Nerves and pressure get to Coco
Gauff at the US Open before she wins again
[August 29, 2025]
By HOWARD FENDRICH
NEW YORK (AP) — This would not have been easy for anyone, and it was
not easy for Coco Gauff. She is aware of the expectations of others.
She has her own expectations, too, of course.
An exit in the second round of the U.S. Open on Thursday night
simply would not do. And double-faulting her way to defeat might
just be the worst possible scenario. So after she missed two
consecutive serves to get broken and fall behind in the opening set
against Donna Vekic in Arthur Ashe Stadium, Gauff felt overwhelmed
and couldn't hide it.
The tears came. They wouldn't stop. She covered her face with a
towel on the sideline. When she walked back out on court after the
changeover, Gauff kept dabbing at her eyes between points, trying to
focus, trying to figure out a way to win. After she did just that,
straightening out her serving issues in the second set and
eliminating Vekic 7-6 (5), 6-2, Gauff cried some more.
“I just show people what it’s like to be a human, and I have bad
days, but I think it’s more about how you get up after those bad
moments and how you show up after that,” said Gauff, who is seeded
No. 3 at Flushing Meadows, where she won the first of her two Grand
Slam titles in 2023. “I think today I showed that I can get up after
feeling the worst I’ve ever felt on the court.”
Her serving woes resurface from time to time, including when 19
double-faults contributed to a loss that ended her title defense in
New York a year ago. She leads the tour with more than 300
double-faults this season — 23 in one match not long ago — and hired
biomechanics expert Gavin MacMillan, credited with rebuilding No.
1-ranked Aryna Sabalenka’s serve, shortly before this U.S. Open.
MacMillan altered the way Gauff hits serves, and she's been smacking
so many in practice over the past week that her shoulder aches.
“The biggest challenge is just changing the motion and changing
everything before such a big tournament for me," Gauff said. "This
is one of the most nervous tournaments for me in general, and on top
of all this, it’s a lot.”
In the first round, she needed three sets to get past Ajla
Tomljanovic, in part because of double-faults.
But like in that match, Gauff’s defense and superiority at the
baseline carried her past Vekic.
What left her as emotional as she was Thursday?
[to top of second column] |
Coco Gauff, of the United States, reacts to defeating Donna Vekic,
of Croatia, during the second round of the U.S. Open tennis
championships, Thursday, Aug. 28, 2025, in New York. (AP Photo/Frank
Franklin II)
“It was just nerves and just pressure, honestly, and I’m someone
that usually can thrive on that. There's been a lot on me this
tournament, more than usual, which I expected coming in,” Gauff
explained. “Basically, what you saw out there was what it was, and I
was able to reset through it. But it was a challenging moment for me
on the court. It's been a tough couple of weeks on and off the
court, but I’m just happy to get through it today.”
Vekic, who beat Gauff at the Paris Olympics last
year en route to the silver medal, took a medical timeout to have
her right shoulder looked at late in the first set and was having
plenty of serving woes of her own. She double-faulted 10 times.
In the first set, Gauff, a 21-year-old from Florida, had seven
double-faults and lost four of her six service games, including to
trail 5-4 — when the tears began — and then 6-5. But she broke right
back each of those times and then was superior in the tiebreaker.
When Vekic sent a forehand long to end the set, Gauff's mother rose
from her seat, one row behind MacMillan, and shouted, “Come on!
Let's go!”
Gauff headed to the locker room to splash some water on her face and
regain focus.
It worked wonders.
She gathered herself, and the second set went much more smoothly:
just one double-fault, zero service breaks, in front of a crowd that
included star gymnast Simone Biles.
By the end, Gauff was in a much better mood, yelling while shaking a
closed left fist when the match was won.
She had noticed that Biles was on hand.
“She helped me pull it out. I was just thinking: If she could go on
a 6-inch beam and do that, with all the pressures of the world, then
I can hit the ball. ... It brought me a little bit of calm, just
knowing her story, with all the things she went through mentally,"
Gauff said. “She’s an inspiration, surely.”
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