Three U.S. Women Playing in Australian Open Semifinals

By ESPN

Thursday is Australia Day, the celebration marking the date British sovereignty arrived here in 1788.

At the Australian Open, it will be a star-spangled day for America, with three U.S. women playing in the semifinals.

No. 2-seeded Serena Williams will play unseeded (and unlikely) Mirjana Lucic-Baroni of Croatia, and No. 13 Venus Williams will meet unseeded Coco Vandeweghe.

Serena hasn't played Lucic-Baroni this century, but she won both of their matches in the late 1990s. More recently, Venus defeated Vandeweghe in their only meeting last year in Rome.

Serena booked her spot with a powerful and convincing 6-2, 6-3 win over No. 9 seed Johanna Konta of Great Britain. It was over in 75 minutes, and it secured the 10th consecutive major semifinal appearance for Serena, a remarkable achievement of high-level consistency.

With two more match wins in Melbourne, Serena will regain her No. 1 ranking.

Earlier, Lucic-Baroni surprised No. 5 seed Karolina Pliskova 6-4, 3-6, 6-4 more than 17 years after she reached her first Grand Slam semifinal, as a 17-year-old at Wimbledon in 1999. Lucic-Baroni is, however, troubled by an injured left thigh.

This is only the fourth time in Open-era history, dating back to 1968, that three semifinalists have been over 30 years old. Venus, 36, is trying to become the oldest woman to win a Grand Slam singles title. Serena, who is 35 and already holds that distinction, will try to beat the 34-year-old Lucic-Baroni.

At times, Serena struggled with her first serve; she landed only 45 percent of them in but managed to win 88 percent of those points when she did.

She finished with a flourish, though, delivering three unreturnable serves in the final game -- two of them aces -- and ultimately winning at love.

"I was just really happy to get through that," Serena said in her on-court interview. "The main focus is actually my serve. I missed a lot today and got frustrated. I thought, 'Stop complaining, don't be Babyrena.' Just have fun and really try to enjoy the moment,' and I did.

Rafael Nadal Reaches Semifinals

At the behest of new coach Carlos Moya, Rafael Nadal spent the bulk of his offseason drilling one forehand after another. Not so long ago, it was his surefire shot, the one that inflicted more pain on his opponents than any other on his way to 14 Grand Slam titles.

On Wednesday, it was Nadal's other wing that turned the tide in a tight opening set against third-seeded Milos Raonic. Up 4-3 and with a break point, No. 9 Nadal hit a beautifully timed backhand lob just out of the reach of his 6-foot-5 opponent to take the lead, eventually the set and ultimately the match 6-4, 7-6 (7), 6-4 to reach the Australian Open semifinals.

Perhaps unthinkable heading into this first major of the season, Nadal joined 30-something peers Roger Federer and Serena Williams and Venus Williams in the final four of the same major for the first time since 2008. Now 30, Nadal is the latest in festival of thriving veterans to make this year's final four, which, remarkably, is the first time since the 1968 French Open (the first major of the Open era) that a trifecta of 30-somethings are around at this stage of a Slam. The one misfit, at least by comparison, is 25-year-old Grigor Dimitrov, who earlier in the day knocked off No. 11 David Goffin 6-3, 6-2, 6-4 to reach his second career Grand Slam semifinal.