KEY BISCAYNE: Karolina Pliskova has never found Miami exactly to her liking, until now.
The second-seeded Pliskova reached the Miami Open semifinals on Tuesday, beating 26th-seeded Mirjana Lucic-Baroni 6-3, 6-4. It's the first time Pliskova has made the semifinals at Key Biscayne.
Pliskova improved to 23-3 this year, the best record on the women's tour.
"I'm really enjoying my tennis this year ... winning almost every match so far," said Pliskova, who took advantage of 10 double faults by Lucic-Baroni.
Next up for Pliskova — who avenged a loss to Lucic-Baroni in the quarterfinals of the Australian Open — is Caroline Wozniacki or Lucie Safarova, who were scheduled to play Tuesday night.
On the men's side, fifth-seeded Rafael Nadal cashed in the only break point of the match and defeated Nicolas Marut 6-4, 7-6 (4) to make the quarterfinals.
Among those joining Nadal in the round of eight is Kei Nishikori, who rallied in the final set to beat Argentina's Federico Delbonis.
Nishikori, the No. 2 seed and Key Biscayne finalist last year, won 6-3, 4-6, 6-3. The Japanese star was down a break early in the third, then took five of the final six games.
Nishikori will next face unseeded Fabio Fognini of Italy, who beat Donald Young 6-0, 6-4.
Young's loss meant only one American man would reach the quarters. That would be No. 13 Jack Sock, who beat Jared Donaldson 6-2, 6-1.
Also scheduled to play later Tuesday were Stan Wawrinka and Roger Federer — on a day of significance for each. The top-seeded Wawrinka celebrated his 32nd birthday, and Tuesday marked the 13th anniversary of the first Nadal-Federer match.
Nadal, then 17, stunned Federer that day at Key Biscayne 6-3, 6-3, the first of the 36-and-counting matches between them.