Madison Keys has powered her way into the Aegon Classic Birmingham final behind a strong serve that is more dangerous on grass. SAP Tennis Analytics for Coaches shows how playing on grass benefits the Keys service game.

In 14 clay court matches this season, Keys hit a total of 53 aces. This week in Birmingham, she’s already hit 33 aces in just four matches. That’s an average 8.2 per match compared to 3.9 per match for the season coming into this week.

Saturday’s semifinal win, which will propel Keys into the Top 10 for the first time in her career, was a good example of how Keys can use her serve to take control of a match.

Keys fell behind in her semifinal against Carla Suárez Navarro, losing the first set 3-6 while winning just 64% of her service points.

In the second set, the Keys serve was dominant. She won 91% of her service points, 20 of 22. The SAP Coaches View shows that Keys was particularly effective serving to the ad court, getting all 10 of her first serves in, and hitting all three of her aces in the set to that side.

Keys won that second set 6-3, then prevailed in the third set tie-break as she won 76% of her service points in the final set.

Grass courts have been better for the Keys serve historically. In the last two years, Keys has won 66% of her service points on the surface, compared to her overall average of just 61% in those two seasons.

The SAP Coaches View combines scoring information direct from the chair umpire with tracking data from HawkEye to allow for an in depth look at five different aspects of a match. Each tracking option can be filtered to narrow the focus to specific situations within a match, such as break points. This information is available directly to coaches in real-time during a match on their SAP tablet and also available to them online after matches.

“Service” tracking shows the landing point for all serves. The display differentiates between first serves, second serves and aces. Additional data on the screen shows the percentage of overall service points won as well as looking specifically at first and second serves.

These serving statistics will be continue to be key for Keys as she looks to ace her test in Sunday’s final against Barbora Strycova.