Gauff cruises; Ostapenko overcomes Navarro to make Stuttgart quarters
Grand Slam champions Coco Gauff and Jelena Ostapenko were the night session winners on Thursday in Stuttgart, completing an engrossing quarterfinal lineup at the WTA 500 Porsche Tennis Grand Prix.
Stuttgart: Draws | Scores | Order of play
All eight quarterfinalists are ranked inside the Top 30 -- including five of the top six players in the PIF WTA Rankings. There will be no play in Stuttgart on Friday due to the Good Friday holiday, but action will resume on Saturday.
Here's what took place on Thursday evening in the Porsche-Arena:
[4] Coco Gauff def. [LL] Ella Seidel 6-1, 6-1
World No. 4 Gauff needed just 57 minutes to oust lucky loser Seidel, the last German player standing in the singles draw. With the win, Gauff matched her career-best Stuttgart result, when she also made last year's quarterfinals.
The American won 87 percent of her first-serve points and erased all three break points she faced in the contest. The victory gives Gauff's year a pick-me-up -- it is her first quarterfinal since January's Australian Open.
"I was already on clay right after Miami, basically," Gauff said after her win. "This year I came a little bit early just to give myself more time to adjust to the clay and indoor conditions here, too. ... Overall I think it was a good decision."
The 2023 US Open champion Gauff will now meet No. 5 seed Jasmine Paolini in a marquee quarterfinal on Saturday. Gauff is 2-0 vs. Paolini, but this will be their first meeting in 20 months.
"She's an incredible mover and she has a really good forehand," Gauff said about Paolini. "We haven't played recently on tour, but we do practice together, like she said.
"Everybody knows about Jasmine and also the fight that she has in her. She never gives up. I have never seen her do that on the court."
Jelena Ostapenko def. [7] Emma Navarro 7-5, 3-6, 6-2
Ostapenko is into her first Stuttgart quarterfinal since 2018 after overcoming World No. 11 Navarro in 2 hours and 18 minutes. It is only her second quarterfinal of the year, but she is 3-1 vs. Top 20 players in 2025.
"She's a great player," Ostapenko said of Navarro. "It was hard to play against her, because she's like not missing a lot of balls since she's very consistent. I was fighting until the very last point."
In a topsy-turvy first set where big returns were the decisive shots, Ostapenko failed to serve out the set at 5-4 but got a second chance at 6-5. There, her power game took over as she barged to a love hold and the one-set lead.
Navarro took charge in the second set, cranking a backhand crosscourt winner to break for 4-2 and tying the match from there. Navarro was just 1-for-6 on break points in that set, but that was enough as she was never broken there.
In the third set, though, Ostapenko turned things back in her favor, finding a plethora of powerful groundstrokes when she needed them most. From 2-2 in the decider, the 2017 Roland Garros champion won 16 of the next 20 points to prevail.
Ostapenko was more successful taking opportunities on Thursday. The Latvian only had nine break points in the match, but she converted six of them. By contrast, Navarro went 4-for-18 on break points overall.
The stage is set for Ostapenko to face No. 2 Iga Swiatek in the quarterfinals. Notably, Ostapenko has beaten Swiatek in all five of their previous meetings, including in Doha earlier this year.
"I just have to do what I have to do: Stay aggressive and playing my game," Ostapenko said, looking ahead to Swiatek. "I'm always ready for a battle against great players."
