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ROLAND GARROS

May 28, 2016

Madison Keys

Paris, France

M. KEYS/M. Puig

7-6, 6-3

THE MODERATOR: Questions, please.

Q. Dirt balling resume continues to grow. How happy are you that you were able to carry the Rome success, that good play, into a Grand Slam, back it up and make the second week here?
MADISON KEYS: I think that's a really important thing for me. I definitely wanted to keep doing everything that I was really doing well in Rome. Obviously I played really well there, so today I don't think I played extremely well all of the time, but being able to figure it out, I think that's where having a lot of matches really helped me.

Q. Talk us through your day a little bit, the rain delay and then also learning that you were getting moved way, way out there.
MADISON KEYS: Way. Earlier. More. I was actually laying on the couch hanging out with CoCo and I was sleep. All of a sudden I heard my name on a radio. They were like, We can't find Madison. I'm like, I'm right here. Then they were, Okay, you're next on. Went from fourth to next. How does that work?

Once I kind of absorbed the information and had a second to process it I was really happy, just because I didn't want to get stuck playing super late and potentially having the rain stop us.

Q. Your level of satisfaction? I think you've made fourth round four straight slams now, so that's pretty decent.
MADISON KEYS: Yeah, it was always a goal mine to make second week, and then once I made second week the first time it became achievable, and then it became something that I wanted to do all of the time just to have the consistency.

Where I may not have had the consistency outside of slams, I had it in the slams. (Smiling.) So, yeah, I just think it's something that I'm getting more and more comfortable with. Obviously I've been laying well in the slams for the past six, seven slams that I've played in.

I don't think it'll always be, Oh, I'm so happy, but right now I'm just really happy with how I've been doing and hope to keep it up.

Q. What were your thoughts in the match, in particular the first set? You had set point, she served for it, and then you had a strong finish in the tiebreak. How big was that?
MADISON KEYS: They was very big, I think. Having the set points was difficult because she was serving and she served well on all of them. I felt like I didn't even real lose the point necessarily.

Then I played a bad game to go down 5-6 and was down 3-1 pretty quick in the tiebreaker. So being able to regroup and get myself back together after and get that first set was big.

After that, I think starting strong in the second helped me.

Q. Your comments the other day on your sister's phone call was great. In the past I believe you said that your sisters sort of keep you real. Could you just talk about how they do that, how they keep you real?
MADISON KEYS: I'm the oldest of my family, and then I have an older half sister as well.

So I grew up with lots of girls screaming and yelling. I think that just really humbled me. We had to share a bathroom for a long time, so that's definitely a life-changing experience.

Yeah, they really just don't care about tennis or my success. They obviously want me to do well. They hope for the best. But to them I'm not a tennis player. I'm just their sister.

For me, that is really special. I don't think many people are like that. That's something I'm definitely not going to complain about.

Q. So does it sort of give you a little bit of balance in your life that way? Is that what you're saying?
MADISON KEYS: For sure. I think my mom and sisters are very good about that. My mom obviously knows when I'm playing in Roland Garros - my sisters may not - but she's never overly, you know, up and down between wins and losses. She's there when I need her, and she knows sometimes after tough losses to give me my space.

I have a very balanced life off the court.

Q. Speaking of tough losses, I think you had a match against Monica before in fading light here a few years ago on an outer court. Just wondering if that flashed through your head at all during this pretty similar scenario and if it feels good to avenge that scenario tonight?
MADISON KEYS: Oh, it did. It definitely flashed through my head. When it started raining and all of that I was thinking, I'm really glad they got rid of Court 7, because that was the court we were on. That was definitely in the back of my head.

But I've played her a couple times since then, so that wasn't the last memory that I had. But it definitely feels good to get some revenge for that.

Q. Just curious how much time you had from when they called your name when you were half asleep on the couch to going out on the court and what do you do to get ready that fast?
MADISON KEYS: They told me that I was next on pretty much about five minutes after they changed the schedule. By the time the cover came off and all that then there was still a set and a half to finish, so I definitely had time. It was just a lot less time than was expecting.

So it wasn't a huge rush.

Q. Thoughts on your next match. I don't know if you've seen who you play.
MADISON KEYS: I think Bertens won.

Q. Yeah.
MADISON KEYS: I could hear it as I was playing. I wasn't exactly sure what was going on over there. Obviously they played very, very tough. I know it was like 10-8 in the third maybe.

You know, it's one of those things where hopefully I'm a little bit fresher than KiKi. She's obviously playing well. She beat Kerber and won Nuremberg. She's feeling good on the clay, so it'll be a tough match.

Q. Do you know much about her game-wise?
MADISON KEYS: Not really. I know she is hits a big ball and she's aggressive. Other than that, I don't know a ton.

Q. Just wondering if at all you have you observed what Shelby has done this week and her breakthrough? Talk about, if you can, a little bit about having that first breakthrough and what it's like for her perhaps and what it was like for you and what she will have to do to follow it up, I think?
MADISON KEYS: I've been texting Shelby. We actually just texted each other. I'm so happy for her. She's one of the sweetest girls. We used to travel together all the time, room together, so we got very, very close. Couldn't happen to a nicer person, so very happy for her.

I think embracing it is probably the biggest thing, and feeling like you deserve to be there no matter what. I think she's just going to have to go out and play her game and not worry about what other people are going to say.

There will be a lot of criticism and skeptics and just outside opinions all of a sudden. So being able to just not listen to anyone and focus on yourself I think is the biggest thing.

Q. Kind of guessing that you didn't exactly grow up on clay courts. If that's the case, could you go back to the first times you were on clay, what it was like learning to slide, did you...
MADISON KEYS: I was eight when I first played on clay, so I don't think that's horribly old. I mean, trained at Evert Tennis Academy full time from the time I was ten so I played on green clay. I've never really had an issue sliding, so much so that I slide on hard court most of the time.

For me it was more figuring out my game style on red clay just because it's so much slower.

Q. Wondering if you and Shelby have any particular emojis that you use to each other to express the emotion of this moment?
MADISON KEYS: I think there are a lot of American flags, hearts, and like kissy faces. That pretty much sums up our conversations.

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