Williams, who will reclaim the top ranking on Monday, has not played for the USA in the Fed Cup since 2007.
"It's always tough against her, " said Sharapova, who will reclaim the top ranking if she can win her 50th career WTA final.
Federer let the match slip with a double-fault and four unforced errors, but played down his disappointment at missing out on the top ranking.
Federer's victory means he is only the second player in the men's game to have held the top ranking over the age of 30, alongside Andre Agassi.
The four women to ascend to No. 1 for the first time in their careers between Sharapova and Azarenka have made the top ranking look like an honor no one should seek.
WSJ: Victoria Azarenka: One Is a Lonely Number in Women's Tennis
Azarenka, who broke down in tears and sobbed into her towel when the match ended, won five of the next six games to claim her second major title and retain the top ranking.
It also opens up the possibility that, should Rafael Nadal win the title, the Swiss will lose the top ranking just a week before equalling Pete Sampras's record of 286 weeks in the number one position.
The Swiss is only the second player in the men's game to have held the top ranking over the age of 30, alongside Andre Agassi, who was one of the many leading players to attend Bollettieri's academy in Florida.
Caroline Wozniacki held on to the top ranking for more than a year, but she's now No. 9 and searching for answers with a new coach, former Australian Open champion Thomas Johansson, who was hired in the past few weeks.
The selection committee had its work cut out after five teams swapped the top ranking in The Associated Press poll, capped by West Coast Conference champion Gonzaga (30-2) moving to the lead spot for the first time in school history.
South Africa have the opportunity to claim the top Test ranking from the Australians as well when the series against them begins in Johannesburg on 26 February.
Last year, several of his funds were among the top-ranking ones in the region.
Esther Peterson, the top-ranking woman in the Kennedy administration, asked an auditorium full of working-class high school girls in Los Angeles how many expected to have a "home and kids and a family, " and the room was full of waving hands.
These constitute the top-ranking ulama, deemed to have the authority to issue opinions on matters facing Islam and Muslims.
Baltacha, 23, has suffered a series of injury and illness problems since losing the top British ranking three years ago.
The top-ranking U.S. military officer said Monday that North Korea's reported nuclear test is a primarily a diplomatic matter right now, not a military one.
The growing popularity of converged mobile devices, or smartphones, with consumers and businesspersons is evidenced by the appearance of a second smartphone-only vendor in the top 5 ranking.
Many people in China are eagerly awaiting the day when the first truly global Chinese brand enters the top-10 ranking of the world's most valuable brands.
The main local winner of all the group buying websites is Peixe Urbano, which employs 750 people and is the gold medal winner of the ranking Top 10 Startups in Brazil.
Looking at longer-term performance, 19.1 percent of large-cap funds with a top-quartile ranking over the five years ending March 2011 maintained a top-quartile ranking over the previous five years.
The institutions that top our ranking of the Safest Banks are those that have shown their strength in times of turbulence.
Washington DC creeps in near the top of the list, ranking eighth in the entire country with 12.16 records per user, and Maryland falls somewhere in the middle of the country with 11.86 records per user.
At their presentation in Phoenix, summarizing research for a paper to be finished soon, they compared the world ranking of the top 200 players to a ranking of those same players' skill levels calculated using a statistical model they also devised, which simultaneously takes into account players' adjusted tournament scores and the difficulty of the courses.
The top-10 ranking alone reveals three powerhouse black women, whose success plants the seed of possibility for generations of women to follow: Michelle Obama (No. 1), Oprah Winfrey (No. 3) and Beyonce Knowles (No. 9).
Ryan became the third-youngest player to win an ATP Tour match at 15 and Bollettieri believes he has the talent to make it to the top from his current ranking in the mid 200s.
It is also one of the sunniest cities in the United States, ranking in the top 10 for clear days.
In the recent Financial Times ranking of the top 100 full-time MBA schools, the Northeast had 13 schools, as did the South.
In Oregon, the dubious top hunger ranking has led to a flurry of do-gooding.
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