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11/08 19:39 CST Coco Gauff opens WTA Finals with win over Jessia Pegula at Indian Wells Coco Gauff opens WTA Finals with win over Jessia Pegula at Indian Wells By DAVID KANE Associated Press INDIAN WELLS, Calif. (AP) --- Coco Gauff defeated fellow American Jessica Pegula 6-4, 6-7 (5), 6-2 in her first match of the 2026 WTA Finals on Sunday. Competing in Group 1 of the eight-woman field's round-robin draw, Gauff improved to 6-5 in her career against Pegula after two hours, 39 minutes at Indian Wells Tennis Garden. "I was having a lot of fun today," the 22-year-old No. 4 seed said after the match, joking she left bits of rubber from her shoes on court. "I had a match point in the second (set) and I didn't get too down on myself...I think today, the key was just trying to be aggressive, but I also had to run a lot." Gauff, who won the WTA Finals in 2024 and was playing her first match in over a month, held serve from 0-40 down at 4-4 in the first set and then earned the lone break of the set in the following game to take early control in the match. Pegula took a 5-1 lead in the second only to lose five straight games and face match point at 5-6, but she regained control in the subsequent tiebreaker and leveled the match with a forehand return winner. The momentum swung back towards Gauff in the final set. The two-time Grand Slam champion won the first three games on her way to a 5-2 advantage. A missed overhead from Pegula earned Gauff two more match points, and Gauff let out a celebratory roar after clinching the match on her third opportunity. Gauff will next face No. 8 seed and reigning Wimbledon champion Linda Noskova, who defeated alternate Marta Kostyuk 6-2, 6-4 in the first match of the day. Kostyuk, who will face Pegula after both lost their opening round-robin matches, was a late substitute for world No. 1 Elena Rybakina. Rybakina, last year's WTA Finals winner and this year's Australian Open and U.S. Open champion was forced to withdraw from the season-ending championships citing a viral illness. Indian Wells, which is home to the annual BNP Paribas Open, is hosting the WTA Finals after instability in the Middle East led to a move away from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, where the event had been held since 2024. The WTA Finals is set to move again in 2027 to Charlotte, North Carolina. ___ See AP's full tennis coverage here