HOLDING COURT

AT 20, DEFENDING U.S. OPEN CHAMPION COCO GAUFF IS MOVING INTO A NEW PHASE OF HER CAREER 

- SEAN GREGORY

AT THE BNP PARIBAS OPEN IN Indian Wells, Calif., maybe the most prestigious nonmajor tournament on the global tennis tour, players conduct their warm-up routines on a patch of grass outside the stadium. Some toss medicine balls to their trainers, while others stretch with elastic bands. A few pedal lightly on upright bikes. One player throws a Frisbee.

Then Coco Gauff takes the field.

Gauff, who in September became the first American teenager to win the U.S. Open in nearly a quarter-century, grabs a football, sends a guy downfield, and uncoils a tight, 40-yard spiral, right into the receiver’s chest. Then she does it again. And again.

Gauff’s cannon is a flex. I see your toe-tapping a soccer ball and raise you a Patrick Mahomes bomb. Gauff, who grew up in the football hotbed of South Florida, takes tremendous pride in showing off her athleticism. “It’s not really for the girls,” Gauff tells TIME in early March, about a week before her 20th birthday. “I don’t think they care too much, especially the Europeans. They don’t know much about football.” Her throws are designed to mess with the men. “I do like to show, especially the American guys, that I can probably throw it just as far as them, if not farther,” says Gauff. “I love to get in the American guys’ heads.”

To her coach, former tour player and current ESPN commentator Brad Gilbert, Gauff’s live arm speaks to her still untapped potential. “When you see that, it’s almost like ‘Sh-t, she should be serving better,’” he says.