“Sometimes I find myself speaking to them,” Pegula disclosed in her post-match press conference. “It can be difficult to hear over the crowd, so often I’m just uttering things they probably don’t catch, but at the same time, I’m also talking to myself.
“I felt a bit frustrated towards the end of the first set. My coach kind of mentioned, ‘Your demeanor hasn’t been great,’ and I got rather annoyed, thinking, ‘Well, what do you expect? I’ve actually been competing quite well this week.’ Then I started an internal monologue, like, ‘Are you seriously kidding me? I genuinely think it’s been fine.’ Obviously, my mood wasn’t fantastic once I dropped that first set. Yeah, it’s tough.
“I feel like, for me, as someone who doesn’t typically show a lot of emotion, there are moments where I really need to let it all out. He claims he did it somewhat on purpose. I’m not entirely convinced that’s true, but he explained he wanted me to get a little mad at him, almost to prevent me from over-analyzing all the other aspects of the match.”
Despite her quarterfinal match going the full distance, Pegula delivered her most commanding finish of the week, clinching the final six games consecutively against Shnaider. This victory secured her a spot in the semifinal against either Iva Jovic or Anna Kalinskaya.