By Chris Oddo | Saturday April 16, 2016

Christina McHale battled past Sam Stosur on the red clay to power the Americans to a 2-0 lead in their Fed Cup World Group Playoff tie with Australia on Saturday in Brisbane.

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American captain Mary Joe Fernandez was made to look like a genius by the 23-year-old New Jersey native as McHale fought back to claim a 3-6, 6-1, 7-5 victory to claim her first Fed Cup victory since 2012.

McHale, chosen over No. 2-ranked American CoCo Vandeweghe, did not face a break point in the second or third set in winning for the first time in five career meetings with Stosur.

“I mean it’s easy to look back and say “you know, good decision,” Fernandez said at the day’s conclusion. “Like I said yesterday and a couple of days ago, you try to put forth you know, the team on Day 1 that you think’s going to match up the best head to head with the surface, so how they’ve been practicing, how they’re feeling physically. And you put all of them into account and you come up with it. Obviously that’s like a match that could have gone either way. It was really tight at the end, a couple of points made the difference, but I was really proud of the way Christina played from the start to the finish and you know, Madison started us off on a very positive note which always helps.”

Late in the match McHale was unable to convert on six break point opportunities in a 22-point game in which Stosur held for 4-3 in set three, but that did not deter McHale.

She was able to stay on serve and eventually break for 6-5 before holding serve to close out the rubber.

“I mean she did play pretty well on those break points,” McHale said. “I mean, I think there were maybe two of them that I think I could have done something more with the return. But other than that, she hit an ace, she hit a good serve and then a good forehand on a couple of them. So I just tried to stay focused and you know, I knew I was still in the match. I didn’t want to even think about that last game and just keep on fighting and keep on focusing on that next point.”

In the day’s first rubber, Madison Keys hammered her way past Daria Gavrilova, 6-4, 6-2.

“You know, Dasha is very good at getting a lot of balls back so I think I was pretty good about not going for anything too early and just waiting for my shots,” Keys said.