Sixteen months ago, Emma Navarro—the 23-year-old American now in the semifinals at the US Open—was the world’s 121st-best women’s tennis player. With her deep run in New York, her live ranking is now number eight.
What a difference, indeed, that a year and change can make.
Yet while hers is one of this tournament’s breakout names—there are always one or two newish personalities who emerge from the US Open, given its scale and prestige—tennis aficionados may not be especially shocked by her ascent. Navarro is an even-keeled workhorse and consummate all-court player who perhaps lacks in pyrotechnics but more than compensates for it with a steadiness and understated athletic elegance. That quality has now seen her topple Coco Gauff twice (in Wimbledon this past summer and at the US Open just a few days ago), Aryna Sabalenka once (at Indian Wells in March), and clinch her first and only tour title (as of yet!) in Hobart, Australia, this past January.
“It’s crazy that I’m able to walk out on Ashe [Stadium] and feel comfortable,” Navarro told the press after her match against Paula Badosa on Tuesday, “because it’s definitely not my nature to want to be in the spotlight and seek the attention. It’s kind of crazy, my comfort level out there.”
Navarro was born in New York and raised in Charleston, South Carolina. She hails from an affluent, tennis-loving family: Her father, Ben, is a billionaire businessman who owns tournaments in Charleston and Cincinnati. They’re a seemingly close-knit bunch; Navarro’s grandmother has even been making the drive from Mystic, Connecticut, to Flushing to spectate.
“[Earlier on] she watched my match, drove home, and then rewatched it,” said Navarro last week. “She’s insane.”
Navarro originally opted to go to college and forgo the professional circuit. But when she took the NCAA singles title as a freshman at the University of Virginia in 2021, she decided to pursue tennis full-time.
Her still-nascent career comes to an apex tonight in New York. There she will once again face Sabalenka, whose uber-powerful game has been dialed in over this past week and a half. Yet with the experience of their Indian Wells combat, plus Navarro’s own reliability, the young American has a chance of pulling through—especially if her style gets under Sabalenka’s skin. (Where Navarro is largely coolly composed, Sabalenka can get fiery.)
Navarro credits their meeting in California as a breakthrough for competing in the spotlight: “I was a little overwhelmed playing at Indian Wells on center court, but it was so important to me,” she told reporters. “I’m happy with my progression of feeling more comfortable on big stages.”
Navarro seems just as relaxed off the court as she is on it. Jessica Pegula, who is also in the semifinals tonight—and who is also the daughter of a billionaire—uploaded a TikTok during the Olympics that showed various clips of Navarro running late or scrambling to keep up, with the caption “keeping @emmanav on schedule.” During her match against Badosa, commentators mentioned that they’d seen Navarro shortly before play in Ashe’s hallways, walking around and eating a bowl of cereal.
Of course, low-key does not mean less intensity. Navarro sees her shot, and she’s going to go for it—surely and steadily.