Coco Gauff wiped the sweat off her brow as she bowed her head and walked to the net.

She had just lost in the fourth round of the US Open in front of a capacity crowd on Arthur Ashe Stadium to fellow American Emma Navarro in three sets. Her eagerly anticipated title defense was officially over, as was her 2024 major season.

Her disappointment was clear with every step she took off the court.

“Mentally I gave it, and emotionally, I gave it my all,” Gauff later told reporters, before faulting her serving woes for the final result.

The 20-year-old Gauff had recorded 19 double faults in the match, and her serve had been a constant struggle throughout the tournament. In her news conference, she vowed to fix it and said she would consider working with a mechanics coach and getting other opinions.

“[It’s] kind of a mental hurdle that I have to get over,” Gauff said. “But, yeah, I definitely want to look at other things because I don’t want to lose matches like this anymore.”

And since that devastating September day in New York, Gauff has lived up to her promise. Not only has she improved her serve, she hasn’t lost much either. The 2025 season — which technically began during the last week of December — has gotten off to a strong start, and Gauff already looks to be a very legitimate contender for the year’s first Grand Slam title at the Australian Open.

“We are so back,” Gauff wrote on Instagram following her first match at the United Cup. “New szn, better me.”

What can we expect from Gauff in the new year, and what has changed since last season? Let’s break it down before the “Happy Slam” gets underway in Melbourne on Sunday (or Saturday at 7 p.m. ET for those stateside).

OK wait, first, what did Gauff do in 2024?

Few entered the 2024 season with as many expectations as Gauff. Coming off her first major title at the 2023 US Open and having won three other tournaments on the season, Gauff opened last year ranked at No. 3 and showed few signs of slowing down. She kicked off 2024 with her second consecutive title at Auckland following a dominant run in the tournament and impressive three-set win over Elina Svitolina in the final. She then had her best-ever showing at the Australian Open by reaching the semifinals.

Though she did reach the semifinals at Indian Wells in March, the next few months on the hard court proved challenging for Gauff. But she turned things around on clay with semifinal appearances at the Italian Open in May and then later that month at the French Open. She also won her first major doubles title at Roland Garros alongside Katerina Siniakova.

But at Wimbledon — the site of her breakthrough in 2019 — she fell to Navarro in the fourth round. Back on clay weeks later for the Olympics in Paris, Gauff was given the honor of being one of Team USA’s flag bearers for the opening ceremony, alongside LeBron James, but she was unable to win a medal — something she had called a goal all year — despite playing in all three draws. Gauff then won just one match at the Canadian Open and Cincinnati Open, the latter of which she was the defending champion, during her preparations for the US Open. She later admitted both events had been somewhat “mentally draining” following the Olympics but insisted she was “excited” and “ready to go” once she got to New York. But it was not to be.

Following the round-of-16 exit at the US Open and falling to a season-low No. 6 in the rankings, Gauff returned to play later that month for the 1000-level China Open. And everything seemed to click for Gauff in Beijing, as she battled through a star-studded field and won the title with a rousing 6-1, 6-3 victory over Karolina Muchova in the final. She reached the semifinals the following week at the Wuhan Open and ended the season with the trophy at the WTA Finals. Gauff didn’t drop a match in the group stage at the year-end event and recorded wins over Aryna Sabalenka and Iga Swiatek, the top-two ranked players in the world, throughout her run.

“lol safe to say I beat the bad season allegations,” she wrote on X after the trophy ceremony.

Gauff earned a $4.8 million paycheck for the title and ended 2024 back at No. 3 and as the year’s highest-paid female athlete in the world, according to Forbes.

Did she make any changes after the US Open and ahead of the 2025 season?

Yes. She most certainly did.

After the frustrating result at the US Open, Gauff parted ways with her head coach, Brad Gilbert. The two had been working together since the start of the hard-court summer season in 2023, and he had been by her side for her maiden Slam title. But despite their promising start together, few were surprised by the move after her rough summer stretch in 2024.

Gauff even expressed her frustration at times with Gilbert, most notably during a heated exchange during the loss against Navarro at Wimbledon in which she yelled, “Tell me something, you guys aren’t saying anything,” to her box during the match.

“I think we had a game plan going in,” Gauff later told reporters. “I felt that it wasn’t working. I don’t always ask for advice on the box. Today was one of those rare moments where I felt I didn’t have solutions. I don’t want to say I didn’t have any because I think I’m a capable player of coming up with some [but] I think today mentally there was a lot going on. I felt like I wanted more direction from the box.”

After dismissing Gilbert, Gauff then hired Matt Daly, the former coach of Denis Shapovalov, to work in conjunction with her longtime coach Jean-Christophe Faurel. Gauff took several weeks off from competition for a training block ahead of the China Open — her first since before the clay season began in the spring — to implement changes and refocus. In an interview soon after she brought Daly on, Gauff told WTA Insider, she was “really excited” for a fresh start.

“I think it was just time to do a reset, a refresh, and add some things in my game that I felt like I need to do to have a better season next year,” Gauff said.

Daly is considered a grip specialist, and per a post on GripMD, a company in which he co-founded, he works most specifically on grip changes. Gauff confirmed the two were working on that when speaking to reporters in Wuhan. “I don’t want to give too much of what’s going on, but there are changes happening,” she said.

Many around the game took notice of some of those adjustments. Former world No. 1 and 2003 US Open champion Andy Roddick, who also had worked with Gilbert during his career, discussed Gauff’s improvements on his “Served” podcast in November.

“One thing I have noticed is that the serve looks way better, and I know she double-faulted in Wuhan, but the grip is better,” Roddick said. “It is more straight on and what I am seeing is that you are not getting the double faults where one is 3 feet below the net line and the next one is 5 feet long. The variance in misses is way less.

“…. She’s made a little bit of a grip change on her serve; I think it looks way better. I think as the year progressed, she kind of started turning the crank over and over and over a little bit more and maybe got herself into a bit of a bad habit. So credit for Daly for realizing that and switching it. [Her] forehand looks like she’s getting the racket back and prepared a little bit more often so she doesn’t have to do as much work late in the swing and play catch up.”

Gauff has also praised Daly for his help with “tactical stuff [and the] mental side, too.”

Daly declined an interview request for this piece in December, saying he preferred to stay in the background and let Gauff speak for herself and choose to share what they were working on. But he added she was “very mature for her age” and had been a “pleasure to work with so far.”

How has she looked so far this season?

Gauff kicked off her 2025 season on Dec. 29 — yes, in 2024 because, well, tennis — and made a statement with a 6-3, 6-2 win at the United Cup over 2021 US Open finalist Leylah Fernandez. Just hours later she was back on court alongside Taylor Fritz to take on Fernandez and Felix Auger-Aliassime in a mixed doubles match. Once again, Gauff was victorious as the American duo defeated the Canadians 7-6(2), 7-5. Fritz later thanked Gauff for “carrying the team” after her performance in both singles and doubles.

Gauff’s dominance at the event never wavered.

In singles play, she went on to defeat Donna Vekic (Croatia), Zhang Shuai (China), Muchova (Czech Republic) and then Swiatek in the final — all in straight sets — as she helped lead the Americans to a title over Poland. Despite having a 3-11 career record against Swiatek, Gauff has now won their past two matches and looked firmly in control throughout their clash in Sydney with a 6-4, 6-4 victory. Gauff was named the tournament’s Most Valuable Player.

USA with the early break 🤌

How good from @CocoGauff ?! #UnitedCup pic.twitter.com/ZDQFkbjnwC

— United Cup (@UnitedCupTennis) January 5, 2025

Gauff opted to not participate at the 500-level Adelaide event the week before the Australian Open, instead choosing to arrive early in Melbourne and begin training on site. She was spotted practicing with two-time champion Victoria Azarenka earlier in the week, as well as participating in a mixed doubles charity match alongside Andrey Rublev and taking on Daria Saville and Lleyton Hewitt.

What can we expect from her at the Australian Open, and what are her chances to win the whole thing?

That’s the million-dollar — or $2.17 million, to be exact — question. As mentioned before, Gauff recorded her best result at the tournament last year by reaching the semifinals, and as the No. 3 seed, she certainly looks poised to do so yet again. However, repeating that feat, or going even further, won’t be easy.

Gauff opens play Down Under against fellow American Sofia Kenin, who won the 2020 tournament. Kenin upset Gauff in the opening round at Wimbledon in 2023 — their last meeting — and is capable of doing it again. If Gauff wins, her road would only get more difficult. A slew of notable names, including Jelena Ostapenko, Muchova, Belinda Bencic or four-time major champion Naomi Osaka, could await in the fourth round. Her former doubles partner, Jessica Pegula, who reached the final at the US Open in September, could be her opponent in the quarterfinals.

If Gauff were to make it that far, she would potentially set up a clash with Sabalenka, the two-time defending champion who won the title in Brisbane earlier this month, in the semifinals. Swiatek is on the opposite side of the draw, as are Elena Rybakina, Jasmine Paolini and Navarro.

But Gauff sounded confident about the state of her game going into the year’s first major following her performance at the United Cup.

“I have the belief that I’m one of the best players in the world,” she said after the final against Swiatek. “And when I play good tennis, I’m hard to beat.”