Have You Heard About Jessica Pegula?

At last year’s U.S. Open, a casual fan could be forgiven for thinking American tennis started and ended with Serena Williams, whose impending retirement was properly commemorated on what seemed like every LED screen or slab of polyethylene in Queens. They should have been familiar, too, with Coco Gauff, the teenage phenom out of South Florida. And by the end of the tournament, many had fallen for Frances Tiafoe, the affable and athletic Marylander who upset Rafael Nadal and reached the semifinals. But the highest-ranked American—then, and now; man or woman—was a less trumpeted talent: Jessica Pegula, who made her way to the quarterfinals in methodical fashion before falling, like most did at some point during the 2022 season, to eventual champion Iga Świątek.