ROLAND GARROS, PARIS — It is the sort of fairytale run that French tennis officials dream about.
All the host nation’s players, men and women, are usually long gone by this stage of their Grand Slam tournament. But Loïs Boisson, arguably the unlikeliest last one standing of the 27 players representing France who locked into the French Open starting gate a week ago Sunday, took to the red clay of Roland Garros Wednesday alongside the best in the world, for the quarterfinals.
In beating the world No. 3, Jessica Pegula, Boisson became the first French man or woman to reach the last eight here since 2017. She did it on a packed-to-the-gunwales Court Philippe-Chatrier, in front of a crowd of 15,000 screaming at every Boisson winner and every Pegula error as only a hometown crowd losing its mind during a borderline-inconceivable upset can do.
Against Pegula, the crowd had been sparse early on, as it often is at the beginning of the day, when the women’s matches tend to be scheduled. Those late-arriving Parisians who take their time over lunch normally settle into the stadium in time for the second contest of the day. But by the middle of the second set, when Pegula began to falter and Boisson started her charge, numbing the American with a seductive mix of spins and deep,…
