NEW YORK (AP) — Jessica Pegula shook off a slow start and came back from a set and a break down at the US Open She defeated Karolina Muchova 1:6, 6:4 and 6:2 on Thursday evening to secure her first place in the Grand Slam final.
The number 6 seed Pegulaa 30-year-old from New York, has won 15 of her last 16 matches and will face No. 2 Aryna Sabalenka for the title on Saturday.
Sabalenka, second last year Coco Gauff in Flushing Meadows, returned to the championship game by fending off a late attack and defeating No. 13 Emma Navarro the USA 6-3, 7-6 (2).
Things didn’t look promising for Pegula at first: Muchova, the runner-up of the 2023 French Open, but after the will be absent for around 10 months due to wrist surgerymade the most of their versatility and creativity, the qualities that make them so difficult to handle on any surface.
The slices. The touch at the net. The serve-and-volley. Ten of the first twelve winners of the match came from her racket. The first set lasted 28 minutes and Muchova won 30 of the 44 points.
“I was completely exhausted, but she played unbelievably. She made me look like a novice,” Pegula said. “I was about to burst into tears because it was so embarrassing. She destroyed me.”
Muchova won eight of the first nine games and was just one point away from a 3-0 lead in the second set. But she failed to capitalize on a break chance and botched a forehand volley, and everything changed.
“I thought, ‘Okay. That was kind of lucky. You’re still in it,'” Pegula said. “It’s really little moments that turn the momentum around.”
Muchova, seeded 52nd, quickly went from missing a single shot to hitting a single shot. And Pegula upped the ante, demonstrating the confident brand of tennis that she used to eliminate No. 1 Iga Swiatek, a five-time major winner, in straight sets on Wednesday. Before this breakthrough, Pegula had lost 6-0 in the quarterfinals of majors.
It took a while for Pegula to play so well on Thursday, but once she got going, she was really good, winning nine of 11 games in total, a period that allowed her to not only turn the second set around, but also take a 3-0 lead in the third.
Muchova, a 28-year-old Czech who had not dropped a set in the tournament up to that point, began to falter. After scoring 7 of 7 points at the net in the first set, she made 11 of 19 in the second. After only seven unforced errors in the first set, she made 19 in the second.
And all the while, the crowd in Arthur Ashe Stadium, which had been rather indifferent at the beginning – except for the occasional shout of “Come on, Jess!” – was going wild.
When things suddenly got quite close in the second set of the first semifinal and the crowd suddenly became quite loud cheering for Navarro, Sabalenka had to think back to 2023, when she was interrupted by a violent crowd in Ashe while supporting Gauff.
“Last year was a very hard experience. A very hard lesson. Today in the match I thought: ‘No, no, no, Aryna. This will not happen again. You have to control your emotions. You have to focus on yourself,'” said Sabalenka, the winner of the last two Australian Open. “There were people supporting me; I tried to focus on them. I thought, ‘Come on. There are so many people supporting you. There’s your team in the box. There’s your family. Just focus on yourself and try – not just try, just fight for it.'”
Sabalenka, a 26-year-old from Belarus, joked after her last game that she would try to get fans on her side by buying alcohol, saying: “ Drinks on me tonight? ”
Navarro remained undeterred in the second set despite trailing for a long time and, as the noise around her grew louder, she broke Sabalenka when she tried to serve for the win at 5-4.
“I wasn’t ready to finish the game,” Navarro said.
But in the ensuing tiebreak, Sabalenka took the lead after Navarro had led 2-0 and secured every remaining point.
“At the end of the second set, I really pushed myself,” said Navarro, who beat Gauff in the fourth round, “and I felt like I could definitely make it to the third round. But I didn’t manage that.”
While Sabalenka is as demonstrative as possible, often raising her fist in the air and shouting for an important point or rolling her eyes after a missed shot, Navarro is far more reserved and rarely, if ever, shows any trace of emotion, neither positive nor negative.
Even when she broke to level at 5-5, Navarro couldn’t tell what had happened – the noise from the seats was a clue. But soon, thousands of ticket holders were congratulating Sabalenka on her latest hard-court feat; she is now in her fourth consecutive final at a Major played on that surface.
“Well, guys, now you’re cheering me on,” laughs Sabalenka. “Well, it’s a bit late.”
She managed 34 winners and 34 unforced errors – landing most of her groundstrokes with a shout – and, in fitting symmetry, Navarro had 13 winners and 13 unforced errors.
Sabalenka has shown that she is not simply a power player who swings from a standing position, even though that is the foundation of her game.
She delivered a perfectly timed return winner that helped her break early for a 4-2 lead. Later in the set, she offered two incredibly fine drop shots to win points. When Navarro failed to get a return in play after a 100-mile serve, Sabalenka was halfway to victory.
“That’s really important – to have all the skills and all the variations in the game,” Sabalenka said, “especially in the crucial moments when the opponents are used to a certain style of tennis from me.”
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