Coco Gauff will make her long-awaited return for the United States at the Billie Jean King Cup as she has been included in the squad for the tie against Hungary.

The Americans will take on the European country in the playoffs for a 2027 qualifying spot on home soil in Delray Beach, Florida, on 21 and 22 November.

Lindsay Davenport’s team are looking to return to the qualifiers after the 18-time champions suffered a shock 3-1 defeat to Belgium in April, but the United States captain has named a considerably stronger outfit for their upcoming encounter.

Iva Jovic, McCartney Kessler, Hailey Baptiste, Caty McNally and Nicole Melichar-Martinez represented the US against Belgium and only Melichar-Martinez has made the cut for the squad against Hungary.

World No 5 and two-time Grand Slam winner Gauff will headline the team alongside world No 21 and 2025 Australian Open winner Madison Keys with Ann Li and Taylor Townsend also getting the nod.

WTA News

“I’m very excited for this group of ladies we have set to compete for us in Delray Beach,” former world No 1 Lindsay Davenport.

“This is an incredibly important tie for us to get back to competing for the Billie Jean King Cup title next year, so all of us will be solely focused on accomplishing that.

“I’m grateful to be able to nominate a team with three top 25 players in singles and two top 10 players in doubles at the end of a long season. That tells you how motivated our players are to get the USA back into title contention, and certainly Coco always wants to win on her home turf.”

Player Records

For Gauff, it will be her first BJK Cup outing since April 2023 when she featured in the playoffs against Austria.

Since making her debut in 2022, Gauff has played only four matches for the United States for a 3-1 record with two of those wins coming in the doubles while she is 1-1 in singles.

Keys has a 6-6 win-loss record and she will play for the first time since 2022, while the 26-year-old Li, who has climbed to a career-high No 25 in the WTA Rankings after reaching the quarter-finals of the Wuhan Open, will make her debut.

Townsend is currently No 2 in WTA doubles ranking and won this year’s French Open and US Open women’s doubles tournaments. She last played for the United States in 2025 and has a 6-2 record while Melichar-Martinez is 1-1 having played only two matches.

The United States last won the Billie Jean King Cup in 2017 when they defeated Belarus 3-2 in Minsk while their most recent final appearance was in 2025 when they lost 2-0 against Italy.