After a first-round exit at Wimbledon that left her flustered and frustrated, Coco Gauff made wholesale changes.
She changed her mindset, and her coaching team.
At her very next tournament — at the Citi DC Open — she likened it to building a house.
Now?
The hottest player in the sport, in the U.S. Open quarterfinals, is the new favorite to win it all in Flushing Meadows.
“Still building,” Gauff said as she prepared to take on Jalena Ostapenko at noon Tuesday on Arthur Ashe Stadium.
The expected heat — forecasts of 90 degrees — play into the Florida teen’s hands.
And so does her own play, 15-1 since adding Brad Gilbert to her coaching team.
Gauff, just 19, and newly hired coach Pere Riba brought in Gilbert — who’d guided Andre Agassi, Andy Roddick and Andy Murray — as a consultant on a trial run.
Since?
He’s become integral to Gauff’s best-ever run.
Recent form has made Gauff the betting favorite to win the title, and icons Chris Evert and Jon McEnroe both tabbed her the next U.S. woman to win a Grand Slam.
“I see a different Coco Gauff, and with the new team, with Brad Gilbert on the team giving her some expert advice — he’s been one of the most accomplished coaches out there over the last 30 years — that’s given her an edge that she didn’t have before,” Evert said. “Her attitude and her confidence now has grown to the point where … now she believes that she can win it.”
With good reason.
Gauff dispatched Caroline Wozniacki while No. 1 Iga Swiatek, No. 3 Jess Pegula and No. 5 Ons Jabeur all lost in a 24-hour span that saw the draw open up.
Can she make Ostapenko — who beat her in Australia — the next rung on her ladder?
“With Jelena, she’s a ball-striker. She’s hot or cold, to be honest,” Gauff said. “I might get some more free points with her, more so than Iga; maybe not. Maybe she’ll hit so many winners.”
Gauff’s defense, power and lungs have all been impressive.
But arguably most auspicious has been her grit, rallying from a set down in two of her four matches.
“She battles to be perfect every day, even in practice,” Gilbert said on ESPN. “The most important thing to being great is learning how to win when you’re average. … If you accept that, but know how to compete — while [playing] average — accepting it is what it is, but move on.
“You don’t lose like that. Sometimes when you’re expecting it to go that way and it doesn’t, you don’t find a way to win. She’s told me a couple times, ‘Before, I was never winning that match.’ She wouldn’t find her way out of these situations.’’
Essentially, Gilbert has imparted his “Winning Ugly” motto on his new protégé. She’s gushed over his “incredible” scouting reports and picked up his teachings — at least some.
“I was worried about being with the older person, to be honest, before I met Brad. He’s older, but he still has the mind of a 20-year-old, maybe even younger, a 10-year-old kid sometimes,” Gauff said, laughing. “He played every match with a Jolly Rancher in his mouth. He’s been giving me Jolly Ranchers all the time. I take them but I don’t eat them.
“He’s also been sending me crazy playlists of ’60s and ’70s bands, but I haven’t kept up with it.”
But she has kept up her level, the first American woman to reach consecutive quarterfinals here as a teen since 1999-2001 and Serena Williams — who inspired a generation of black girls like Gauff, the same way Gauff is doing now.
“The long-term impact, it’s huge, the ripple effect for 20 years,” USTA GM of Player Development Martin Blackman told The Post. “I started to see a gradual increase in the number of African-American girls in camps. If you ask them who’s your favorite player … why do you love tennis? ‘Serena. Venus.’
“So we get Sloane [Stephens] and Madison [Keys], and then we get the next generation of Coco and Clervie [Ngounoue] and Robin Montgomery. So that ripple effect is something we’re very blessed to have it and it’s going to continue.”
