U.S. Open Women’s Final: Coco Gauff Wins First Grand Slam Title

Down a set and fighting just to stay in games, Gauff’s signature fist-pumps and shouts of “Come on!” harkened to Serena Williams, her legendary predecessor as the queen of Flushing Meadows. She started chasing and lunging toward ball after ball, rattling Sabalenka into error after error. Each highlight charged up the crowd, sending more noise bouncing off the walls and the roof, helping to wither Sabalenka’s spirit.

“It doesn’t get more dramatic than that,” Gauff said.

Sabalenka will become the new world No. 1 Monday, a mark of her prowess all year that included the Australian Open title. But this — and Gauff — were too much.

“I gave them energy, and she started to be better,” Sabalenka said.

As soon as it was over, waves of congratulatory messages streamed forth, from two former presidents, Barack Obama and Bill Clinton, along with many others.

As well as she had played throughout the two-week tournament, Gauff said she didn’t start to envision winning the title until Friday night. And she wanted that thought out of her head. She called her boyfriend and they talked until 1 a.m., when it was time to go sleep. There was a big day ahead.

Her victory, which came with a $3 million payday, was a coronation of sorts for the new face of the sport in America.

Her father had brought her to the U.S. Open as a young girl. She sat in the stands watching the Williams sisters pave the way for the next generation of Black American players.

“They’re the reason why I have this trophy today,” she said Saturday night.

Since she first broke through with a victory over Venus Williams on Centre Court at Wimbledon in 2019, Gauff’s rise to the elite level of the sport was more a question of when rather than if. That ascent took on a new urgency when Serena Williams, widely considered the greatest player of the modern era, said she would step away from tennis after her final match at this tournament last year.

Gauff, who grew up in Delray Beach, Fla., the daughter of a teacher and a midlevel health care executive who have spent much of the past four years traveling the world with her, figured to be the most likely next face of tennis. Around her 10th birthday, she was selected to join the prestigious academy in France overseen by Serena Williams’s longtime coach, Patrick Mouratoglou, where she spent roughly 10 weeks a year training. She dominated her age group and made the U.S. Open junior final when she…