Keys open to rare double but Sabalenka lies in wait
At 30, the American is young enough to build on that win, but not so young that she can take her time, and she wasted little in beating Olga Danilovic 6-4 6-2 to reach the Wimbledon third round on day three of the championships.
The 37th-ranked Danilovic battled hard, saving five break points in one game in Wednesday's second set, but Keys always looked in control.
After declaring the record-breaking opening day heat "quite toasty" the Florida resident said of the cooler conditions: "I definitely felt a little more comfortable today, it's the cloudy, rainy England we know and love so I felt a little more normal."
Keys is seeking to emulate her teenage inspiration, Serena Williams, in achieving the relatively rare AO-Wimbledon double.
Williams did this four times, but only three other players have won both events in the same calendar year since the Australian Open moved from grass to hard courts in 1988.
Of those only Amelie Mauresmo, in 2006, has done so in the 21st century.
Steffi Graf (1988 & 1989) and Martina Hingis (1997) are the others while most recently Ash Barty held both titles but won Wimbledon in 2021 and the Australian Open in 2022.
With three of the top five seeds eliminated on Tuesday Keys is a serious contender, though Aryna Sabalenka, the woman she defeated at Melbourne Park, lies on the horizon.
The pair are slated to meet in the quarter-finals after the No.1 seed beat Marie Bouzkova 7-6 (7-4) 6-4 on Centre Court.
Sabalenka looked at risk of a shock herself after her 48th-ranked French opponent broke her to serve for the first set at 6-5. But Sabalenka broke back, took the tiebreak, and was never threatened again.
Two more seeds were evicted, Paris Olympic silver medallist Donna Vekic and former US Open finalist Leylah Fernandez.
Vekic, seeded 22 and a semi-finalist here last year, went down 6-1 6-3 to Spain's Cristina Busca while Canadian 29th-seed Fernandez was beaten by German Laura Siegemund 6-2 6-3.
Elsewhere rising Brit Sonay Kartal beat Bulgarian Viktoriya Tomova 6-2 6-2,
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