City Tennis Champion Faces Difficult Return

For years, Dragan Jovanovski, a precocious tennis player with a powerful backhand, dreamed of life in the United States. But when he awoke, he was always faced with a stark reality.

“I used to dream that I would be walking along the street in the United States, seeing all these things,” he said. “But I would wake up and still be in Yugoslavia, and I would be so unhappy. Everything is limited there. People don’t believe they can succeed in anything.”

Two years ago, his dream reached fruition. He boarded a plane for Los Angeles. But he was only 15 years old and he was alone.

“Before the airplane left the ground, I was only a little sad that I might not see my family for one to three years,” he said.

But as the plane departed, Jovanovski suddenly realized that he was leaving behind his family. It hit him like an overhead smash.

“I could not help but cry,” he said. “The tears, they just came.”

Jovanovski arrived in Los Angeles in 1989 and, within 20 months, had claimed the City Section individual tennis championship. The North Hollywood High junior defeated Grant’s Paul Knizek, an emigrant from Czechoslovakia, 6-3, 6-3, last week at The Racquet Centre in Studio City.

The victory capped a season in which Jovanovski’s skills seemed to improve with each match. One match in particular, in the quarterfinals of the Ojai tennis tournament in April, might have proved beneficial to the 5-foot-10, 150-pound Jovanovski.

“We noticed his serve, under pressure, has a tendency to be a little shaky,” North Hollywood Coach Joseph Traham said. “So he worked on that and improved it tremendously, and he saved his best match for the finals.”

Yet, that might have been the last high school match for Jovanovski, who could lose the financial support he needs to continue living in the United States.

Jovanovski lives in North Hollywood with Jorgo Ognenovski, an assistant professional at the Mulholland Tennis Club in Los Angeles who coached Jovanovski in Yugoslavia. Ognenovski, who came to the United States in 1987, arranged for Jovanovski’s student visa because of the limited opportunities his home country provided aspiring tennis players.

“The conditions are horrible,” Ognenovski said. “We struggle all the time because we have no balls and no string for our rackets.”

A can of three tennis balls costs $12 in Yugoslavia, where salaries for the country’s top surgeons range from $500 to $600 a month, according to Ognenovski.

“It is ridiculous,” he said. “Who is going to buy a $12 can of tennis balls when they make only $500?”

So Jovanovski, a left-hander who admires the intensity of John McEnroe, came to the United States to further his tennis career.

Jovanovski, polite and well-mannered, speaks with a strong accent but patiently repeats himself to ensure understanding. He displays the same quiet determination on the court.

He works a ball machine relentlessly in search of the perfect stroke. Jovanovski practices two hours in the morning, attends classes at North Hollywood, then returns to the court for another couple of hours of practice in the evening.

“If I tell Dragan to practice four or five hours, he does it,” Ognenovski said. “Most kids can’t take it after one or two months, but Dragan can, and that’s what makes him a great athlete.”

Traham, his high school coach, said Jovanovski does everything but breathe fire when he’s on the court.

“He’s willing to work and put in the time,” said Traham, whose Calabasas High teams won nine Southern Section titles in the 12 seasons he coached there.

Traham, who coached two high school All-Americans at Calabasas, ranks Jovanovski among the top 10 players he has coached. He was particularly impressed last Wednesday when Jovanovski overpowered Knizek despite a shin injury that hampered his serve-and-volley attack.

“That he won even though he had an injury is a tribute to Dragan,” Traham said. “He was able to do what he had to do to win.”

However, Jovanovski is going to need all the determination he can muster if he is to find a way out of his current predicament. Ognenovski’s two children recently moved in with Ognenovski and Jovanovski in their two-bedroom apartment. Jovanovski has moved to the living-room couch and Ognenovski no longer can afford to support his budding young star.

“I just am not in a position to support Dragan,” he said. “I will not give up on trying to find a solution, but if I cannot find one, he will return to Yugoslavia.”

Jovanovski, 17, will return to Yugoslavia later this month for the first time since he left. If he stays in Europe, his chances of earning a scholarship to a college in this country seem remote.

“I would hate to see him stay, because this next year is very crucial to his development,” Ognenovski said. “He knows if he goes back, he will not be as good as he would if he stayed here.”

For his part, Jovanovski is unsure of his future, saying he might return to the United States after earning his high school degree in Yugoslavia.

“My family never believed me when I said I would some day come to the United States,” he said. “They said I was dreaming.”