NEW YORK — Jessica Pegula is back in the quarterfinals of a Grand Slam tournament, which used to be her roadblock.
The way Pegula is playing at this U.S. Open, it may be just another stop on the way back to the final.
Pegula rolled into the last eight by routing fellow American Ann Li 6-1, 6-2 in just 54 minutes on Sunday. The No. 4 seed hasn’t dropped a set this year at Flushing Meadows, and only once was she even kept on court for more than 1 hour, 15 minutes.
“Probably the best match, honestly, I’ve played since, like, before Wimbledon I feel like from the start to finish. So that was encouraging,” Pegula said. “I was just hitting the ball, doing everything well, executing my strategy very well and got through it pretty quick.”
Pegula had been 0-6 in Grand Slam quarterfinals before upsetting Iga Swiatek in that round last year. She went on to reach the final, where was defeated by Aryna Sabalenka. But she wasn’t sure her tennis was ready for a follow-up when she returned to New York.
She had lost four of her previous six singles matches coming into the U.S. Open, and said she played so poorly while practicing with Sabalenka a few days before the tournament that she stopped early, opting instead for an escape room with some friends and a couple of drinks.
Things have certainly gotten better since.
“Like I said, I haven’t been feeling my best on court, so to be able to come back and make another quarterfinal here is something I’m definitely proud of,” Pegula said. “Of course, I want to go further and do more and win the tournament, but I feel like just on a personal kind of goal level, I’m happy with the way I’ve been able to kind of turn some of my tennis around the last few weeks.”
Pegula will face either two-time Grand Slam champion Barbora Krejcikova or another American, Taylor Townsend, on Tuesday.
The 58th-ranked Li was the highest-ranked player Pegula has faced in the tournament, but the 25-year-old was overpowered in her first appearance in the round of 16 in a major. Pegula broke her all four times she served in the 25-minute first set, and she had just five winners against 19 unforced errors in the match.
In the men’s bracket on Sunday, Carlos Alcaraz wowed the crowd with a behind-the-back shot to win a point in a 7-6 (3), 6-3, 6-4 victory over Arthur Rinderknech on Sunday that made the Spaniard the youngest man in the Open era to reach 13 Grand Slam quarterfinals.
“Sometimes, I practice it. I’m not going to lie,” the No. 2-seeded Alcaraz said about the bit of wizardry he delivered in the first set. “But I mean, I don’t practice it, like, too many times. Just in practice, if the opportunity is there, I will try. In the match, it’s kind of the same. If I have the opportunity, why not?
“The people like it; I like playing tennis like this,” Alcaraz said. “My style of tennis fits pretty well to the energy here.”
At 22 years and 3 months old, Alcaraz is about 6 months younger than Boris Becker was when he got to major quarterfinal No. 13.
Alcaraz’s opponent on Tuesday will be No. 20 Jiri Lehecka, a 23-year-old from the Czech Republic. Lehecka advanced to his second Slam quarterfinal with a 7-6 (4), 6-4, 2-6, 6-2 win over Adrian Mannarino.
By the last game, even Rinderknech was smiling at other next-level strokes by Alcaraz, who has won 54 of 55 service games through four matches this year at Flushing Meadows. He claimed the title here in 2022 for the first of his five Grand Slam trophies.
Alcaraz is into his fourth major quarterfinal of 2025, the first time in his career he’s gone 4 for 4 in that category in a season. He lost to Novak Djokovic at that stage at the Australian Open in January, won the French Open in June and lost to No. 1 Jannik Sinner in the final at Wimbledon in July.
Rinderknech was appearing in the fourth round of a major for the first time.
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