WIMBLEDON : Chang Misses Chance in Fourth, Loses in Fifth : Tennis: Mayotte calls his tough victory over 19-year-old a fun match. Agassi avoids an upset.

There must be something about Michael Chang that brings out the best in the older guys. Call him Dr. Chang, the career-healer.

The 19-year-old Chang, seeded ninth at Wimbledon, lost an exciting five-setter Friday to Tim Mayotte, who will turn 31 in August. The score read more like a calculus exam than a tennis score. It was 6-7 (8-6), 4-6, 6-1, 7-6 (11-9), 6-2, and Chang wasted four match points in the fourth set.

On a day when Andre Agassi barely escaped with a five-set victory, Patrick McEnroe upset 11th-seeded Emilio Sanchez, and Boris Becker, Ivan Lendl, Jim Courier and Steffi Graf cruised in straight sets, Chang lost only the second five-set match of his career. He has won nine of them to date, including his recent, much-celebrated encounter with an opponent even older than Mayotte, the soon-to-be-39 Jimmy Connors. Chang and Connors traded slap shots for more than four hours in the French Open, and it ended only when Connors walked off one point ahead after the first point of the fifth set, too pooped to continue.

After that match in Paris, which brought the fans at Roland Garros Stadium to their feet in an ovation of admiration for Connors’ effort, Connors decided that if his badly injured wrist had held up so well for four hours against Chang, it might hold up for another fortnight at Wimbledon. He is competing here for the 19th time and, having advanced past Veli Paloheimo of Finland in straight sets Friday, is assured of playing his 100th Wimbledon match, most for any man in this tournament.

So, he has Dr. Chang to thank for some healing, as does Mayotte.

Mayotte hadn’t played a tournament match since April, and the former top-10 player was ranked 94th coming into Wimbledon. He hurt his back, had that injury reoccur three times, then suffered tendinitis in his knees during his recent comeback try. So shaky was the former NCAA champion from Stanford that he sought coaching from Billie Jean King, who eventually sent him away, telling him to get his head back in order before they attempted more work.

Whatever new mental approach resulted, it not only worked against Chang, it manifested itself in a slightly strange way. Throughout the match--especially at the most pressure-packed times, such as when he was facing match points--Mayotte displayed a wide, relaxed smile.

“It was just a good time out there,” he said. “I came in realizing that, with no preparation and coming off injuries and stuff, I couldn’t go out there expecting too much.

“So I just tried to get into the atmosphere out on the court, and the crowd really got behind it. It was infectious really, and I just started laughing more and more. . . . It was really one of the most fun matches I have played.”

He won it with a running cross-court forehand, his second match point, handing Chang his first first-round loss in a Grand Slam tournament.

“I didn’t know what to expect,” Chang said, “because he hasn’t been playing a whole lot, and his results lately haven’t been as good as they used to be. I think that he did come in here with a certain amount of confidence, because he has done well in the past.”

Indeed, Mayotte has played in 10 previous Wimbledons and has been a semifinalist once and a quarterfinalist five times, including as recently as 1989, when he ousted the newly crowned French Open champion, Chang, in straight sets.

Chang, who had never lost a match in which he had four match points, said he wasn’t thinking about a repeat situation from this year’s French Open.

“Not on grass,” Chang said. “You really don’t have that kind of thinking. When I was playing Connors and we just started the fifth, I wasn’t thinking, ‘Hurry up and tumble over,’ or something.”

Will Connors tumble over here? The London odds have him at 200-1. Asked how he reacted to that, he said: “I’m worth a pound or two, just for old times’ sake, don’t you think?”

Agassi beat Canadian Grant Connell, 4-6, 6-1, 6-7 (8-6), 7-5, 6-3, completing a match stopped by rain. The two had left Centre Court Thursday at a set apiece and 1-1, and much of the attention then was directed at Agassi’s all-white attire.

But in those first two-plus sets and in the remaining play, some superb tennis was played. Agassi got away with a lucky net cord at a crucial moment in the fourth set when it seemed Connell might get in a position to serve it out and was the first to admit his good fortune.

“I have a good hunch that he would have served a pretty big game (for the match),” Agassi said. “I think that (the lucky net cord) cost him the match. If he had not missed that, I wouldn’t be here. I was pretty lucky.”

Patrick McEnroe, John’s younger brother and a rapidly improving player on all surfaces, took out the Spanish star, Sanchez, 6-3, 7-6 (7-4), 6-1; Becker ran over fellow German Carl-Uwe Steeb, 6-4, 6-2, 6-3; Lendl had an easy time with Kelly Evernden, the New Zealander, 6-2, 7-5, 7-6 (7-5); French champion Courier defeated Rodolphe Gilbert, 6-4, 6-2, 7-6 (7-3), and Graf beat Peanut Louie Harper, 6-0, 6-1, in 39 minutes.