TENNIS / JERRY CROWE : It Sure Didn’t Take Long to See That Sampras Had Right Stuff

He was only 16, still a sophomore at Palos Verdes High, but Pete Sampras provided tournament organizers a glimpse of the future when he made his debut in the Newsweek Champions Cup at Indian Wells six years ago.

He made a lasting impression on tournament director Charlie Pasarell even while losing early in a lesser tournament.

Playing in the Adidas Invitational--which is open to college players, top juniors and former tour players, and awards its winner a wild-card entry into the Newsweek event--Sampras lost in the third round.

But, Pasarell recalls, “The moment I saw him hit three or four shots, I said, ‘Boy, this kid is really going to be good.’ I really couldn’t see any weaknesses in his game.

“I sort of felt, when I looked at him, ‘Boy, if I could start all over again, that’s the way I would want to play tennis.’ ”

Pasarell offered the youngster a wild-card entry into the qualifying tournament for the Newsweek event, and Sampras rewarded Pasarell’s faith in his ability by winning three matches, the first over the top-seeded player in the event, to qualify for the main draw.

In the opening round, he upset Ramesh Krishnan, who at the time was ranked among the top 30. In the second round, he won on the stadium court against Eliot Teltscher, a former top-10 player, to reach the round of 16.

Although he was eliminated by Spain’s Emilio Sanchez, Sampras had won five matches in less than a week against professional players.

“He looked pretty much the same way as he does now, except he was a lot thinner and maybe a little bit shorter,” Pasarell said. “But the way he played the game--I was just amazed at how complete his game was.”

Before the end of the year, Sampras had dropped out of school and turned professional. Two years later, he won the first of his two U.S. Open championships, becoming the youngest men’s champion at 19 years 28 days.

He enters this year’s Newsweek Champions Cup, which runs Monday through Sunday at Hyatt Grand Champions, as the world’s No. 1 player and winner of the last three Grand Slam events.

“I don’t want to say I’m a fortune teller, but I saw a tremendous future for him from day one,” Pasarell said. “And thank God, he hasn’t proven me wrong yet.

“I predict he’s going to go into history as one of our greatest players of all time, along with (Rod) Laver, (John) McEnroe, (Jimmy) Connors and those guys.”

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Grunt work: Monica Seles, who announced this month that she will remain sidelined from the WTA Tour for “an indefinite period of time,” told Tennis magazine that her career did not end when she was stabbed by a spectator last April 30 during a tournament at Hamburg, Germany.

“I don’t just want to be remembered for grunting and giggling,” she said. “I hated being known for that. And I don’t just want to be the one who got stabbed. I want to be remembered for my game and I want to give something back to the game. . . . There’s still a lot I want to accomplish.”

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Tall order: Her prom falls only a couple of days before she is scheduled to open defense of her first pro title--at Lucerne, Switzerland--and her graduation is scheduled only 48 hours before Wimbledon, but senior Lindsay Davenport doesn’t plan to skip either event at Murrieta Valley High.

“There are some things I’m not going to miss out on,” said Davenport, who at No. 13 is the top-ranked U.S.-born player on the WTA Tour.

Davenport, 17, who is 6 feet 2, was asked recently who she was dating.

“Anybody over 6-3,” she said.

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Feeling no pain: Tracy Austin, who played only five more tournaments in 1993 after launching her comeback in the Evert Cup last February, said her plan to play a full schedule of about 15 tournaments this year was not changed by last week’s 6-0, 6-0 loss to top-ranked Steffi Graf.

“It’s been a wonderful, wonderful year, just in getting the confidence in my body again,” said Austin, who is ranked 86th. “For so many years, all I was was injured. It seemed like I’d start playing again and get injured again.

“It was so frustrating because all I wanted to do was play. Now, I have confidence in my body again. And that’s a huge barrier to break down.”

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Famous last words: After losing to Graf last week in the opening round of the Evert Cup, Gigi Fernandez told reporters: “If we were on a doubles court, I guarantee you I would have won.”

Two days later, Fernandez and her partner, Natalia Zvereva, the top-ranked women’s doubles team in the world and winner of seven of the last eight Grand Slam events, were upset by Davenport and Lisa Raymond, who were playing in only their fourth tournament together.

Of their on-court teamwork, the 5-5 Raymond, 20, said: “She can cover more of the higher balls, and she’s got the wingspan that I don’t have. I’ve got the wheels, so to speak. I’m more mobile and closer to the ground.”

Tennis Notes

A strong field for the Newsweek Champions Cup includes seven of the top 10 and 14 of the top 18 players in the world. . . . For the first time in the event’s history, night matches will be played Monday through Friday, starting at 6:30. . . . ESPN will televise matches daily starting at 11 a.m. . . . With her victory this month in Paris, Martina Navratilova has won a tournament in 21 consecutive years.

Lisa Raymond, a two-time NCAA champion at Florida, took exception to a comment by Ed Ward, coach of Anne Mall, who dropped out of UCLA in 1992 after one year. Ward said college tennis was a waste of time for women. “I totally disagree with that,” said Raymond, who turned pro last year after her sophomore season. “If anything, the two years I spent at the University of Florida were probably the best thing for my tennis. You grow up both on and off the court, and I think it helped me mature.”

The ninth annual Juvenile Diabetes Foundation/Nutra-Sweet tournament, opening event of a five-city, nationwide celebrity tennis and golf tour, is scheduled for March 7 at North Ranch Country Club in Westlake Village.