Coco Gauff keeps her cool and reaches U.S. Open final under Brad Gilbert's tutelage
Coco Gauff returns the ball during her U.S. Open women's semifinals match in Arthur Ashe Stadium at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadow on Thursday. Credit: Newsday/J. Conrad Williams Jr.
Coco Gauff did not become unglued.
The American teenager earned the right to play in her first U.S. Open final after winning a bizarre semifinal match against Karolina Muchova, 6-4, 7-5, Thursday.
Gauff had won the first set and was up a game in the second when the match was stopped because of an environmental protest in the stands. It soon became clear that one of the protestors had glued his bare feet to the floor, causing a 49-minute delay in play during which both players left the court.
There was no way Gauff was going to let this kind of thing derail her shot at winning her first Grand Slam title and doing it here in her own country. Not after everything she had gone through this year, not after the way she had gotten her game back on track after her shocking loss in the first round of Wimbledon in July.
Gauff brought the crowd to their feet when she won a 40-stroke rally to force her sixth. match point. This time she clinched it all when a Muchova shot went long.
Gauff has now won 17 of her last 18 matches and one reason why is she was able to step outside her comfort zone and work with a coach she felt she had little in common with.
Brad Gilbert, at age 62, hadn’t coached top-level talent in more than a decade. Though Gilbert had kept close to the game by working as an ESPN commentator, he had little first-hand experience working with today’s young players. Gilbert is the first to admit his social media skills are suspect and his musical taste is oh-so-very 20th century.
So when Coco Gauff’s parents first mentioned in July that they wanted her to meet with Gilbert, a former player who had coached Andre Agassi and Andy Roddick to wins in the U.S. Open in 1994 and 2003, the 19-year-old was less than enthused.
Said Gilbert: “She thinks I’m an old dude which is fine.”
Said Gauff: “I was worried about being with an older person, to be honest.”
Score one for the old dudes. It’s not like Gilbert has performed magic with Gauff. Rather, he’s been the Dumbledore to Gauff’s Harry Potter; he’s basically tweaked a few things and given a few pieces of advice in order to empower Gauff to be the best she can be.
“I’ll tell you Coco’s two best qualities, she’s incredibly humble and hard working. She wants to get better,” the American told Sky Sports. “I think I’ve helped her a lot with simple strategy and in-match, understanding her opponents’ strengths and weaknesses. And when you start with somebody on the fly, that’s what you can do most.”
Consultant Brad Gilbert watches Coco Gauff against Maria Sakkari during the women's singles final of the DC Open on Aug. 6 in Washington. Credit: AP/Alex Brandon
Gilbert, the father of three young adults, apparently learned a thing or two from parenting that has helped him coach Gauff. Rather than being overly concerned with Gauff’s weaknesses when he was hired after her shocking first-round loss at Wimbledon, he decided to concentrate on her strengths.
“It’s not about if you’re trying to change somebody’s forehand or backhand,” he said. “And you cannot believe how many texts I got saying ‘fix this forehand’. Like, really? Last I checked, she does a lot of things really well. So you work with the things you have and you just try to get better.”
Gauff said in a press conference earlier in the week that Gilbert’s scouting reporters are the best she’s ever seen and have really helped her prepare for every match. She believes that his experience as a commentator for ESPN has given him unique insight into the skills of many players on the tour. Gilbert, in a somewhat strange arrangement, has continued to work as a comentator for ESPN during the tournament when he is not in Gauff’s box.
Of course, there remains some generational differences. Gilbert sent her an inspirational playlist that included songs by Bruce Springsteen and the Grateful Dead. He said she had never heard of either.
He also struggles to master some things that come automatically to her — like social media. After Novak Djokovic entertained the U.S. Open crowd by singing “You have to fight for your right to party” Gilbert intended to tweet out a link to the Beastie Boys. Unfortunately, he linked to an adult video site run by someone with a similar name. . The mistake was quickly discovered, the post deleted and Gilbert tweeted out an apology.
Perhaps Gauff, who has more than a million followers in Instagram, might be able to thank her coach by giving him some social media pointers in the future.
Barbara Barker is an award-winning columnist and features writer in the sports department at Newsday. She has covered sports in New York for more than 20 years.
