Defending champion Sam Querrey came back from the brink of defeat Friday afternoon at the Farmers Classic in Los Angeles, prevailing against German veteran Rainer Schuettler 6-2, 3-6, 7-6(4) to reach the semi-finals at the ATP World Tour 250 tennis tournament.

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After levelling the match at a set apiece, Schuettler continued to put pressure on the No. 2 seed’s serve. He finally converted on his seventh break point of the decisive set to go up 5-4, but then faltered in his bid to close out the match. Though Schuettler earned a second chance to serve out the victory with a break in the next game, Querrey once again fought back to send the match to a tie-break.

“I was pretty frustrated the whole time, but I did a great job of playing the 5-4 and 6-5 games,” said Querrey. “I played great points on those games and really battled back well.”

Querrey put away a forehand winner to go up a mini-break, 2-1, and clinched the two-hour, 20-minute victory on triple match point.

World No. 20 Querrey enjoyed a stellar hard-court swing last summer, winning the Los Angeles title and reaching the finals at Indianapolis and New Haven to finish as the Olympus US Open Series Bonus Challenge winner. The 22 year old is attempting to claim his fourth ATP World Tour title this season, after winning on hard court in Memphis, clay in Belgrade and grass at The Queen’s Club.

The American will play Janko Tipsarevic for a place in the final after the sixth-seeded Serbian defeated No. 3 seed Marcos Baghdatis 6-3, 7-5. Tipsarevic, a grass-court finalist last month in ‘s-Hertogenbosch, broke the Cypriot for the third time in the match to go up 6-5 in the second set and proceeded to serve out the win.

Watch: Tipsarevic Answers Your Questions

Top seed Andy Murray finished his quarter-final match on a strong note, winning the final six games to clinch a 7-6(3), 6-1 win over Colombian Alejandro Falla. Murray was pushed to three sets in his opener Thursday night, and was tested again in his quarter-final match Friday. He saved two set points in the opening set, and after dropping serve to start the second, stepped up to claim the victory.

“I feel much better than I did yesterday,” said Murray. “I had the same sort of thing earlier in this year after the Australian Open when I didn’t play for a few weeks. Then I played in Dubai, I was really sore after the first match, and then each match after that I started to feel a lot better. Hopefully that’ll be the case here.”

Murray will next face No. 4 seed Feliciano Lopez, whom he has defeated in their previous two meetings. Lopez, who won the hard-court ATP World Tour 250 title earlier this season in Johannesburg, said of the World No. 4: “Since the first time I saw him, I realised he was a very talented player and would be one of the best players in the world.”

Lopez prevented a second American player from reaching the semi-finals, as he edged past 2007 finalist James Blake 3-6, 7-6(6), 6-4. The Spaniard fired 18 aces and capitalised on his two break points, whereas Blake managed to go just two for eight on his opportunities.

Blake posted his first match wins since March this past week, having missed the European clay circuit with a knee injury, and felt good about his form.

“I’m playing fine,” he said. “It’s just a matter of getting more matches in and playing those big points more aggressive… Just having the confidence to do it in big occasions now after not having done anything for the last three or four months or so is going to take a little bit of time, but I know now it’s pretty darn close.”