At Saturday’s women’s tennis final at Roland-Garros in Paris, Coco Gauff, 21, delivered an impressively beyond-her-years performance.
Gauff’s stellar defense—and some opportune moments of impeccable offense—secured her three-set victory over Aryna Sabalenka, 27, the world’s number-one-ranked player. Gauff returned serve extremely well and seemed to have all the answers to Sabalenka’s power hitting—from a shot-of-the-match backhand winner against an overhead to an arcing lob that was so well-placed you’d have thought it was drawn to its target by a magnet. Especially breezy conditions on Court Philippe-Chatrier made things complicated—for both players—yet Gauff breathed deep and rose against the headwinds, forcing Sabalenka to crash out.
There was something almost serene in watching Gauff’s gritty maturity coalesce as the match progressed: Despite the kicked-up brick dust scraping the air, she seemed entirely still between points, with zero nerves palpable. No hands were wrung, nor palms flared—while Sabalenka seemed to variously battle her team, herself, and the world at large, Gauff stayed largely quiet in her resolve, bar a few come ons.
Gauff is now a two-time major winner—with more certainly on the way. She spoke with us from New York City, between appointments on some morning talk shows.
Vogue: Congratulations, Coco! That was an incredible match to watch. Now that you’ve had 48 hours or so since the big win, tell us about the match. What worked best—and was there anything that might not have hit right away?
Coco Gauff: I think what worked best was just the mentality, honestly—stepping out on the court and accepting that it was going to be a tough one, and kind of an ugly one, because the conditions were so tough. And I guess what’s hit me later is thinking about the second set. It was actually a pretty clean set for me—but in the moment, it didn’t feel like that. I’m proud of the fight I put up in the first set, and I think that set me up to win the second. Then, in the third, honestly, anything could have happened.
The conditions were…I mean, you could see the wind’s effects on TV, which isn’t always the case. It looked like mayhem.
The clay was flying around, getting in your eyes, and at some points in the match it was a little bit rainy. Yeah. But that’s Paris! You never know what weather you’ll get.
In your on-court interview after the win, your first thank you was to God. Does prayer factor in when you play, or do you just get in your zone, and prayer comes before or after?
I’ve done both: Sometimes I don’t think about it at all, and then there are times where I feel desperate and, honestly, just need something or someone to call on. It has been something that helps me. It’s important. In the final, I did say some prayers, but they were mostly just to not have any regrets—I remembered from when I made the finals in 2022, I left the court with a lot of them. I did not want to have the same feeling this time.
You mentioned after the match that you were tuning out Sabalenka’s frustrations—but was there anything physically or shot-wise that you were targeting against her?
She made a lot more errors than usual. When I walked on court and felt the wind, my game plan was to just be as aggressive as possible given the conditions, and not be the one running as much—I mean, obviously when I play Aryna, I know I’m going to have to run. In the beginning, I thought I was making too many errors, too, so I was like, Okay—I need to scale this back. I think it really was all improvisation from there. Literally just taking it point by point.
You ended your acceptance speech with the Tyler, the Creator quote, “If I ever told you I had a doubt inside me, I must be lying.” Have you guys talked since then?
He texted me! He said that it meant a lot to hear that—just how a small line from his music can have an impact. And he posted on his Instagram Story, so that was cool, too. But yeah—it was something I was thinking about in that match and through this whole French Open, honestly. I did have doubts. I was like, “Am I going to be able to overcome a finals curse?” I just tried to tell myself that, deep down, those doubts weren’t really what I believed.
You beat Lois Boisson in the semi-finals. She had a remarkable run—a home-country Cinderella story. How did you prepare for that, given that because she was a local, you knew she’d have the crowd hugely behind her, and she was obviously kind of an unknown quantity?
I was nervous playing an opponent I’d not seen play much before. You could really only take what she did those past two weeks as part of your scouting. I approached that match with a little bit of a mindset taken from playing Jasmine [Paolini, the Italian player] in Rome a few weeks ago. I lost that match, and I think I let the crowd affect me too much. So I just told myself, I’m going into this match and giving the crowd nothing to lean on.
We loved what you said after that match: that the sun will still rise the next day, and that the world is bigger than tennis. Can you pinpoint an exact moment when that realization dawned on you?
I think it has built up over time, but there is a specific moment that set it in motion. When I woke up after winning the US Open, I was in New York City still. The people in the streets were still moving, the world was still turning. I was like, Okay—even though it obviously means the world to win these tournaments, life will continue whether I do or don’t. Sometimes, when I would lose matches, I would think that everybody was thinking the worst things about me because I lost. I realized those are more so my thoughts than others’.
There was a funny moment earlier in the tournament when you walked out on court, only to find your rackets were missing. The same thing happened to Frances Tiafoe a while back. Has Frances chirped you on that at all?
Yes, definitely. I knew he was going to say something. When we ran into each other, he was like, “I’ve been waiting to see you.” He gave me a lot of crap for it because I gave him a lot of crap when he did it—but honestly, I think it was meant to be, because I was kind of nervous heading into that match in particular. So I think it helped take the load off. And now I won’t give Frances so much crap the next time he does something dumb!
There seems to be a nice kind of humor and camaraderie among the US players—I think Taylor Fritz started the joke of saying “you almost had them” to a player who gets beaten pretty badly.
Yes! I think humor helps you realize it literally is just a game. Finding humor in a loss can be tough, but ultimately, it’s just a game and you should treat it as that.
When is the New Balance x Miu Miu collab coming back? That project seemed to get a great response.
Right now it’s planned to come back in Berlin, but with the French result, we’ll see if anything changes. Next up is a green-and-white fit, as of now.
Was there any feedback about that partnership that’s stuck with you?
I think Doechii followed me on Instagram after that. She’s someone I really like, and I think she saw that I was a Miu Miu girl, too, so I appreciated that!
We’re now heading into grass season, with Wimbledon on the horizon. What’s the biggest thing that you adjust in your game going into grass?
Grass has been trial and error for me. The biggest thing, I think, is just to be more aggressive. On clay, you have a little more time, you can slide, you can use the height of the ball’s bounce a bit more. That’s less so on grass. So I’ll be playing more aggressively, and I want to serve a lot bigger.
Last question: Your maturity and composure out there is really a model. Is there something specific you attribute this to?
Well, I’m the oldest of two younger brothers, and I’m the only girl. I do think girls mature faster, and then, you know, you feel like you have to set the standard for your younger siblings. I also played above my age group when I was younger, so most of the people around me in tennis were older. I think maybe that’s played into it. I was also a bit like the teacher’s pet—I was always the first one in class, and I would be one of those kids that had to be, like, on the green behavioral chart all the time. I think it’s a little bit family, a little bit how I was brought up in the sport, and a little bit just my personality. But I’m not mature in all ways! I’m immature in a lot of other ways. But on court, I will agree: I try to act a little bit older than maybe my age shows.