Sania Mirza and Elena Vesnina

California: India’s Sania Mirza and her Russian partner Elena Vesnina defeated Bethanie Mattek-Sands and Meghann Shaughnessy to clinch their first title in just their third WTA event as a team, lifting the BNP Paribas Open women’s double trophy. Sania and Vesnina beat the eighth seeds Mattek-Sands and Shaughnessy 6-0 7-5.

Mirza and Vesnina, who were quarterfinalists at Dubai and Doha in February, were unseeded here but they lost just 19 games in their first four matches, including a surprise 6-2 6-3 upset over seventh seeds Iveta Benesova and Barbora Zahlavova Strycova.

Sania and Vesnina took the first set Saturday in just 24 minutes before the Americans jumped to a quick 3-0 lead in the second.

Mattek-Sands and Shaughnessy broke for a second time to go 5-1 up, but the Indian-Russian duo roared back to reel off six games to take the title without dropping a set in the entire tournament.

“We weren’t even supposed to play here, because initially I wasn’t going to play Indian Wells. Now we’re planning to play the rest of the year,” Sania said.

“We tried playing together in Dubai and Doha and it worked fine. From our first match you could see it was already a team. It really works,” Vesnina added.

Sania and Vesnina have been among the top-30 in singles. “It improves certain areas of your game you don’t use in singles,” Sania said.

This was Sania’s 10th WTA doubles title, Vesnina picked up her fourth.

Mattek-Sands and Shaughnessy, who had upset third seeds Liezel Huber and Nadia Petrova en route to the final, were playing their fourth WTA doubles final as a team and now have a 1-3 record in those.

Tags: Bethanie Mattek-Sand, Elena Vesnina, Indian Wells, Meghann Shaughnessy, Sania Mirza, Tennis