Rick Macci, a former coach of Serena Williams and Venus Williams, has encouraged Coco Gauff to experiment with her serve during the off-season.
Gauff, ranked this year by SportsPro as the world's most marketable tennis player, always receives much media scrutiny, but her serving difficulties generated a particularly high level of attention throughout 2024.
The 20-year-old, for the most part, possesses a powerful and effective first serve. It is Gauff's second serve that broke down several times this season, costing her matches she would have won.
That reality is demonstrated by Gauff holding the unwanted record of the most double faults served in 2024. Her total of 430 is slightly worse than it looks because she played more matches this year than any other WTA player, but it is still alarmingly high.
Gauff also served the most double faults in a single match this season. That occurred during a three-set loss to Aryna Sabalenka in the Wuhan Open semifinal, a match the American lost despite dominating in most other aspects of the contest.
However, there were very encouraging signs for Gauff during the WTA Finals. Although not entirely fixed, her second serve was much less problematic throughout, helping her to thrive at the event in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Gauff won the WTA Finals, securing the second-biggest title of her career in the process. She had to battle through an epic and physically grueling final against Qinwen Zheng, eventually prevailing in a final set tiebreak.
Last year's US Open champion recovered from losing the first set and being a break down in the second and third sets against Zheng to triumph, one of many examples of Gauff's outstanding mentality despite still being just 20.
There may be no other WTA player who could have won matches as consistently as Gauff has this year despite having such significant problems with her second serve and moderate issues with her forehand. She digs in more than anyone else.
Macci, a hall-of-fame tennis coach, has spoken about Gauff's serve in the past. He feels that a biomechanical approach could solve her consistent issues with it in less than an hour.
The highly respected coach wrote about Gauff's serve once again in a post on X (formerly Twitter). He thinks the world No. 3 should use the current off-season to try different approaches with the serve and identify what works best for her.
"The time for pros to improve is the off season. Experiment on the serve since you are in control. Changing from pinpoint to platform or platform to pinpoint could help and understanding that it is counter intuitive regarding the leg drive innates the racquet entry. @CocoGauff"
Gauff had an outstanding end to the 2024 season after hiring Matt Daly to replace Brad Gilbert, winning the China Open and ATP Finals. The American's sometimes troublesome forehand was already much improved in those tournaments.
Daly and Gauff undoubtedly have a plan for her serve during the off-season, but listening to a respected figure like Macci might also help the young star thrive.
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