MELBOURNE, Australia – Jessica Pegula’s first win over a top 10 opponent earned the 26-year-old American her first trip to the quarterfinals of a Grand Slam tournament.
The 61st Pegula, whose parents own Buffalo’s NFL and NHL franchises, defeated No. 5-selected Elina Svitolina from Ukraine beaten.
Pegula is making a breakthrough. She has won four matches at Melbourne Park in the past week – including victories over two-time Australian Open champion Victoria Azarenka and 2011 US Open champion Sam Stosur – after entering the hard court tournament with a total of three victories on majors for her career.
Also important for Pegula, who works with Venus Williams’ former coach, David Witt: she entered the day with a 0-6 record against top 10 women.
With the sky blue and the temperature in the low 70s Fahrenheit (low 20s Celsius), and no fans in the stands for the third consecutive day due to a local COVID-19 exclusion, Pegula dictated foundation exchanges right next to the base.
In the early stages, she pushed two-time Grand Slam semifinalist Svitolina, who eliminated American teenager Coco Gauff in the second round, and went 1-0 in the second round with a set and a halftime break.
Until then, Pegula had not been broken.
But this is where Svitolina, with everything slipping away, made a point. She suddenly broke Pegula twice in a row, part of a four-game tie that put Svitolina ahead 4-1 in second place to force a third set.
As if snapping a switch, or remembering what worked so well in the past, Pegula returned to her more aggressive brand of hit play and took a 4-1 lead. She did break to 4-3, but broke right back and then scored the most important victory of her career by grabbing the last four points after falling behind the love-30.
Pegula plays the winner of the match that followed in Rod Laver Arena: no. 22 Jennifer Brady of the United States against no. 28 Donna Vekic from Croatia.
The last two games for the fourth round for women were Ash Barty against American Shelby Rogers, number 1 and Elise Mertens against Karolina Muchova.