Gauff needed a third set comeback against Mirra Andreeva in the quarterfinals, saving two match points in a tiebreak after losing the first set 6-2 in just 26 minutes, then closed it out 2-6, 7-6(7), 6-2 to set up a semifinal against incoming world No. 1 Elena Rybakina. That win followed a more straightforward fourth round victory over 18 year old American Iva Jovic, 6-1, 6-4, but even that match started shakily with a double fault gifting Jovic an early break before Gauff reeled off six straight games.
Just how bad were the numbers behind Gauff’s quarterfinal win
Genuinely rough, which makes the outcome more impressive rather than less. Gauff finished the Andreeva match with 42 unforced errors against just 22 winners, including 12 double faults, and won only five of the first 21 points played.
Andreeva, by contrast, made just five unforced errors in the entire opening set. Former British No. 1 Annabel Croft, calling the match for BBC Radio, said Gauff looked barely recognizable between the start and end of the match, moving from subdued and defensive tennis early on to complete control by the finish. That kind of statistical gap winning out anyway is rare, and it says more about Gauff’s ability to survive bad tennis than to avoid it.
Coco Gauff comes back from a set down to earn her 90th Major match win 🙌
She advances to her second-career US Open semifinal 🔥 pic.twitter.com/dFjdkQYlVa
— ESPN (@espn) September 9, 2026
What actually flipped the match in Gauff’s favor
A double fault opened the second set tiebreak in a way that looked ominous, but Gauff held her composure to save both match points that followed, winning a 39 shot rally at one stage to set up the equalizer. Andreeva’s response told its own story.
She managed just two unforced errors across the entire final set compared to Gauff’s earlier struggles, yet still fell apart mentally, flinging her racket toward her chair after getting broken early in the third and later admitting she had been holding her emotions in for too long before finally letting them out in frustration.
Why does the Rybakina matchup carry extra weight
Rybakina did not just qualify for the semifinal, she claimed the world No. 1 ranking outright by getting there, arriving at the tournament trailing Aryna Sabalenka by only 434 points and locking in the top spot with her win over Zheng Qinwen.
She and Gauff have split their two career meetings evenly, but Rybakina won the most recent one in the Toronto semifinals just last month. Gauff acknowledged as much afterward, noting that Rybakina is arriving at this match in a completely different headspace now that she is playing from the top of the rankings rather than chasing it, which changes how she expects the Kazakh star to approach Thursday’s match compared to their past meetings.
Is there a bigger storyline building around this whole tournament
Yes, and Gauff’s win completed it. This marks the first time since Wimbledon 2009 that all four top seeds have reached the semifinals of a Grand Slam women’s draw, with Sabalenka and Pegula having already advanced.
There is also a smaller story worth noting in the player Gauff and Rybakina didn’t have to face. Zheng Qinwen entered the tournament ranked 121st after elbow surgery cut short her 2025 season, fought through three qualifying rounds just to reach the main draw, then upset both Madison Keys and Iga Swiatek before falling to Rybakina in three sets. She heads into the rest of the season back inside the top 60, a quieter redemption story that got buried under the bigger headlines from Wednesday’s results.
