“I beat the No. 1,” del Potro said. “If you don’t play unbelievable, you cannot beat him.”
Nadal, a six-time Grand Slam champion, won at Indian Wells two weeks ago, but his best finish at Key Biscayne was as the runner-up in 2005 and last year.
“I didn’t play well during this tournament,” Nadal said. “I didn’t adapt well. I played really bad.”
Azarenka closed out her victory on her fourth match point when Kuznetsova netted a backhand to end the 2-hour, 40-minute endurance test played in 30˚C sunshine.
“It’s the first final in such a big tournament for me,” Azarenka said. “It’s the biggest moment, I would say, in my career. It’s all kind of an experience for me. It’s a new thing that I’m going to be introduced to on how to handle.”
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