Jessica Pegula could do no right at the outset of her first Grand Slam semifinal. Her opponent at the US Open on Thursday night, Karolina Muchova, could do no wrong.
“I came out flat, but she was playing unbelievable,” Pegula said. “She made me look like a beginner. I was about to burst into tears because it was embarrassing. She was destroying me.”
Pegula managed to shrug off the sluggish start and come back from a set and a break down to defeat Muchova 1-6, 6-4, 6-2 for a berth in the final at Flushing Meadows. The No. 6-seeded Pegula, a 30-year-old from New York, has won 15 of her past 16 matches and will meet No. 2 Aryna Sabalenka for the title Saturday.
It will be a rematch of last month’s final at the hard-court Cincinnati Open, which Sabalenka won — the only blemish on Pegula’s post-Olympics record.
“Hopefully,” Pegula said, “I can get some revenge out here.”
Pegula’s parents own the NFL’s Buffalo Bills and NHL’s Buffalo Sabres; her father was in the Arthur Ashe Stadium stands Thursday, as were her sister, brother and husband.
Things did not look promising for Pegula early on the cool evening.
Muchova, the 2023 French Open runner-up but unseeded after sitting out about 10 months because of wrist surgery, employed every ounce of her versatility and creativity, the traits that make her so hard to deal with on any surface.
The slices. The touch at the net. The serve-and-volleying. Ten of the match’s first 12 winners came off her racket. The first set lasted 28 minutes, and Muchova won 30 of the 44 points.
Muchova grabbed eight of the first nine games and was one point from leading 3-0 in the second set. But she couldn’t convert a break chance, flubbing a forehand volley, and everything changed.
“I was thinking, ‘All right. That was kind of lucky. You’re still in this,'” Pegula said. “It comes down to really small moments that flip momentum.”
Quickly, the 52nd-ranked Muchova went from not being able to miss a shot to not being able to make one. And Pegula turned it on, heeding her two coaches’ advice to mix up her serves and her spins, and to go after Muchova’s backhand.
“She was…
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