Unseeded Garbine Muguruza beat No. 4 seed Simona Halep in straight sets on Thursday to reach the Australian Open final for the first time.
Muguruza's 7-6 (8), 7-5 victory sends her to the title match against 14th-seeded Sofia Kenin of the United States. Kenin beat No. 1 Ash Barty 7-6 (6), 7-5.
Muguruza fended off four set points in the opener of her semifinal and wound up defeating Halep in a matchup of players who have won Wimbledon and the French Open but not the Australian Open.
It was a streaky contest: Muguruza led 5-3 in the first set before Halep took 15 of 17 points to earn a pair of set points. Muguruza then took seven consecutive points. And so on, until Halep put a shot in the net to relinquish that set, then smashed her racket and sat on the sideline, shaking her head.
"I wasn't thinking I was down," Muguruza said. "You keep going."
Muguruza is a former No. 1 and a two-time major champion, winning the French Open in 2016 and Wimbledon in 2017. But she came to Melbourne Park as an unseeded player at a Grand Slam tournament for the first time in six years.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.