Tennis is a sport where you get silenced by an entire group of people for talking during a point. So you can probably guess how the blaring of country music staple “Cotton-Eye Joe” went down during a top-5 matchup.
The rude, but hilarious stoppage occurred on Saturday during a semifinal match between No. 1 seed Iga Swiatek and No. 4 seed Jessica Pegula at the Canadian Open. During a critical run, with Pegula leading 4–3 in a second set tiebreak and three points off an upset, Pegula attempted to lob a lob over Swiatek to the net.
As the ball fell down, the fast lyric “If it hadn’t been for Cotton-Eye Joe” echoed through Montreal’s IGA Stadium, provoking the crowd to gasp. The point was immediately suspended as cameras caught Pegula in disbelief.
The point was replayed, but the bizarre moment became a turning point in the match as Swiatek won 12 consecutive points to win not only the tiebreak but also the first two games of the third set. Fortunately, Pegula recovered from there and scored the upset with a 6-2, 6-7(4), 6-4 win.
She had to laugh at the moment after the game.
Pegula will face the winner of a semifinal between Elena Rybakina and Liudmila Samsonova on Sunday.
