US Open 2024: Jessica Pegula beats Diana Shnaider to reach seventh Grand Slam quarterfinal

Jessica Pegula secured a spot in the quarterfinals at the US Open 2024 after a 6-4, 6-2 victory over Diana Shnaider on Monday, her seventh trip to that round at a Grand Slam tournament. Now comes the hard part: Pegula is 0-6 in major quarterfinals over her career.

The No. 6-seeded Pegula, an American whose parents own the NFL’s Buffalo Bills and NHL’s Buffalo Sabres, is on quite a run now, having won 13 of her past 14 matches, all on hard courts. That included her second consecutive title in Canada and an appearance in the final at the Cincinnati Open, where she lost to No. 2 Aryna Sabalenka.

“I feel like there’s been more pressure this year because I did so well coming into this tournament. I want to keep working my way and hopefully bring my best tennis for the later rounds this time,” the 30-year-old Pegula said.

Gauff was seeded No. 3 this year and was eliminated Sunday by No. 13 Emma Navarro.

Pegula made it to the quarterfinals at Flushing Meadows two years ago, before losing to No. 1 Iga Swiatek, who went on to win one of her five major championships. Ironically, Pegula next faces the No. 1 seed Swiatek in the quarters.

ALSO READ | US Open 2024: Clinical Iga Swiatek beats Liudmila Samsonova to cruise into quarterfinal

Three of Pegula’s six quarterfinal exits at Slams came against a No. 1 player — Swiatek twice and Ash Barty once.

“I’ll just try to draw from those experiences and kind of how I felt going into the next match, but it’s just so tough,” Pegula said.

“I mean, I know you don’t want the cliche answer, but it’s just kind of one match at a time, and every day kind of feels different. It depends on who you are playing, how the conditions are, when you’re playing. There are so many variables day to day,” she said.

Everything went her way against the 18th-seeded Shnaider, a 20-year-old Russian who played one season of college tennis at NC State and won a silver medal in women’s doubles at the Paris Olympics.

Pegula compiled 22 winners, hit six aces, saved 7 of 9 break points that she faced and claimed five of Shnaider’s service games.

“My movement has really improved, which has really helped me stay into a lot of these points and these sets and these games and be super consistent,” Pegula said. “I’ve been serving pretty well. Even if it’s not working, I’ve been kind of getting myself out of service games by serving smart or serving well in big moments like today where she was returning well.”