Tennis phenom wants to be next Serena
DELRAY BEACH — Cori “Coco” Gauff has an impressive resume at age 14: junior Grand Slam champion, No. 1 ranked girls tennis player by the International Tennis Federation, and, as of Tuesday, holder of a key to the city of Delray Beach.
The tennis phenom and Delray native — who got her start on the clay courts of Delray ’s Pompey Park — was presented with the key to the city at a ceremony Tuesday night.
“The city is behind you, supporting you 100 percent,” Mayor Shelly Petrolia told Gauff, calling her a local “celebrity.”
On Monday, Gauff was ranked the No. 1 junior girls player by the International Tennis Federation — the youngest to earn the ranking.
A small group of family, city officials and residents crowded around Gauff inside Delray Beach City Hall as the mayor handed her a 4-inch, metal key with “City of Delray Beach” inscribed at the top. “This is home,” Gauff said. Gauff was fresh off a plane from Great Britain, where she played at Wimbledon. Gauff ’s mom, Candi, didn’t tell her she would be celebrated at the city meeting.
“She dragged me to a city commission meeting,” Gauff said with a laugh. “I didn’t know until 10 minutes before.”
Before Wimbledon, G au ff clinched the French Open girls’ singles title, her first junior Grand Slam championship, after defeating Caty McNally, ranked No. 8 in the world.
She became the youngest-ever finalist in the girls’ singles event at the U.S. Open in September.
But it was Gauff ’s modest start on the courts in Delray that caught the attention and admiration of locals. She, like a handful of other tennis stars, learned her craft at the public park on Northwest Second Street near West Atlantic Avenue.
“I’ve been playing there since I can remember,” said the prodigiously-skilled Gauff. “My first tennis memory is there. Everyone there, I feel like we’re all a big family.”
So it’s only fitting that Gauff ’s favorite tennis player is powerhouse Serena Williams, a Palm Beach Gardens resident who also spent her formative tween years practicing on the same pot-hole covered courts of Pompey Park in the 1990s.
“I think she’ll always be my favorite player,” Gauff said. Gauff tweeted a picture of Williams at Wimbledon with the caption, “You are amazing.”
About a year ago, Williams and then-fiance Alexis Ohanian visited Pompey Park to “walk down memory lane,” former coach William “Bill” Murray told The Palm Beach Post.
Tennis analysts have drawn comparisons between Gauff and Williams, whose coach Patrick Mouratoglou has taken an interest in Gauff since she was 11. She’s trained with Mouratoglou several times at his academy in France.
Gauff says she dreams of being “the next Serena Williams.”
“That’s the plan,” she said. “I just have to work hard at it every day.”