Sixth-seed American Coco Gauff and second-seed Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus will square off on Saturday afternoon with the U.S. Open trophy on the line after each won their respective semifinals on Thursday evening.
Gauff was up first and ousted 10th seed Karolina Muchova of the Czech Republic 6-4, 7-5, overcoming a stiff challenge from Muchova as well as fan interruptions during the match.
“It was a tough match,” said Gauff. “I had leads, lost it. It was a lot of emotional, I guess, challenges in the match. But I think I did a good job of staying focused.”
The 19-year-old came out of the gate firing and took advantage of uncanny unforced errors from Muchova, as Gauff raced out to a 5-0 lead. But Muchova responded strongly and erased all of those early breaks to get the set back on serve at 4-5.
But Gauff dug in to break serve and close out the opening set and take the early advantage. In the beginning of the second set, protesters disrupted the match for nearly 50 minutes as both players went back to the locker room during the delay.
Gauff would break for a 5-3 lead in the second set, but she could not serve out her milestone win just yet as Muchova broke back to extend the match temporarily and held to even things at 5-5. But Gauff, after holding for 6-5, pounced on the Muchova serve to set up more match points, ultimately closing out the victory after a Muchova backhand sailed long.
“She’s the type of player it’s so hard to get a rhythm,” said Gauff. “In the second set, she started to play more aggressive. I told myself, ‘Just trust yourself in the moment. You’ve got to trust yourself.’”
Gauff will now advance to her toughest test yet as she faces off against Sabalenka, who will be out to knock out her second straight American. Sabalenka came back to win a thriller against 17th seed Madison Keys 0-6, 7-6(1), 7-6(10-5) that finished up just before 1:00 a.m.
Aryna Sabalenka rips a backhand during her comeback win over American Madison Keys in the U.S. Open semifinals on Thursday night (Photo Credit: Simon Bruty/USTA)
Sabelenka was down 3-5 in the second set before turning the match on its head, rallying to win the second set in a tiebreaker, and then outlasting Keys in the deciding third-set 10-point tiebreaker.
“It was a really incredible match,” said Sabalenka. “[Keys] played unbelievable tennis. And I’m really proud of myself that I was able to turn around this game and get this win, because it was just incredible. I kept reminding myself that I lost a lot of tough matches. One day all those matches should help me somehow. This kind of thinking helped me to stay in the game and give me some hope that I’ll be able to turn around this match, that the match is not over until the last point, and that I just have to keep fighting, keep trying to find my rhythm, my game, just find myself. Magically, I finally found the game, and I was able to turn around this match and to get this win.”
Gauff is 3-2 all-time versus Sabalenka. Their last meeting came earlier this year at Indian Wells where Sabalenka won in straight sets.
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