Coco Gauff and her father Corey have a pre-match ritual; they say a prayer together, then share a couple of final words, right before she steps on the court.
“We just hope that I'm healthy, my opponent is healthy, that I have a good time out there. I believe the last thing he really says to me before I go on court, he gives me a kiss on the cheek and he says, ‘Have fun’. That's it,” the 15-year-old Coco says.
“He doesn't get too mad when I lose. It's more about how I act on the court. That's the biggest thing for him.”
Corey, who also serves as his daughter’s coach, has played a huge part in helping Coco calmly navigate her rapid rise that saw her vault to 68 in the world at the end of 2019, after starting the year ranked 685.
Six months ago, Coco made history as the youngest player to ever make it to the Wimbledon main draw through qualifying. She went on to become one of the biggest stories of the fortnight when she upset Venus Williams in her opening round and advanced to the last 16 before falling to Simona Halep. By the time the US Open came around, ‘Coco Mania’ had taken over New York, and beyond, and her stock kept on rising as she picked up her maiden WTA title at the end of the 2019 season in Linz, Austria, as a lucky loser. She is the youngest titlist on the women’s tour since 2004.
On Monday in Melbourne, making her Australian Open debut, Coco once again posted a win over Williams to set up a second round against Romanian Sorana Cirstea.
MORE: Déjà vu as Coco vanquishes Venus again
Her draw this fortnight is a case of déjà vu as she not only got to play Williams in her opener for a second time in the last three slams, but she also might face Naomi Osaka in the third round, just like she did at the US Open last September.
“These draws, you can’t make this stuff up,” Corey told ausopen.com with a laugh.
“But we can’t look that far ahead. We’ve got a second round we’ve got to get ready for. And Naomi has got to take care of business. We’re not even going to worry about that, we’re going to try to win our next match.”
Coco is contesting just her third Grand Slam main draw but the expectations on her have increased exponentially with every new milestone she has hit so far. Her father is particularly pleased with how well she handled her second showdown with the 39-year-old Williams on Monday.
“I thought she went out pretty confident and she played pretty confident throughout,” he says.
Confidence never seems to be an issue when it comes to Coco. The Floridian has made her intentions clear from the very start, declaring her No.1 goal is to “become the greatest of all-time”. She is grateful her parents never put a ceiling to her ambitions and it’s a strategy that has been paying off.
Corey has complete faith in her abilities, while noting there is still enormous room for improvement. Did her title run in Linz come earlier than expected for him?
“It was a little bit of a surprise,” he admits. “We had a couple of chances when she was playing $25k ITFs to win a couple of tournaments and it didn’t happen. And you know she’s never been through a year without winning a tournament since she was eight years old.
“In the pros, you’re not thinking about that, you just want to improve your situation. And then she got a lucky loser spot, and she got lucky to get another chance at the same tournament and made the most of it.
“It was pretty surprising but she’s held her stats pretty good, she always wins a tournament every year, so we don’t know when it’s going to come but if she can keep that up, that would be great.”
Coco carries herself in a manner that seems well beyond her years. She is comfortable with the media, level-headed on court, but she assures she is your typical 15-year-old off the court.
“I don't know if you guys know, there's a new app called TikTok. I'm very active on that. I procrastinate a lot on that app,” she says.
“I have to do homework. I'm still procrastinating on that. Everyone thinks I'm so serious because of my on-court [demeanour]. Really I'm not. I don't really take life too seriously.
“I just like to have fun. Same with my dad. I know my dad seems like this big, intimidating guy. But he's really more the jokester. We had that altercation on court, I told him not to curse. That's just how we talk with each other.”
Coco is referring to an on-court coaching exchange with her dad in Auckland that went viral when she stopped Corey mid-conversation to call him out for saying, ‘damn’ on live television.
The pair clearly share a sense of humour among many other things.
Asked how they’ve been managing the ever-increasing hype surrounding Coco at such a young age, Corey says: “I think this time we didn’t do any press before the match, we didn’t do anything. We’ll continue that, just try to normalise and quiet and stay focused on the match.
“I think people realise there’s a lot of hype, but let’s be honest, anybody that’s 15 that wins a match in a Grand Slam, it’s going to be a lot of hype, so it’s more of an age factor than anything. If she was 18 or 19 I don’t think it would have been that big of a deal.”
Corey said they didn’t spend too much time during the off-season taking stock of everything they accomplished in 2019 and just shifted their focus to getting back to work and improving various elements of Coco’s game. Her serve is already looking stronger – Coco clocked the fastest serve (191km/hr) on the women’s side on day one of the Australian Open and won 77 per cent of her first-serve points – among other things her father says have notably got better.
“We set some technical goals in terms of being able to improve parts of her game. I think we set some mental goals, being a little bit more mature around the court, being able to have good body language; she had great body language today [against Venus], so no shrugging shoulders, head’s up,” he explains.
“I think as always, you go into a tournament, we go to a Grand Slam, the goal is to win seven matches. And it starts one match at a time. I think that goal won’t change.”