Jessica Pegula noted she tried to serve a little smarter when facing match points but admitted that she may have just been lucky in saving two match points against Jelena Ostapenko. On Wednesday, second-seeded Pegula recovered from a 5-2 third-set deficit and saved two match points en route to collecting a 6-2 2-6 7-5 win over Ostapenko in the Doha round-of-16.
Down 5-4 in the third set and serving to stay in the match, Pegula saved two match points on her serve. “The beauty about tennis is there’s no time limit. There’s always a chance. I just tried to serve a little bit smarter, maybe got a little lucky.
I don’t know,” Pegula said after the match, per tennis.com. During her on-court interview, Pegula was asked if back home her mother was watching the match. “She might be, actually. She probably would have been having a heart attack watching,” Pegula jokingly said.
How Pegula defeated Ostapenko?
Pegula got off to a brilliant start to the match, earning back-to-back breaks to open a 4-0 lead. Up by a double break, Pegula routinely held on to her serve the rest of the set to win the opener.
After easily losing the first set, Ostapenko saved a break point in the first game of the second set before earning her first break of the match in the following game. In the eighth game – when Pegula was serving to stay in the second set – Ostapenko collected her second break to send the match into a decider.
After winning the second set, Ostapenko also started the third set with an early break and a 3-0 lead. Ostapenko held on to her serve until the ninth game, when she failed to serve out for the match. In the 10th game, Ostapenko missed out on two match points on Pegula’s serve.
Ostapenko paid the price for her missed chances as Pegula broke the Latvian in the 11th game to take a 6-5 lead. In the 12th game, Pegula routinely served out for the match.
