{"id":46233,"date":"2026-08-03T20:27:10","date_gmt":"2026-08-03T20:27:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/46233\/"},"modified":"2026-08-03T20:27:10","modified_gmt":"2026-08-03T20:27:10","slug":"alex-eala-stuns-jessica-pegula-in-dc-open-finals-for-first-career-wta-title","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/46233\/","title":{"rendered":"Alex Eala stuns Jessica Pegula in DC Open finals for first career WTA title"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>  Published  August 4, 2026 1:05am  <\/p>\n<p>     <a href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/preferences\/source?q=gmanetwork.com\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"gma-preferred-source-link\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">  Add GMA on Google <\/a> <\/p>\n<p> Make this your preferred source to get more updates from this publisher on Google. <\/p>\n<p>The sun finally rose in Washington\u2014and with it came Alex Eala&#8217;s first career title.<\/p>\n<p>The Filipina tennis star regrouped after a 20-hour suspension due to bad weather, stunning top seed and hometown bet Jessica Pegula with a 4-6, 6-4, 6-0 win in the 2026 Mubadala DC Open finals on early Tuesday in Washington DC, USA.<\/p>\n<p>The epic comeback win marked Eala&#8217;s first WTA 500 title\u2014the biggest triumph of her young career.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">A champion is born \ud83c\udfc6<\/p>\n<p>Alex Eala wins her FIRST WTA title!<a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/hashtag\/MubadalaDCOpen?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow\">#MubadalaDCOpen<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/UAKNrAXEf5\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/UAKNrAXEf5<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Mubadala DC Open (@mubadaladcopen) <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/mubadaladcopen\/status\/2084323166852116849?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow\">August 3, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>By outlasting the 32-year-old veteran, the Filipina also notched her ninth\u2014and seventh this year\u2014career victory over a Top 10 player.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">ALL ABOARD THE EALA EXPRESS \ud83d\udd25<\/p>\n<p>Alexandra Eala secures her first ever WTA Tour title!<a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/hashtag\/MubadalaDCOpen?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow\">#MubadalaDCOpen<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/uSpxYxWqO5\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/uSpxYxWqO5<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 wta (@WTA) <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/WTA\/status\/2084324134763237515?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow\">August 3, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>&#8220;First of all, of course, first and foremost, congratulations Jessie for an amazing week and you&#8217;ve had an amazing season. It&#8217;s always a pleasure to share the court with you,&#8221; Eala said of Pegula.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I definitely learned so so much, especially from your forehand lines and your backhand crosses. So I&#8217;m really looking forward to hopefully many more finals with you.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>After dropping the opening set and taking a slim 2-1 lead in the second before bad weather suspended the match, Eala picked up right where she left off when play resumed.<\/p>\n<p>Eala grabbed a 4-3 lead in the second set before Pegula leveled the frame at 4-4 after the Filipina committed back-to-back errors in the eighth game.<\/p>\n<p>Unfazed, Eala responded by holding serve in the next game then capitalized on three consecutive errors from the American in the 10th to clinch the set, 6-4, and force a deciding third.<\/p>\n<p>It was all Eala in the deciding set as the Filipina blanked Pegula in a near-flawless display to complete the comeback and capture her first career title.<\/p>\n<p>\u2014JMB, GMA News<\/p>\n<p> <script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Published August 4, 2026 1:05am Add GMA on Google Make this your preferred source to get more updates&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":46234,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1138],"tags":[1956,829,11725,183,1145],"class_list":["post-46233","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wta-finals","tag-alex-eala","tag-alexandra-eala","tag-dc-open","tag-jessica-pegula","tag-wta-finals"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46233","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46233"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46233\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46234"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46233"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46233"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46233"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}