Osaka, currently ranked 88th in the world, missed last year’s US Open after giving birth to her daughter Shai. Her last appearance in New York was in 2022, when she suffered a shock first-round exit. However, she was dialed in against Ostapenko, who scripted her best run in the US Open last year by beating world no. 1 Iga Swiatek to reach the quarterfinals, firing 19 winners to wrap up the victory in just 63 minutes.

As the crowd inside the Louis Armstrong Stadium applauded Osaka, the four-time Grand Slam winner was left in tears.

“I so badly wanted to step on these courts again,” Osaka said. “I didn’t know if I could … Just to win this match, just to be in this atmosphere means so much to me.”

“I mean, it was stressful. She was hitting some really good shots,” Osaka added. “I just told myself, ‘keep going, keep fighting for every point and maybe you’ll have an opportunity.’ And eventually I did but then I looked up and saw so many faces, so I was like, whoa!'”

For the 2018 and 2020 champion in New York, this was Osaka’s first win over a top-10 player in four years. She previously made two quarterfinals at tour events in 2024 but never made it past the second round at the majors. None of the other three, she said, stirs her like the US Open.

“It’s like a combination of a lot of different things,” Osaka said. “I grew up here, so just seeing kids, and then remembering my daughter, but seeing kids coming and watching me play and just remembering that I was a kid … made me very emotional.

“Just seeing the stadium really full, it meant a lot, because I was, like, ‘Oh, I hope people come watch me play.”

Osaka will next face Czech Karolina Muchova.