How can Coco Gauff improve her subpar service game?

Remarkably, Gauff keeps racking up wins despite her Achilles heel, raising the question: how good could she be if she fixes her serve?

Many have tried to dissect the issues in Gauff's serve. Last year, after she committed 19 double faults in a fourth-round loss to Emma Navarro at the U.S. Open, former player Rennae Stubbs publicly criticized Gauff's serving technique during an ESPN broadcast while in the presence of Gauff's former coach, Brad Gilbert. The awkward moment was quickly followed by Gauff firing Gilbert, putting the onus on her new coaches, Matt Daly and Jean-Christophe Faurel, to fix her serve.

Predictably, Gauff's new coaching staff has been unable to fix her service game, prompting others to chime in with their opinions. The latest being the legendary Rick Macci, who coached Serena Williams, Venus Williams, Andy Roddick, Maria Sharapova and Jennifer Capriati, among other slam winners, during his active years on the Tour.

In a chat with Tennis365, Macci assured that he can fix Gauff's service game within one offseason, citing her second serve — and the muscle memory tied to the stance — as the main issues.

"I would have her go to a platform stance, right now she does a pinpoint," he said. "And I'm not saying it's wrong. I mean, [there are] world class servers [who use] pinpoint. But the corrective technique has to jolt the muscle memory, and I gotta re-program the reflexes from the beginning. So, in a platform stance, it'd be like fresh out of the oven. And then from there, the whole timing would be very different, her vertical component would be easier to correct – that means her upward movement."

Macci added he can modify Gauff's stance from pinpoint to platform "in one hour," but would still need an offseason to iron out other flaws. 

Gauff enters the upcoming U.S. Open with little expectation to repeat her heroics from 2023, when she captured her first major title at Flushing Meadows. Following her 2025 French Open victory, she lost in the first round at Berlin and Wimbledon, before being knocked out in the third round by teenager Victoria Mboko in Montreal.