Cavaliers Now

Emma Navarro Beats Paula Badosa to Reach U.S. Open Semifinals

Matt Newton

Emma Navarro has reached her first-career Grand Slam semifinal, defeating Spain's Paula Badosa in the quarterfinals of the 2024 U.S. Open Tennis tournament.
Emma Navarro has reached her first-career Grand Slam semifinal, defeating Spain's Paula Badosa in the quarterfinals of the 2024 U.S. Open Tennis tournament. / Geoff Burke-Imagn Images

Emma Navarro's epic 2024 continues. The former Virginia women's tennis star has secured her first trip to a Grand Slam semifinal, defeating Spain's Paula Badosa in straight sets in the quarterfinals of the 2024 U.S. Open Tennis tournament on Tuesday afternoon.

After dominating the first set 6-2, Navarro struggled early in the second set and Badosa, the No. 29-ranked player in the world and the No. 26 seed in the women's singles draw at the U.S. Open, jumped out to a 5-1 lead. Then, Navarro reached back and found another gear, winning the next six games in a row in a furious rally that ended with the former NCAA singles champion securing a 6-2, 7-5 victory over Badosa to reach her maiden Grand Slam semifinal.

A couple of days after taking down World No. 3 Coco Gauff by being the more fundamentally sound player, Navarro ran it back against Badosa in the quarterfinals. Navarro was a perfect 5/5 on net points and was 5/8 on break point opportunities. She committed only 15 unforced errors while Badosa committed 35 and Navarro won a staggering 59% of her second serve points as compared to 26% for Badosa.

After trailing 5-1 and nearly facing the prospect of going to a third set, Navarro won 24 of the final 28 points to win the match.

Now, Navarro is on to the U.S. Open semifinals, continuing what has been a breakthrough year for the former Wahoo. Before 2024, Navarro had never advanced past the second round of a major. This year, she has reached the third round at the Australian Open, the fourth round at the French Open, the quarterfinals at Wimbledon, and now the semifinals at the U.S. Open, not to mention a run to the third round at the Paris Olympics.

In Thursday's semifinals, Navarro will face the winner of No. 2 Aryna Sabalenka and No. 7 Qinwen Zheng.

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Matt Newton

MATT NEWTON

Matt launched Virginia Cavaliers On SI in August of 2021 and has since served as the site's publisher and managing editor, covering all 23 NCAA Division I sports teams at the University of Virginia. He is from Downingtown, Pennsylvania and graduated from UVA in May of 2021.