Second seed Coco Gauff won her first French Open title on Saturday following a thrilling 6-7, 6-2, 6-4 victory over the top seed Aryna Sabalenka.
Sabalenka powered into their 11th meeting. The 27-year-old Belarusian broke the American's serve twice to sweep into a 4-1 lead after 18 minutes on centre court.
As the 15,000 spectators feared a rout, Sabalenka, boasting three points for a 5-1 lead, wandered.
She lost 11 points on the trot to allow the 21-year-old back to 4-3 and with three consecutive points to gain parity at 4-4
The world number one woke up to rescue the crisis but Gauff eventually got the break to justify her resilience and belief.
But Gauff failed to maintain her momentum. Sabalenka broke again to take the lead and served for the set at 5-4
In a 12-minute game of absorbing intensity, Sabalenka squandered two set points before Gauff converted her fifth break point to recover to 5-5.
Seize the initiative
Again, Gauff failed to push on. Sabalenka seized a second chance to serve for the set and failed again.
Fifty minutes after breezing along, Sabalenka was in a dogfight of a tiebreak. A Gauff backhand winner and two sloppy shots off the same wing from Sabalenka put Gauff in control but Sabalenka gritted her way back to life and won four consecutive points to take the shoot-out seven points to five.
In a comparatively tame second set, Gauff swiftly moved into a 4-1 lead on the back of less intensity and more unforced errors from Sabalenka, she served at 5-2 to level the match and she executed authoritatively without dropping a point.
Gauff got the first break of the decider to lead 3-1. As the tension mounted, Sabalenka twice produced imperious shots to stop Gauff going 4-1 up with her service to follow.
But that high seemed a distant memory when Sabalenka punched back to 3-3. After the flow, another ebb. She coughed up her own service.
Gauff edged to 5-3 and a couple of hours after appearing that she was in for a waltz of an afternoon, Sabalenka was serving to stay in the mach.
She completed that dance to force Gauff to serve for the title.
A first match point came with a forehand crosscourt winner and it went in a thunderous forehand service return.
Sabalenka got her chance to level at 5-5 off a second serve but the return was fractionally out.
After Sabalenka's backhand flew wide on the second match point, Gauff fell onto her back, held her head in her hands and wept.
"I'm very happy," said Gauff after the four-time French Open champion Justine Henin presented her with the Coupe Suzanne Lenglen.
"Aryna, you are a fantastic opponent," she added. "It was a hard match for me."
