TENNIS OJAI TOURNAMENT : Stanford’s O’Brien Gets Pac-10 Title

Stanford history major Alex O’Brien learned something from losing the Pacific 10 men’s singles final in the Ojai Valley tennis event last year. So he did something about it.

“My serve was a mockery,” O’Brien said.

With a revamped serve, O’Brien proved he had learned his lesson well as last year’s runner-up became this year’s winner. O’Brien defeated Stanford teammate Jonathan Stark, 7-6 (7-3), 6-1, Sunday to take the Pac-10 singles title at Libbey Park.

O’Brien, a junior from Amarillo, Tex., turned the match in his favor in the tiebreaker. He trailed, 3-1, and won the next six points, then began the second set with back-to-back service breaks.

“From there, it was over pretty quick,” Stark said.

Down 3-1 in the tiebreaker, O’Brien was in trouble. He looked around for something to blame. He looked down and yelled “Feet!”

The reason?

“It was like my feet were planted in cement,” O’Brien said.

Stark said his own feet are completely well. He suffered a stress fracture of his left foot last spring and missed some time, then reinjured the foot last fall and spent more time on the bench.

The highly regarded sophomore isn’t sure whether he will return to Stanford next fall, but O’Brien said his own decision has pretty much been made.

“I’m fairly sure I’m coming back,” he said. “I have a lot more work to do on my game . . . and not just my serve.”

Stanford’s Sandra Birch, who will turn pro this summer, won the Pac-10 women’s singles championship with a 6-3, 6-0 decision over UCLA’s Kimberly Po, who also plans to turn pro this summer.

Birch, 21, No. 1 in the Volvo Tennis/Collegiate rankings, graduates in June with a degree in economics.

“Everybody has different priorities,” Birch said. “I wanted to finish school first, then move on.”

Po, 19, is taking a different approach to the pros. She is leaving school in June at the end of her sophomore year, but plans on returning to UCLA to get her degree.

“I’m just going to see how it goes,” Po said. “If I don’t like it, I’ll go back to school. If I do like it, I’ll stay.”

Po made 40 unforced errors in losing to Birch, but UCLA Coach Bill Ziama cautioned against making too much out of the match.

“Last year she tore ligaments in her elbow and this year she tore ligaments in her thumb. Kim has not played enough college tennis because of injuries to play Sandra at this level,” said Ziama, who nevertheless supports Po’s decision to leave UCLA.

“You only have X-number of years to play quality tennis,” Ziama said.