Iva Jovic reached the fourth round at Wimbledon on Friday, defeating 18th seed Ekaterina Alexandrova 6-3, 3-6, 6-4 to extend a breakthrough week at a tournament where she had never previously won a main-draw match. The 16th seed, an 18-year-old from California, dropped only her second set of the fortnight in the process. She will play fellow American Jessica Pegula for a place in the quarterfinals.
Not a newcomer Jovic arrives in the second week as an established prospect rather than a surprise. She reached the quarterfinals at the Australian Open in January, becoming the youngest American to make the last eight in Melbourne since Venus Williams in 1998, and climbed to a career-high ranking of No. 16 in March. What she had not done was win at Wimbledon. A qualifier a year ago, she lost her opening match on her debut.
A grass game The gap looks less like a weakness than a matter of timing. Jovic has said grass is the surface that suits her most naturally and takes her the least time to adjust to, and her results this season have supported that. She moved through the draw past Jaqueline Cristian, former semifinalist Tatjana Maria and now Alexandrova, losing serve rarely and reading the low, skidding bounce with unusual ease for a teenager. A junior doubles champion at Wimbledon in 2024, she has a longer relationship with the lawns than her senior record suggests.
The soccer connection Her footwork has drawn attention. Jovic has credited a childhood soccer background for the balance and movement that grass rewards, where first-step timing and low, stable contact matter more than on slower courts. Against Maria, a specialist in slice and variety, she resisted overhitting and instead absorbed the junk, a maturity that has defined her week.
What’s ahead Pegula, the fourth seed, presents a clear step up. It is the kind of test that has previously caught out young players arriving on a wave — Jovic lost to Aryna Sabalenka in the Melbourne quarterfinals — but it also offers her a first grass meeting with a top-five opponent. For a player already talked about as a future No. 1, the second week at Wimbledon reads less as a ceiling than as a marker of how quickly the grass has become her territory.
