Marie Bouzkova and Karolina Muchova scored upsets of Top 10 players Jessica Pegula and Maria Sakkari, respectively, at the Western & Southern Open in Cincinnati on Thursday to set an all-Czech quarterfinal at the the WTA 1000 event.
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Muchova was the first of the two to reach the final eight with a 6-3, 2-6, 6-2 win against eighth-seeded Sakkari, before Bouzkova overcame a mid-match rain delay to surge to an emphatic win against No.3 seed and Montreal champion Pegula, 6-4, 6-0.
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Here are some more numbers:
2: Muchova has now knocked off Sakkari twice this year, having also beaten the Greek in the first round of Roland Garros on her way to her first major final.
Though she's now won four straight matches against Sakkari, Muchova's 1-hour, 54-minute win on Thursday was her first against Sakkari on hard courts.
5: Muchova is through to her first quarterfinal since finishing runner-up to Iga Swiatek in Paris in June, and her fifth of the season overall.
75: Though she didn't ace Sakkari in victory, Muchova was largely effective behind her first serve. She won three-quarters of the points played behind it in the match, and didn't face a break point in the third set.
Muchova masters Sakkari 💪
— Western & Southern Open (@CincyTennis) August 17, 2023
The Czech claims victory 6-3, 2-6, 6-3!#CincyTennis pic.twitter.com/LoMMTjnzYo
3: Bouzkova, meanwhile, is through to her third career WTA 1000 quarterfinal, all of which have come on hard courts. She's 2-0 in the round, having reached the semifinals in Canada in 2019 and in Guadalajara last year.
4: Bouzkova won the first four games of the opening set against Pegula, and also the first three of the second set. A brief rain shower interrupted play with Bouzova up, 6-4, 3-0, 15-0. When the match resumed, Bouzkova picked up where she left off, and won all three games played -- including two that stretched past deuce.
6: Bouzkova snapped Pegula's six-match winning streak in victory.
10: Bouzkova now owns 10 career wins over Top 10 players, and has beaten Pegula in four of their previous six matches.
Up next: Bouzkova and Muchova have split two prior meetings, and will be playing for the first time in four years. Neither match came in a WTA main draw: Bouzkova won at an ITF World Tennis Tour event in 2015, and Muchova won in qualifying in Miami in 2019.