Former Georgia men’s tennis player Jan Zielinski has won the mixed doubles draw at the Australian Open, capturing his first Grand Slam title.
Zielinski and partner Su-Wei Hsieh defeated Desirae Krawczyk and Neal Skupski by a 6-7(5), 6-4, 11-9 score on Thursday evening. He joins Murphy Jensen and Travis Parrott as the third Bulldog to win a Grand Slam in program history. Jensen and Parrott won the 1993 French Open doubles title and the US Open doubles title in 2009, respectively.
“Very proud of Jan on his first Grand Slam Championship,” head coach Manuel Diaz said. “He is establishing himself as one of the very best doubles players in the world, also making the final of the men’s draw in Australia. He’s worked very hard and is a great guy to boot.”
Zielinski and Hsieh dropped the first-set breaker and faced a triple break point while down 2-4 in the second set. They rallied to force the 10-point tiebreaker third set by winning four consecutive games, taking the second set, 6-4. After taking a 7-4 lead in the breaker, Zielinski and Hsieh fell behind and faced championship point at 9-8. The pair tied the breaker at nine-all with a forehand winner and capped off the match by taking three straight points to win the mixed doubles draw.
A Warsaw, Poland native, Zielinski’s win also marks the first time a Polish-born player has won the Australian Open mixed doubles title. He has now won five ATP Tour titles, winning the Moselle Open for three consecutive years and The Internazionali BNL d’Italia in 2023.
During his time as a Bulldog, Zielinski, a two-time ITA All-American, helped lead Georgia to three regular-season SEC Championships in 2015, 2016 and 2017. The Bulldogs also earned the 2017 SEC Tournament Championship in his junior year. Zielinski holds the fifth-most combined singles and doubles victories in program history with 227 wins while in Athens. He peaked at No. 2 in both the ITA singles and doubles rankings.