US tennis star Jessica Pegula defeated Sofia Kenin 6-3, 7-5 at the Charleston Open on Sunday, winning her first clay court title in the tournament’s first all-US final since 1990.

The victory marks Pegula’s second of the season, with the 2025 Miami Open finalist overtaking fellow US star Coco Gauff in the No. 3 spot in the newly updated WTA rankings — matching her career high.

"I was playing a lot of matches over the previous couple years, and I was just burnt out," Pegula told reporters afterwards. "So I'm just really happy that this year I feel so much fresher, so much better, and I think the results are kind of showing this early in the year."

2025 Charleston Open champion Jessica Pegula kisses her glass trophy.
Next year's Charleston Open champion will enjoy equal winnings to the men for the first time. (Matthew Stockman/Getty Images)

Equal pay heads for Charleston Open

Charleston organizers also announced on Sunday that the Open will provide equal prize money to both the men’s and women’s pools starting with next year's edition, becoming the first standalone WTA 500 event to level the financial playing field — and doubling the winner’s approximately $1,000,000 purse in the process.

The move follows a 2023 WTA announcement outlining a pathway to equal pay, with the goal of achieving purse equity across combined WTA 1000 and 500 events by 2027 and single-week WTA 1000 and 500 events by 2033.

"People often assume there's equal prize money across the board, but it's really only at the Slams, and maybe one or two of the 1000-level tournaments," Pegula explained. "So just starting that trend toward better equity is huge for us. It's amazing."

Belinda Bencic cruised to her first clay court final Saturday, taking down Ekaterina Alexandrova 6-4, 6-3. She’ll face off against Ons Jabeur, who mounted a comeback against Amanda Anisimova in her own semifinal.

The defending Olympic gold medalist and world No. 21, Bencic will be playing in her 14th WTA Tour singles final.

Alexandrova didn’t go down without a fight, pulling back from being down 4-1 to 4-4 in the first set. But Bencic won three-fourths of her first service points while also winning on 68 percent of Alexandrova’s second service points.

Bencic managed five aces and won 71 percent of her first service points.

In the other semifinal, Anisimova took a commanding lead in the first set before Jabeur fought back in the second and third sets, winning 2-6, 6-1, 6-4.

The world No. 10 had to stage multiple comebacks to secure the win over 47th-ranked Anisimova. Sunday will be Jabeur’s first WTA final of the year and just her second overall.

Both will be seeking their first clay court singles title. Bencic took the only match the two have taken, winning via retirement in the round of 16 at Madrid last season.