Background and career
Jessica Pegula (born February 24, 1994) is an American professional tennis player. She has a career-high rankings in singles of world No. 3, first achieved in October 2022, and in doubles of world No. 1, achieved in September 2023. Pegula has won 11 singles titles and seven doubles titles on the WTA Tour, including four WTA 1000 titles in singles and two in doubles. She was the runner-up at the 2024 US Open and at the 2023 WTA Finals. In doubles, she was runner-up at the 2022 French Open, partnering with Coco Gauff, and in the mixed doubles of the 2023 US Open, with Austin Krajicek. She is a four-time major singles semifinalist (thrice at the US Open, once at the Australian Open) and has reached eleven quarterfinals across all four major tournaments. Pegula also led the US team to victory in the inaugural 2023 United Cup and to the final of the 2025 Billie Jean King Cup.
Jessica Pegula was born on 24 February 1994 in Buffalo, New York, to Terry Pegula and Kim Pegula. Her father made his fortune in the oil and gas industry, and her parents later became owners of the Buffalo Sabres and Buffalo Bills. He is of Carpatho-Rusyn descent through his paternal grandparents, who emigrated from Hanigovce, in present-day Slovakia. Her mother was born in Seoul, South Korea, and was adopted by an American family at the age of five. In a 2016 interview, Kim Pegula reported that family DNA testing had indicated Russian and English ancestry on Terry's side and suggested Japanese ancestry on her own side, in addition to Korean ancestry. She has two siblings, Kelly and Matthew, and two half-siblings, Michael and Laura, from her father's first marriage. Pegula began playing tennis at around the age of seven, inspired by her older sister Laura, who played collegiate tennis at the University of Pittsburgh. She initially took lessons as an after-school activity before attracting the attention of coach Billy Stearns, who recognized her potential. Her family subsequently moved to Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, where she trained under Stearns at the Smith Stearns Tennis Academy for approximately five years. She later moved to Florida to continue her tennis development.
On August 30, 2011, Pegula was granted a wildcard into the main draw of the US Open doubles tournament, where she was paired with Taylor Townsend. They eventually lost in the third round to the third-seeded team of Vania King and Yaroslava Shvedova. In March 2012, Pegula was handed a wildcard to the qualifying draw in Indian Wells and surprised higher ranked players Bojana Jovanovski and Paula Ormaechea to qualify for the main draw where she lost to Magdaléna Rybáriková in three sets.
Pegula made her major singles debut at the US Open as a qualifier. She defeated Shuko Aoyama, Margarita Gasparyan, and Melanie Oudin to reach the main draw, where she beat Alison Van Uytvanck in the first round. In the second, Pegula was defeated by Dominika Cibulková in three sets.
In 2018, Pegula reached her first WTA Tour singles final at the Tournoi de Québec in September as a qualifier. She beat Kristýna Plíšková, Ons Jabeur, second seed Petra Martić and fifth seed Sofia Kenin en route to the final, where she lost to eighth seed Pauline Parmentier in straight sets. This brought her ranking back inside the top 200 and helped her finish the year inside the top 125.
Pegula began the year playing primarily on the ITF Circuit, before cracking inside the top 100 in February for the first time in her career. This allowed her to enter several larger WTA Tour events, including in Indian Wells and Miami. Her best result during the early clay court season came in Charleston, where she upset world No. 12, Anastasija Sevastova, en route to the third round. This helped her break inside the top 75 for the first time. She also competed in the main draw of a Grand Slam tournament other than the US Open for the first time. She was defeated in the first round of the French Open by eventual champion Ashleigh Barty, before falling in the same stage at Wimbledon to Mihaela Buzărnescu. Pegula achieved the best result of her career at the start of the North American hardcourt season when she won her first career singles title at the Washington Open, defeating Camila Giorgi in the final. This took her to a new career-high ranking of world No. 55. Despite failing to win another main-draw match the rest of the season, Pegula finished the year ranked inside the top 100 for the first time, at No. 76.
