Krajicek Wins Roland Garros, Earns Doubles World No. 1.

Austin Krajicek scaled a double peak in Paris.

Krajicek and partner Ivan Dodig won the Roland Garros doubles title today and on Monday the American will become the new world doubles No. 1.

Krajicek and Dodig defeated the all-Belgian team of Sander Gille and Joran Vliegen on Saturday, 6-3, 6-1, to give Krajicek his first major doubles title.

The 32-year-old Krajicek is the first American to win the Roland Garros men’s doubles title since Ryan Harrison in 2017 and it’s the sixth time in the last 30 years the French Open men’s doubles championship team has featured an American:

2023 – Austin Krajicek

2017 – Ryan Harrison

2013, 2003 – Bob and Mike Bryan

1994 – Jonathan Stark

1993 – Luke and Murphy Jensen

A Tampa native who lives in Dallas, and the 2011 NCAA doubles champion at Texas A&M, Krajicek is the 20th American to rank No. 1 individually in doubles since the inception of the ATP Doubles Rankings in 1976. All 20 Americans to rank No. 1 played collegiate tennis in the U.S.:

2023 – Austin Krajicek (Texas A&M)

2022 – Rajeev Ram (Illinois)

2003 – Bob and Mike Bryan (Stanford)

2002 – Donald Johnson (North Carolina)

2000 – Alex O’Brien (Stanford)

2000 – Jared Palmer (Stanford)

1994 – Jonathan Stark (Stanford)

1993 – Patrick Galbraith (UCLA)

1993 – Richey Reneberg (SMU)

1992 – Kelly Jones (Pepperdine)

1991 – David Pate (TCU)

1990 – Rick Leach (USC)

1989 – Jim Pugh (UCLA)

1989 – Jim Grabb (Stanford)

1985 – Ken Flach (SIU-Edwardsville)

1985 – Robert Seguso (SIU-Edwardsville)

1982 – Peter Fleming (UCLA/Michigan)

1981 – Stan Smith (USC)

1979 – John McEnroe (Stanford)

Clervie Ngounoue, a 16-year old who is the No. 1-ranked junior in the world, and Tyra Grant, 15, ranked No. 29 among juniors, became the eighth and ninth American girls to win the junior doubles title at the French Open, after defeating Alina Korneeva and Sarah Saito (JPN), 6-3, 6-2, on Saturday.

On Sunday, Taylor Townsend, 27, is competing in her second major doubles final (’22 US Open) since giving birth to her son, Adyn, in 2021. She and Canadian Leylah Fernandez will play Su-Wei Hsieh (TPE) and Xinyu Wang (CHN). A win would mark the first major doubles title for Townsend, who is projected to rise to No. 5 in the world doubles rankings, where she would join No. 3 Jessica Pegula and No. 4 Coco Gauff to give the U.S. three women in the Top 5 of the doubles rankings for the first time since the week of August 13, 2012.

Photo credit: Roland Garros Facebook