square up

phrasal verb

squared up; squaring up; squares up

: to turn so that one is facing something or someone directly

She squared up (with/to the basket) for a three-point shot.

They squared up for a fight.

Examples of square up in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Has Lee suddenly developed the ability to square up the baseball in the air more consistently, despite a fairly substantial drop in his fly ball rate? —Tony Blengino, Forbes.com, 16 Apr. 2025

The latest benchmark revision — an annual process that squares up estimates — showed there were 589,000 fewer jobs added to the economy in 2024 (more on that below). —Alicia Wallace, CNN, 7 Feb. 2025

The last time Curry and James squared up was the Christmas Special. —Danny Emerman, The Mercury News, 25 Jan. 2025

Michelle Rodrigues, a primatologist, conservation scientist and member of the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Primate Specialist Group focused on human-primate interactions, agrees that under normal circumstances, a gorilla won’t be squaring up against 100 men. —Miles Klee, Rolling Stone, 29 Apr. 2025

Rhymes for square up

• buttercup
• backup
• blowup
• breakup
• buildup
• checkup
• cleanup
• holdup
• hookup
• lineup
• lockup
• makeup