AUSTRALIAN OPEN

January 19, 2026

Jessica Pegula

Press Conference

J. PEGULA/A. Zakharova

6-2, 6-1

THE MODERATOR: Dominant performance out there today. Just talk us through how it felt out there and what you were most pleased with.

JESSICA PEGULA: I thought I played really solid today. Served really well. You know, kind of did exactly what I wanted to do. I felt like my game plan worked really well, and what I thought was going to happen, kind of happened.

It's always nice when you are kind of right about the strategy and you are able to execute what you need to. It makes your life a lot easier, so I'm happy with today.

THE MODERATOR: Questions.

Q. One of the unique aspects of tennis is that you share a locker room with your rivals and competitors. I know it's something that's normal to you, but is that ever awkward or strange, whether it's before or after a match with the person you're playing and you come in and see someone in tears in the locker room?

JESSICA PEGULA: It definitely can be tense. Not in a bad way, but just, you know, you come off the court. Maybe you just played someone. There's a lot of emotions. You're upset; they're upset. Or you just see another girl come off a crazy match, and she's really upset.

It is a weird dynamic. I think that's special a little bit to tennis that you could be changing and getting ready right next to the person that you're playing or that you lost to or that you beat.

Yeah, I think we all have a good awareness. We just don't like to get in each other's way too much if that's the case, but it can be a little tense and a little awkward at times.

Q. Do you think you ever find yourself just avoiding eye contact?

JESSICA PEGULA: Yeah, I don't know. I just try to stay in my lane. It depends. If you know the person really well and you can't avoid each other, you're probably on the same schedule, and you're maybe right next to them, you know, you can small talk and stuff like that.

I think it just kind of depends on who it is and what your relationship with them is, but you know, I never try to go out of my way too much to, I don't know, make it a huge deal.

I think sometimes when you have your match, you just like to stay in your lane a little bit and, yeah, keep to yourself.

Q. Can I ask you how difficult yesterday was?

JESSICA PEGULA: Yeah, yesterday sucked, not going to lie. I was not happy. Not a happy camper.

Tough game. Tough loss. How we lost was also -- you know, it just was like a stab in the heart kind of situation. It just wasn't fun, yeah.

Q. Seriously, though, do you have to be careful about letting that affect this in any away? I don't know whether you were hitting after the game.

JESSICA PEGULA: I was actually practicing during from 11:00 to 12:00, so actually I practiced with an earbud in and had the stream on my phone so I could just at least hear what was going on, because it was pretty much to the end right before we went into the overtime. Then the game pretty much ended. It was an important part of the game.

I don't know why my coach booked practice that time. That was his fault, but it was the only time we could get a court.

Yeah, I mean, it doesn't affect me when I'm out there on court, but you do get, like, a little fired up, because you're, like, upset about the loss, maybe some of the calls, how we played. Then you see the Broncos' quarterback is out for the rest of the season for sure getting surgery, and you are, like, oh, my gosh, that could have been us.

There's a lot of emotions I think that run hot, especially with my family when we're texting and calling each other and stuff like that.

When it comes match day, you kind of forget about all that. I have other things to kind of focus on.

Q. A question about the memory of the day's player, because Sascha Zverev said he remembered playing against the guy who won the 1 Point Slam at 14 years old. You played thousand and thousand of matches. Are you the kind of player that remember every single match you played or sometimes you erase some of them?

JESSICA PEGULA: I definitely don't remember a lot of them. There are people like that that remember, like, exactly what happened.

Half the time I'm, like, oh, I didn't even know I played them. So I think I kind of tend to let things go pretty quickly. There are some more memorable stuff, but I definitely I think have to be reminded, yeah.

Q. You're scheduled to play Kessler McCartney next. Your thoughts on playing her in the second round?

JESSICA PEGULA: Really tough second round. Not really quite sure how she's not seeded, but I think she just missed that.

A really tough second round, playing against an American, playing against a girl I'm playing doubles with here. So there's just a lot of dynamics.

She's a great girl. I know her team really well, her husband and her brother. My coach actually used to coach her brother at the University of Florida. So there's a little bit of a connection there.

It's kind of a shame that we have to play each other second round, but she's a really good player. Unbelievable competitor. Hits a pretty big ball and is really dangerous, so I'm going to have to do my best to kind of use my experience and try and come up with a game plan.

We played a tight two sets in the Austin final last year, but it was super windy conditions, and it was kind of one of those, like, ugly matches that I felt I won, but it was kind of -- the weather was causing a lot of issues. We haven't really played in a true conditions kind of straight-up.

Yeah, it will be interesting to see how that goes.

Q. You mentioned that you are playing doubles with her. You had sort of, like, taken a little downtime from doubles in the last year or so, right?

JESSICA PEGULA: Yeah, I haven't really played.

Q. Is that something you plan on doing more of this year and why?

JESSICA PEGULA: I think so, a little bit more. I don't know. I kind of miss playing. I like being in that competitive mindset.

I'm not going to play as much as I did when Coco and I were playing every single week singles and doubles, but I do think when I'm feeling up to it that I want to play a little bit. I think it's fun. I enjoy competing.

I think it made me a better tennis player. I think there's stuff I can work on. I think sometimes at longer events, especially two-week events, it kind of keeps me mentally still there, especially if singles doesn't go that well. The weeks get really long, and you are just kind of out there practicing.

I would much rather be practicing and working on things, but competing at the same time. For me, I think I'm going to play a little bit more than I did last year, but we'll just kind of see how it goes.

Q. Will you have a consistent partner, do you think, or are you going to just put your name out there?

JESSICA PEGULA: If I'm not really sure, I think it's going to be just me kind of finding people to sign on-site with.

You know, I think McCartney and I wanted to play Brisbane, and we didn't get in. We were supposed to play Brisbane and here and kind of see how it goes.

So we'll see how we play together here. Then maybe we'll play a little bit more. I'm not sure.

Q. You obviously are a player who likes to step inside the court, take the ball early. I'm curious to hear in your words the importance of court position and staying up on inside the baseline and the challenge of that, as well?

JESSICA PEGULA: That's something I've worked on a lot, a lot, a lot, a lot over the last six months is my court positioning, my spacing.

It's one thing to take the ball early, but you also have to judge, like, how their ball is coming at you. Sometimes you can't take it early. Sometimes you can, but you can give yourself more space.

Sometimes you need to cut off the angle more. Sometimes you need to hold your ground, and you are trying to make all these decisions as the ball is kind of coming really fast at you. Your opponent is also trying to do different things to you to kind of get you off of that timing.

It's something I've worked on a lot. I've worked a lot on my footwork and my positioning and my spacing on the court. Yeah, it's something I think that is one of my kind of skills that I do really well, maybe more than other players.

I definitely have worked on that and try to kind of get even better at that and make it more of a weapon. It's very important. I think your court position is kind of everything.

You know, being able to see where your opponent is as well based on what shot you're hitting. If you see them really far back in the court, trying to get them to move up.

Sometimes there are things you don't notice that much when you are playing until maybe your coach mentions it or, for whatever reason, you realize it. You realize, oh, my gosh, your opponent is also really far behind the baseline. Maybe you should try and bring them in or vice versa.

It's very important. I would say the court positioning and your awareness of not just where you are, but also where your opponent is and then being able to change that throughout a game or a point is, yeah, definitely a big part of my game.