It’s Crystal Clear Again--Sampras Can Forget Paris : French Open: Schaller wins in five sets to slam the door on American’s pursuit of only major title that has eluded him.

Even though Pete Sampras, at 23, has already accomplished more than other merely excellent tennis players have managed in their entire careers, he still has unattained goals, gleaming in the distance. But of late, he can’t seem to reach them.

The French Open is one--the only Grand Slam event he has failed to win.

At Roland Garros, he has been an ardent suitor, willing to change his style and schedule to suit the caprice that is clay-court tennis, as he, like Andre Agassi, yearns to become the first American male since Don Budge in 1938 to win the four Grand Slam events in his career.

It was Sampras’ earnestness about doing well here that made his first-round loss Wednesday all the more poignant. Sturdy Gilbert Schaller of Austria won the match, continued from Tuesday night, in five sets, over 4 hours 2 minutes of tense tennis.

Schaller, ranked No. 24, handed No. 2 Sampras his first first-round loss in a Grand Slam tournament in five years. The scores were 7-6 (7-3), 4-6, 6-7 (7-4), 6-2, 6-4.

Agassi is not having similar difficulties, winning his second-round match against Todd Woodbridge of Australia, 7-5, 6-1, 6-0.

Sampras would seem to be a player at the apogee of his career, but for the level of his own expectations.

The past few months have been a bumpy slide for him, started by his injury and then the illness of his coach. Sampras heated up the tour in the first six months of 1994, winning the Australian Open, making it to the quarterfinals here and winning Wimbledon for the second time.

Sampras remained No. 1 for the entire calendar year, a feat not accomplished since Ivan Lendl’s reign in 1987.

The second half of the season was different. Sampras did not play a tournament between Wimbledon and the U.S. Open, where assorted leg and foot ailments (and Peru’s Jaime Yzaga) overcame him.

After holding the No. 1 ranking for 82 consecutive weeks, he relinquished it to the onrushing Agassi on April 10. Their ensuing weekly battle for supremacy has been a much-touted feature of the men’s tour.

But while Agassi re-dedicated himself to the game and reaped the dividends of his work by beating Sampras to win this year’s Australian Open and Lipton Championships, Sampras has not progressed.

Crestfallen and a little numb after Wednesday’s defeat, Sampras could do little more than repeat how much he wanted to win here.

“This loss is going to sit with me for quite a while,” he said quietly. “One of my major goals was to play well here and hopefully win. I changed my whole schedule to play more on clay and to improve my clay-court game.”

Surely, the twin factors of slow red clay and Schaller’s intelligent tactics had much to do with Sampras’ loss. But a more fundamental problem exists for Sampras, and it can be traced to the sudden illness of his coach, Tim Gullikson. He collapsed during the Australian Open and, after a brief hospitalization, went home to Wheaton, Ill. There, he was found to have a brain tumor.

Since then, Sampras appears afflicted with a profound malaise. Gullikson has been his coach and best friend since 1992. The depth of their relationship was made clear at the Australian Open when, during a match against Jim Courier, Sampras began to cry on the court when a fan mentioned Gullikson’s name.

Gullikson has been unable to travel with Sampras this year. Sampras can win without the coach, as he did convincingly at Indian Wells in March, but he is in desperate need of the friend.

His vulnerability showed against Schaller. The two began play Tuesday night, splitting the first two sets and Sampras going up, 3-1, in the third before play was suspended because of darkness.

On a sunny afternoon Wednesday, Sampras lost the initiative he had gained.

He began with two double faults, losing his serve. Schaller held his first service game and was suddenly even at 3-3. Even though Sampras won the tiebreaker, it was obvious that his powerful serve was not going to bail him out. He had 24 aces in the match, but there was no consistency to his play. He committed 99 unforced errors to Schaller’s 41.

Sampras lost the fourth set and was down, 1-4, in the fifth but fought back to 4-4. Schaller held in the next game, and Sampras was put in a position that in the past would have been excellent--serving to stay in the match. His serve failed again as he wound up getting in only 57% of his first serves during the match.

Sampras double-faulted at 30-30 to give Schaller match point. Sampras’ next serve was strong and he followed it to the net, but Schaller managed to get to a high-sitting volley and whipped a backhand cross-court to pass.

Schaller, who nearly quit the tour a few years ago, was jubilant. Sampras sank in his courtside chair and looked blankly into the distance. His exhaustion was both physical and mental.

In the postmatch news conference, Sampras was asked if he had made a mistake in scheduling--fashioning a long clay-court campaign in Europe but returning to the United States with great frequency.

Sampras called it one of the worst questions he had ever heard, but the question rang with truth.

In the last 2 1/2 months, Sampras’ travel schedule has been as follows:

March 31--Davis Cup at Palermo, Sicily. United States wins. Flies to the United States.

April 10--Barcelona. Lost in first round. Back to the United States.

April 22--Monte Carlo Open. Injures his ankle in first match and defaults. Doctor advises against travel. Flies to the United States the next day.

May 8--German Open at Hamburg. Gets to semifinals. Flies to Rome.

May 15--Italian Open. Loses in first round. Flies to the United States.

May 30-31--Loses in the first round of the French Open. Plans to fly to the United States today.

Even for a fit young athlete, nine transatlantic flights in addition to heavy physical training, are apt to be taxing.

Sampras denied it. His schedule is fine, he said.

He did say that he will probably visit Gullikson this week. In tough times, it’s nice to have a friend to talk to.