PARIS — Coco Gauff kept double-faulting. She kept missing plenty of other strokes. She kept losing games in bunches. And all the while, she would let out a sigh or bow her head or look generally uncomfortable.
What the 21-year-old Gauff never did Wednesday during a tense and topsy-turvy French Open quarterfinal against another American woman with a Grand Slam title, Madison Keys, was give up hope or go away. And, in a contest filled with plenty of mistakes, it was Gauff who emerged to grab eight of the last nine games for a 6-7 (6), 6-4, 6-1 victory over Keys and a third trip to the semifinals at Roland-Garros.
''I have had that in me from a young age," said the No. 2-seeded Gauff, who won the 2023 U.S. Open as a teenager and was the French Open runner-up the year before. ''When times become more difficult, knowing that I can dig deep in those tough moments.''
Where did that come from?
''Just a love to win, the will to win. It's not something that's taught or anything. It's just I have always had that in me, and not just in tennis but in everything. I'm a very competitive person,'' she said. ''My philosophy is if I can just leave it all out there, then the loss will hurt a lot less than regrets of maybe not giving it your all.''
Gauff needed to overcame 10 double-faults — three in the opening tiebreaker alone — and the first set she's dropped in the tournament, as well as deal with the big-hitting Keys, the No. 7 seed, who entered with an 11-match Grand Slam winning streak after her title at the Australian Open in January.
They combined for 101 unforced errors and just 40 winners across more than two hours under a closed roof at Court Philippe-Chatrier on a drizzly, chilly day.
Nearly half of the games — 14 of 29 — featured breaks of serve. But from 4-all in the second set, Gauff held four times in a row while pulling away. She made two unforced errors in the last set, including just one double-fault.
