(August 31, 2025) FLUSHING, NY – In a dramatic match in Louis Armstrong Stadium on Sunday afternoon, two-time major winner Barbora Krejcikova of the Czech Republic, saved 8 match points to defeat American Taylor Townsend 1-6, 7-6 (13), 6-3 at the US Open.
The Czech saved one match point in the tenth game of the second set and seven in the second set tiebreaker. Had Townsend won she would have reached her first major quarterfinal.
The match lasted 3 hours and four minutes. Total points won: Krejcikova 111, Townsend 121.
Townsend started strong, breaking the Czech’s serve three times to win the first set 6-1 in 28 minutes. The American played flawlessly, going up 6-1, 3-1. Krejcikova showed why she is a French Open and Wimbledon champion in her comeback.
Townsend hugged Krejcikova at the net, then went to sit in her sideline chair and began to cry before leaving the court with a towel at her face, with a standing ovation from the fans. She had become a fan favorite this fortnight at the US Open.
“Very tough match,” Krejcikova said during her media conference. “Very intense match. Very up-and-down match. Very happy at the end for me match.”
“Definitely at all those match points, I was just very, I mean, brave as well, but also lucky at certain points, because we had great rallies, and I was facing them when I was serving, then when I was returning,” the Czech continued.
“With all that, Taylor is a great player. She’s playing some great tennis, she’s serving really well, she can come to the net, she can do any magic she wants.
“So it was really tough to kind of, like, know what is going to happen or what to expect. So basically what I was doing, yeah, I was just trying to put the ball on her side, in that space, and hoping that, yeah, I’m going to save it.”
She last reached the fourth round of the US Open in 2019, losing to the eventual champion Bianca Andreescu in her only other fourth-round appearance.
Townsend talked to media about what she had learned during her run to the fourth round of singles:
“I’m exactly where I need to be. I said it in D.C., you know, I was kind of inching there, but I’m exactly where I need to be.
“That’s it. I’m playing the tennis I need to play be inside the top 20, top 10 to win a Grand Slam. She’s a two-time Grand Slam champion. I have beaten a Grand Slam champion this tournament.
“So I have everything that I need, and, you know, it’s just about now just keep getting the reps, keep putting myself in these types of positions. This hurts, but it’s part of competition, it’s part of sports, but I’m right where I need to be.”
“It’s a part of sports,” the American said of the loss. “For me, honestly, I was showering, I’m, like, damn, when is the next time I’m going to play a singles match? I’m the kind of person that motivated me and I’m ready to go back again.
“So, you know, I’m not done here. I have doubles tomorrow. I’m going to do everything that I can to hoist the trophy here. With that, I know I can do it, me and my partner have done it before. This is just motivating me to keep doing the things that I know I can do to be a champion.
“That’s the cool thing about tennis. Doesn’t matter what happened the day before. If you’ve got another match, you have to turn it around and get back on the saddle and keep going.”
“I was holding my breath, just like you guys,” in terms of the match points, Townsend said. “But yeah, it was intense, for sure. But, I mean, it was high-level tennis. I mean, it was high-level tennis.
“I can’t get mad. Like you said, fractions of a centimeter of an inch. The backhand down the line on the match point where it barely clipped the line, what do you do in those moments?
“Yeah, I mean, I felt the pressure, but I also was really proud of the way that I handled that, because I didn’t allow it to affect, like, what I wanted to do. You know, she just played more free and better in those moments, and that happens, right?
“Swing for the fence, I’m down match point, I’m going to go for it. Sometimes it goes in. And today, they went in, they hit the lines. She hit some amazing shots, and I can do nothing but clap it up and move on to the next. And that’s what I tried to do in those moments.
“Too good, move on to the next point. I think my mannerism showed that as well. I mean, it was high pressure, but I also tried not to focus on that too, because if you do, you can psych yourself out almost in a way. So I just wanted to stay free and play my game, and I did the best that I could today.”
“I’m going to use what happened today to just fuel me in to be able to even work on some of the things that I wish I did better in the singles match, I’m going to take that and try and implement those things in the doubles.”
Townsend, the No. 1 player in doubles, is still in the doubles with partner Katerina Siniakova.
Krejcikova will play No. 4 seed Jessica Pegula in the quarterfinals. Pegula dismissed countrywoman Ann Li 6-1, 6-2.
Pegula needed only 54 minutes to complete the match.
“Very good match I think for me today,” Pegula said. “Probably the best match, honestly, I’ve played since, like, before Wimbledon I feel like from the start to finish. So that was encouraging.
“Yeah, I was just hitting the ball, doing everything well, executing my strategy very well and, yeah, got through it pretty quick.”
On playing Krejcikova:
“Barbora, she’s so hard to play. I was watching her match against Emma the other night, and it’s, like, she disguises her shots to well. She’s really crafty. She changes the direction of the ball. She can serve well.
“She does everything really well, and sometimes she can be a little I think up and down in matches. Like you see kind of these stretches where she’ll just reel off multiple games and then she kind of goes down.
“It’s really hard to play people like that, but it feels a little bit this year like she’s kind of doing what she’s done in the past when she’s gone deep. She’s managing the three sets really well and winning and kind of figuring out ways to win.
“I think that’s when she’s her most dangerous, because I saw she was down 3-0 the other night. I looked at the score, and I was, like, that means absolutely nothing with Barbora, because I know that she can just string winners off, like, left and right.
“I think her game is very unorthodox. That’s why she’s beaten a lot of top players as well when she’s playing well, because you just don’t know what to expect, and she disguises the ball very well.
“So to me, she’s been always very frustrating to play. I know I’ve beaten her a few times, but she’s also beaten me the last few times. It can just, yeah, frustrate you, because you’re not really sure what to expect. There’s not a lot of patterns, I guess you could say, I feel like when I play her.”
Krejcikova talked about the crowd on Armstrong.
“To be honest, it was excellent. I mean, I really enjoyed the crowd. Even though they were cheering for Taylor, which, I mean, I knew since beginning. I mean, that’s just the way, how it is.
“I actually like it. I mean, I like when there is a crowd. I like when they are cheering. I like when the atmosphere gets, I mean, you can, like, start cutting it. It’s perfect. I enjoyed it. I’m really happy that I had opportunity to play on the Louis Armstrong court, and I had opportunity to play American, and the crowd was wild.
“Yeah, that’s something that I like. I just enjoyed it very much. It was just, you know, very intensive match and very challenging, as well. I’m happy I could experience it.”
She’ll be experiencing that crowd again when she [plays Pegula for a spot in the semifinals.
