Jessica Pegula barely broke a sweat. Sofia Kenin barely had a look.
In 56 brisk minutes on Arthur Ashe, the No. 3 seed dismantled the former Australian Open champion 6-3, 6-1, marching into the US Open third round for the seventh straight year and underlining why the No. 1 ranking is suddenly within reach.
If Pegula lifts her first Grand Slam trophy in New York and Elena Rybakina falls before the semifinals, the American will rise to World No. 1 for the first time. On this evidence, that scenario no longer feels remote. It feels live.
Pegula turns a rivalry on its head
Coming in, their head-to-head suggested a contest. Pegula led 4-2, but their first four matches, from 2016 to 2021, all went the distance. Kenin had been a long-term puzzle, the kind of opponent who drags you into the trenches and refuses to go away.
Not this time.
Pegula’s win was their most lopsided meeting by far, the third straight time she has beaten Kenin in straight sets and the first time she has held her to fewer than eight games.
“Every match we've played throughout the years has been very tough,” Pegula said on court. “Sonya's given me a lot of trouble in the past, she's a great player and a champion. I was just trying to stay focused on what I needed to do, and luckily was able to be pretty efficient out there today.”
Efficient is one word. Ruthless is another.
Pegula improved her season record to 47-12 and 5-2 against Kenin, but the numbers inside the match told the real story.
A serve that suddenly bites
Pegula has never been known as a pure power server. This week, she’s serving like one.
Against Elena-Gabriela Ruse in the first round, she gave up just seven points on serve. That looked like an outlier. It wasn’t.
She repeated the feat against Kenin: again only seven points lost behind her delivery, this time without facing a single break point. She fired five aces, pushing her tournament total to nine, and dictated service games with an assurance that used to belong to her opponents.
“I'm going for my spots,” she explained. “I'm going pretty big on second serves, I'm trying to mix up where I'm going and just trust that I can hit good serves in the moment. That's been a lot of work we've done off court, so really excited when I can practise something and it pays off in the match.”
The work is obvious. Pegula is not just landing first serves; she’s using them as a weapon, starting points on her terms, stepping in behind them. Kenin, one of the better returners of her generation, rarely got a clean swing.
And when Kenin did, Pegula met her with a different kind of pressure.
Return game with teeth
Kenin blinked first, double-faulting to hand over the opening break. That might have looked like a gift, but Pegula’s weight of shot and depth had already pushed her to the edge.
The pressure only increased.
Early in the second set, Pegula dug in on a long return game, grinding through four break points before finally cracking Kenin’s resistance for 2-0. That game felt decisive: Kenin’s shoulders dropped, Pegula’s foot pressed harder on the gas.
From there, the backhand return took over. Reading the serve, stepping into the court, she ripped her cleanest returns of the day to secure the double break for 4-0. Kenin, once the one dictating rallies in their rivalry, found herself reacting, stretching, reaching — always a step behind.
This wasn’t just a serving clinic. It was a complete, controlled dismantling.
From one runner-up to another
Now the draw offers Pegula a neat narrative twist: the 2024 runner-up against the 2021 runner-up.
Next up is No. 31 seed Leylah Fernandez, who quietly solved her own early-season riddle this week. The Canadian had not won a Grand Slam match in 2026 before arriving in New York, but she put that streak to bed with a 6-4, 6-1 win over Mananchaya Sawangkaew, booking a third trip to the US Open third round.
Pegula leads their head-to-head 3-1, all on North American outdoor hard courts. Their most recent meeting came in Miami this year, a one-sided 6-2, 6-2 win for the American. The history leans Pegula’s way, but she knows better than to trust comfort against Fernandez.
“I think she's tough to play,” Pegula said in press. “She plays a little bit unorthodox, likes to use her forehand and take the ball super early. When she's feeling it, it can be really tough to play against. I have had situations where I feel like I've played well against her and done well, but then sometimes if she's on and you start a little slow, she can really be super-aggressive and it's tricky to play against.
“It's hard. And then on top of that, being a lefty and returning her serve I think is always another hard part. There is definitely some stuff I'm going to have to work on and address probably tomorrow, and then hopefully I'm able to play well against her in the next round.”
That’s the next test: a lefty who takes the ball early, on a court where Fernandez has already lived big moments.
Pegula, though, arrives with something she has rarely owned so fully at a Slam — a serve humming, a game stripped of excess drama, and a clear path to something she has chased for years.
A first major. And with it, the No. 1 spot.
