Lois Boisson's stunning French Open run, one year after Roland Garros heartache
ROLAND GARROS, PARIS — One year ago, Loïs Boisson had her tennis dream dashed.
After tearing through the third rung of professional women's tennis, the French Tennis Federation (FFT) awarded Boisson a wild card for the French Open. A week before, at a minor tournament in Paris, Boisson tore her anterior cruciate ligament in her left knee and missed nine months of tennis. She didn't even watch the tournament on television.
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Twelve months after the pain, Boisson was on Court Philippe-Chatrier, soaking in the adoration of a French crowd. She upset Jessica Pegula, the world No. 3, to reach the French Open quarterfinals. She is the first French woman to reach the last eight at Roland Garros since Caroline Garcia and Kristina Mladenovic in 2017, after beating Pegula 3-6, 6-4, 6-4.
'I don't know what to say,' Boisson told the crowd in French on court. 'I knew before the match that there was a possibility, but I knew that she was very tough … I gave my all and in the end I won.'
Boisson is the world No. 361, 358 places below Pegula, and she looked a little overawed by the occasion in the first set, as Pegula's relentless accuracy and consistency from the baseline ground her down and drew her into mistakes. Boisson couldn't read the American's drop shots and was often scrambling to no avail after being pushed further and further to the back of the court.
But Boisson did not wilt, and the slow filling-up of the lower bowl of Chatrier was a barometer for how she worked her way into the match. Boisson figured out that she could make Pegula hesitate in coming to the net, with a combination of drop shots and lobs that left the American in two minds.
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'In the beginning, even though there weren't many, you can still hear them on center court. But for the third set, it was full. It was incredible,' she said in her news conference.
Boisson said she felt relaxed on one of the biggest courts in the sport. She's much more used to smaller venues, clubs with a few decent courts or dedicated tournament venues where spectators sit almost in the tramlines and might peer through wire fences, hoping to glimpse a player ready to break into the top tier of the sport. Boisson, like Victoria Mboko of Canada and Tereza Valentová of Czechia, is a breakthrough player at this Grand Slam.
But the more important thing she shares with Mboko and Valentová, both 18 to Boisson's 22, is the accumulated confidence of a winning streak against players in her own wheelhouse. Playing the world No. 3 on Court Philippe-Chatrier is not like playing an ITF Tennis Tour event on the third rung of professional tennis in the middle of France. But winning is winning is winning.
Boisson's streak just came a year before theirs. Before the ACL injury, she was 31-7 in ITF events in 2024. She was 14-6 going into the French Open, with 13 ITF wins and one WTA Tour win against Harriet Dart in Rouen, the site of the ugly comment from Dart that sent Boisson's name around the online world. She's 18-6 now. Winning is winning is winning.
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She had harnessed that confidence throughout the second set, staying with Pegula in a situation in which it would have been easy to fall away. At 4-4, the pressure started to tell — for the American. Pegula missed two groundstrokes she will likely never miss at a major again, before Boisson cracked a backhand crosscourt to take the set.
After the match, Pegula said she wasn't surprised by how Boisson played, with her heavy topspin forehand and the foot speed to access it from her backhand corner, while still being able to get back across the other side of the court when Pegula swung for the space.
'All she wants to do is hit forehands,' Pegula said.
'She's really good at moving. She's really fast, so she's really good at running around to get her forehand and, you know, also covering the forehand side.
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Yeah, she hits it pretty heavy. I mean, super high and heavy when she wants to, when she needs to get back in the point, and then she's able to use her dropshot and slice.'
Riding a wave of tricolores and chants of 'Loïs,' Boisson broke Pegula in the first game of the third set, but the American came back to reel off three games as Boisson went from sparkling to flat — and the crowd did too.
But at 4-4, just as in the second set, her combination of high, heavy spin and elite redirection on her forehand — dragging Pegula this way and that — put more doubts in the American's mind. She missed a backhand from the middle of the court at deuce, and a point later, Boisson was serving for the match.
With Boisson down 30-40, both players tightened. Pegula waifed a backhand over the net and then hit a clever short, angled forehand, but Boisson eked it over and the ball died at Pegula's feet. The American earned a second break point, but the crowd rose to Boisson again. A drop-shot-lob combination spinning over Pegula's head — the play that had given her a foothold in the match in the first place — brought the crowd to its feet and saw Boisson raise her arms for noise for the first time.
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By the final game, Court Philippe-Chatrier was almost full. Word moved around the ticket-holders, likely waiting for Novak Djokovic's match to follow this one, that one of their own was doing something special. Another break point. Another drop shot. A flick from Pegula that dropped wide, the American leaning on the net in disbelief.
A net cord off a Pegula return sent Boisson scrambling forward to a ball she somehow dug out. She played the next shot, a volley off a weak lob, like she wanted it to land on a pillow, not some clay. Pegula got to it but could only net.
On her first match point, Boisson sent a forehand inside-in and raised her arms to a roar that shook Chatrier. It was Boisson's roar after the handshake, arms out and screaming into the sky, that made the past 12 months melt into air.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
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