honor of Bryant's numbers.

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The Lakers lost 127-119 to the Trail Blazers, but the greater loss hung over every moment.

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

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2020-02-01 09:41:38Z
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NBA Top 10 Plays of the Night | January 31, 2020 - NBA

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2020-02-01 08:00:13Z
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TRAIL BLAZERS at LAKERS | FULL GAME HIGHLIGHTS | January 31, 2020 - NBA

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2020-02-01 06:35:19Z
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