Olympic pressure appears to get the best of Coco Gauff, Emma Navarro

Coco Gauff and Emma Navarro are worthy Olympic competitors, but on Tuesday in Paris was a day both may want to forget.

There are various ways to look at Gauff’s self-sabotaging meltdown and Navarro’s bitter criticism of Zheng Qinwen. The most penetrating may be that both Americans caved under the unique pressure generated by their first experience of the quadrennial event.

That doesn’t justify the bold-faced cases of inappropriate conduct, but it does underscore just how much hope both women had invested in their maiden Games. You can’t put it down to rookie mistakes, but the fact that both players are popular, easygoing, easy-to-like thoughtful individuals is telling. Their outbursts were, first and foremost, uncharacteristic.

Gauff’s breakdown occurred in the second set of her third-round match with Croatian Wimbledon semifinalist Donna Vekic. Gauff lost the first set in a tense 9-7 tiebreaker. At 3-2 for Vekic in the second set, chair umpire Jaume Campistol overruled on a Vekic shot that was initially called out. Gauff’s return to the shot then went into the net. Gauff then appealed to the chair, hoping to replay the point. The official clearly did not feel that Gauff’s response was sufficiently impacted by the overrule. It was one of those hairline judgment calls.

However you or anyone else feels about the details, the ensuing rant by Gauff, and her insistence on drawing the tournament supervisor into the a squabble—rendered to a growing chorus of boos—was surprisingly vehement as well as counterproductive. While arguing, Gauff claimed she was getting “constantly cheated on” (a reference to a similar situation at Roland Garros) and repeated, over and over, that it wasn’t “fair.” She lost her composure, lost the match without winning another game, and left the court in tears.

You have to feel for her. The correctness of the decision can be debated with gusto. But there’s no escaping that Gauff was the architect of her own demise.

Navarro’s outburst was just as surprising, although not as costly because she had already lost her third-rounder to China’s Zheng, 6-7 (7), 7-6 (4), 6-1. At the net after the match, Navarro lectured Zheng at length, although there were no untoward incidents during the play. Navarro abandoned her customary cool when she met with the media, ripping Zheng in comments to France’s AFP. She characterized Zheng as a locker-room pariah, declared her lack of respect for the Chinese player, and claimed that Zheng “goes about things in a pretty cut-throat way.”

All Zheng appeared to do to earn the diatribe was play as if her hair were on fire as she ran away with the final set. She took the high road afterward, telling AFP, “If she’s (Navarro) not happy about my behavior, she can come and tell me. I would like to correct it to become a better player and a better person. . .“I will not consider it (the criticism) an attack because she lost the match.”

You can bet that many fans were chortling over the demise of the two American women, both of whom had been over the moon about appearing in their first Olympic Games. That enthusiasm spiraled out of control. Put it down to a virulent manifestation of “Olympic Fever.”