Serena Williams won her first singles title since giving birth, defeating the unseeded American Jessica Pegula, 6-3, 6-4, to win the ASB Classic on Sunday in Auckland, New Zealand.

Though the implications for next week’s Australian Open are unclear, it was abundantly clear how much this long-awaited victory meant to the 38-year-old Williams.

After finishing off the match with a backhand winner down the line, she thrust both arms into the air, looked skyward and roared for several seconds.

“Finally,” she said to herself after shaking Pegula’s hand.

It had been almost three years since Williams’s last title, which came at the 2017 Australian Open when she was, unbeknown to the wider world, nearly two months pregnant with her daughter, Olympia.