Cardiologist’s Tennis Game Takes a Beating

If on the outside it appeared that Dr. Leland Housman wasn’t playing with enough heart to win a singles championship in the Grand Prix Masters tournament Sunday, the truth is he had too much heart.

Housman, the 1989 champion, trailed by three games and was three points from defeat in the second set before he rallied back to lead in a tiebreaker that would have sent his final match against Dick Johnsrud into a third set. But Housman of San Diego eventually lost the men’s 45s match, 6-3, 7-6 (7-5), at the Rancho Bernardo Inn.

Though he battled back from 2-5 with Johnsrud of Riverside serving, to lead the tiebreaker, 5-4, Housman looked unfocused and lethargic at times.

He missed wide with a forehand passing shot in the tiebreaker, couldn’t catch up to Johnsrud’s left-to-right crossing another shot and couldn’t get enough topspin on a forehand. Game, set, match.

“You’re absolutely right,” Housman, 49, responded to the post-match critique. “It was a matter of concentration. I had a lapse. A couple of times I caught myself thinking of other things.”

Housman was thinking about two people recovering in a San Diego hospital--patients on whom he had performed open-heart surgery the day before.

Housman, a cardiologist, executed two triple bypasses. Both procedures were emergencies, he said.

Housman, who was injured last year, came into the Grand Prix Championships with the most points in his age group (2,000) and poised to reclaim the championship after two years. But Saturday’s events took away some of his competitive edge.

“It’s hard to work for a living and do this at the same time,” he said. “In fact, I’ve got to go to (Mercy) hospital now.

“It’s tough, but that’s why I’m proud of what I’m able to do. I’m always running.

“Most guys check into the hotel, sleep in, have breakfast, hit a few balls and go at a leisurely pace. But I don’t make this an excuse.”

Housman said he was disappointed at being called away only because it meant he would not see his son, Scott, 15, play two freshman basketball games for USDHS Saturday.

Housman was at Mercy at 6:30 a.m., five hours before his semifinal match, preparing for his first surgery at 7:30 a.m. Housman finished sometime between 12:30 and 1 p.m., at which time he had to hurry back to the hospital at 2 p.m. to prepare for the second operation.

“They were both urgent, because we normally don’t schedule heart surgeries on Saturday,” said Housman. Both were successful.

If that wasn’t enough of a concern, Housman’s beeper went off in the middle of his match Saturday. He was notified that one of his patients in the intensive care unit went into cardiac arrest. Housman was on the verge of forfeiting the match when he got word an emergency team resuscitated the patient.

Said Housman, “That cost me a few games of concentration.”

And his concentration was wavering Sunday, but Housman came up with big shots in a second set, which featured eight service breaks.

Johnsrud broke three of Housman’s first four services, the fourth after Housman led, 40-15. At deuce, Housman netted an easy forehand to give Johnsrud the advantage, then double-faulted.

Johnsrud, who lost to Housman in three sets in the 1989 semifinals, found himself serving for the match with a 5-2 lead. But Housman came up with a weird game-winner, hitting a forehand that popped off the top the net and floated over the head of the charging Johnsrud.

After he held serve to make it 5-4 and broke Johnsrud again to pull even at 5-5, Johnsrud broke Housman a fifth time with a rifling forehand that put him back up, 6-5.

Then it happened again. Housman, serving with the advantage in the 12th game of the set, hit the lip of the net with a forehand. There again was Johnsrud, racing in for a cross-court volley and helplessly watching the ball land like a parachute inside the baseline. That tied it, 6-6, and forced the tiebreaker.

Johnsrud went ahead, 3-1, in the tiebreaker before Housman caught him, 4-4, and passed him, 5-4, with two unforced errors. But that’s when Housman made two bad shots and Johnsrud took the final three points to win the match.

“I wasn’t moving my feet because my brain wasn’t telling me to,” said Housman. “When I got ahead I relaxed instead of concentrated.”