{"id":339267,"date":"2026-09-06T10:02:16","date_gmt":"2026-09-06T10:02:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/339267\/"},"modified":"2026-09-06T10:02:16","modified_gmt":"2026-09-06T10:02:16","slug":"iva-jovic-and-alex-eala-two-rising-stars-of-womens-tennis-light-up-u-s-open-primetime","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/339267\/","title":{"rendered":"Iva Jovi\u0107 and Alex Eala, two rising stars of women\u2019s tennis, light up U.S. Open primetime"},"content":{"rendered":"

NEW YORK \u2014 Days after celebrating her high school graduation on the grounds of the U.S. Open<\/a> with her cap in hand, Iva Jovi\u0107<\/a> passed another milestone at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center. She won her first match on Arthur Ashe Stadium in a primetime showcase of two rising stars in women\u2019s tennis, beating her good friend, Alex Eala<\/a>, 7-5, 3-6, 7-5.<\/p>\n

The win sends her into the fourth round of her home Grand Slam for the first time, where she will face an opponent who is plenty familiar with the biggest stage in tennis: Coco Gauff<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This year, New York has tested Jovi\u0107, an 18-year-old Californian born to a Serbian father and Croatian mother. A rain delay Tuesday made her wait until Wednesday afternoon to finish her first-round match, by which time several players had already made it to the third round.<\/p>\n

Her eating schedule was off. Her energy was zapped. Her sleep routine was in disarray. Her week was shaping up to be a classic U.S. Open experience.<\/p>\n

Jovi\u0107 is still learning how to embrace the quirks of tennis life. This January, she became the youngest woman to reach the quarterfinals of the Australian Open since Venus Williams. She has been steadily gaining experience at the Grand Slams ever since: Jovi\u0107 made the third round at the French Open and the fourth round at Wimbledon.<\/p>\n

But the U.S. Open is different for Americans. At least, it usually is.<\/p>\n

Jovi\u0107 was feeling the pressure and excitement of playing at home, but Saturday\u2019s crowd, to no one\u2019s surprise, roared for Eala.<\/p>\n

What tennis star Alex Eala means to Filipino U.S. Open fans<\/p>\n

Ava Wallace and Johnny Sweet<\/p>\n

The 21-year-old from the Philippines draws massive crowds wherever she plays. It\u2019s part of the reason the U.S. Tennis Association put her and Jovi\u0107 on the gigantic Arthur Ashe Stadium, in the showpiece Saturday night time slot.<\/p>\n

Eala launched herself into a stratosphere beyond tennis this summer, when she beat six-time Grand Slam champion Iga \u015awi\u0105tek at Wimbledon. Since then, Eala has made more history by capturing her first career title at the 500-level D.C. Open last month. That win made her the first player from the Philippines to win a title on the WTA Tour.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s indescribable to sum up the support and how it makes me feel in just a few words,\u201d Eala said, tearing up in a news conference after Saturday\u2019s match. \u201cIt\u2019s a real privilege to experience this in a lifetime.\u201d<\/p>\n

The crowd packed into the almost 24,000-seat stadium, making what was already a highly anticipated matchup thrum with electricity.<\/p>\n

Jovi\u0107 welcomes the noise.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t care if they\u2019re cheering for me, against me, I don\u2019t care who they\u2019re cheering for. There\u2019s so many people there, it\u2019s the biggest stadium in tennis, so I\u2019m just really grateful to have been a part of it,\u201d Jovi\u0107 said.<\/p>\n

\"Alex<\/p>\n

\n Alex Eala and Iva Jovi\u0107 played on the biggest court at the U.S. Open, Arthur Ashe Stadium. (Julian Finney \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

Both players, for now at least, speak often about a new way of doing things on the WTA Tour. They\u2019ve been buddies for about four years; they don\u2019t follow the old belief that winners don\u2019t have friends in the locker room. Life as a professional tennis player is far too isolating for that.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s really good, because it\u2019s very lonely and we are traveling basically all the time, so our concept of friendships and family and everything is a little bit warped,\u201d Jovi\u0107 told reporters after her second-round win over Francesca Jones, yet another young player who\u2019s good friends with Eala.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou need to have the people you can lean on through the tour, and not everyone\u2019s open for that \u2014 personal choices \u2014 but it\u2019s obviously very difficult to be friends and also compete.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut there\u2019s quite a few, especially the younger players, who are very open to that and want to have a good time, want to build friendships,\u201d Jovi\u0107 added. \u201cThen, on the court, it\u2019s fair game.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jovi\u0107 has no problem flipping that switch in her brain. She\u2019d beaten Eala twice before Saturday night, once on grass and once on clay.<\/p>\n

\"Iva<\/p>\n

\n Iva Jovi\u0107 staved off a surging comeback from Alex Eala to win their third-round U.S. Open match in three sets. (Julian Finney \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

Eala\u2019s game is crafty, with plenty of spin, and she has a knack for finding tricky angles. But she also wins by applying pressure on her opponents and taking their time away on court. She reads the court well, anticipates and takes the ball early.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s difficult to do against someone as fast as Jovi\u0107, and who hits a ball as heavy. It also helps that Jovi\u0107 is the rare player who is as fearless as Eala.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s what the tennis world saw Saturday night \u2014 two players going all out to outfox each other on the ground. Neither Jovi\u0107 nor Eala has a sturdy serve, as is common among players their age, so quick points were few and far between. The match was instead a battle of strategy and focus, and a test of which player could execute her shots best under pressure, amid the excited buzz of a crowd waiting for reasons to explode.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt took losing my earrings, falling literally flat-out on the floor, cuts on my knees, mental breakdowns. It took literally everything,\u201d Jovi\u0107 said.<\/p>\n

After two seesawing sets, Jovi\u0107 lasered a backhand return down the line into the corner behind Eala, working her way back from a 4-2 deficit in the third set to 4-4.<\/p>\n

\"Alex<\/p>\n

\n Alex Eala and Iva Jovi\u0107\u2019s counterpunching styles produced a phenomenal match. (USTA via Getty Images)<\/p>\n

Jovi\u0107 had match point on Eala\u2019s serve at 4-5, 30-40, but Eala curled a serve just on the service line and Jovi\u0107 overcooked her backhand, sending it long. On the next point, Eala drilled the ball into Jovi\u0107\u2019s forehand before wrong-footing her with a change of direction, then hit a 112 mph serve \u2014 a lightning strike compared to Eala\u2019s usual serve \u2014 and Jovi\u0107\u2019s return sailed out.<\/p>\n

But then Jovi\u0107 won a quick service game, a rarity in a match with more breaks than holds. That pushed the set to 6-5, forcing Eala to serve to send the match to a 10-point tiebreak.<\/p>\n

Jovi\u0107 did just enough to get herself a match point, and Eala set it up beautifully, pulling Jovi\u0107 into the corner before stepping in to smash a winner. But she sent a forehand smack into the net instead, and Jovi\u0107 fell to the ground in celebration.<\/p>\n

When she rose, her friend was there, having crossed to her side of the net to give her a hug.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NEW YORK \u2014 Days after celebrating her high school graduation on the grounds of the U.S. Open with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":339268,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[17,9,11,10,15547],"class_list":["post-339267","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-culture","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339267","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=339267"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339267\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/339268"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=339267"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=339267"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=339267"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}