Jovana Jaksic loves Monterrey above all other tournaments.  It's easy to see why.  Jaksic notched her first WTA win there last year and reeled off four more wins there this year to earn her first career finals appearance.  She never has won a match outside Monterrey.

The path to her maiden final has not unfolded smoothly for Jaksic, who twice has rallied from losing the first set.  She even saved three match points in the second round before winning a final-set tiebreak.  In the first Monterrey semifinal, Jaksic battled the idiosyncratic Kimiko Date-Krumm for nearly three hours.  The world No. 137 struck 11 aces during the contest despite dropping serve four times.  Fending off nine of 13 break points, Jaksic showed greater resilience on key points than one might have expected from a player so raw.

Like fellow first-time finalist Jana Cepelova in Charleston, Jaksic will enter her maiden final as a heavy underdog.  Compatriot Ana Ivanovic will seek her second title of 2014 after ousting Caroline Wozniacki in the second semifinal.  Although it ended in straight sets, that match featured plenty of twists and turns.  Ivanovic twice failed to serve out the first set before winning it in a tiebreak, and she also squandered a 4-0 lead in the second set.  Both women struggled on serve, winning less than half of their service points.  That trend came back to haunt Wozniacki, who could not hold serve to stay in the match at 4-5 in the second set.

Despite her well-documented frailties over the past six years, Ivanovic has compiled an outstanding career record in finals.  She has won 11 of 14 finals at non-majors, nine of them in straight sets.  A third win this year over a fellow former No. 1 also sends Ivanovic into the final on a wave of positive energy.  All the pressure will lie on her as the favorite, however, and she has frustrated her fans at times with unexpected losses in those situations.  

On the other hand, the cliche of having nothing to lose will apply to Jaksic as much as it ever has to any player.  Ranked more than 100 positions below Ivanovic, she can swing fearlessly in the first all-Serbian WTA final.  Her strong serving in the semifinal should give her confidence that she at least can stay within range of the former Roland Garros champion.  

That said, upsets throughout the Monterrey draw have spared Jaksic from facing an opponent near Ivanovic's quality.  An upset in the final thus would turn more heads than any of the victories that she has earned so far.  Whether Jaksic can curb the inevitable nerves of a first-time finalist will go a long way toward determining how much resistance she can muster.

The Monterrey final will began at 5:00 P. M. local time (7:00 P. M. Eastern time) on Sunday and will be televised on a four-hour delay by Tennis Channel.