Spadea Learns Lesson: Never Play Five-Setter Against Chang

Vince Spadea has been the next-young-thing long enough. He just turned 22 and it was time he experienced playing Michael Chang at a Grand Slam event.

In time, Spadea will come to see Saturday’s third-round match at the U.S. Open as a painful but necessary coming of age. For now, he sees a “great opportunity”--beating the tournament’s second-seeded player--that somehow slipped from his grasp.

That’s part of the learning curve on the men’s tour. Nothing slipped from Spadea that Chang hadn’t already been tugging on during the 3-hour 50-minute tussle. Chang won--it was a five-set match, of course he won--6-4, 5-7, 2-6, 7-5, 6-3.

Spadea can be forgiven his bewilderment at losing a match in which he dictated play. Normally, and against others, he would have won the match. But Chang possesses abnormal willpower that grips him even more intently during major events.

Everyone on the tour knows this, but like the child who insists on touching the hot stove to verify its temperature, Spadea had to find out for himself about Chang’s fabled staying power.

“In all the matches that I play, if I’m down and a guy is serving for it, I don’t count myself out,” Chang said. “I try not to be worried about the situation, not absorbed by it. I just go out and play each point, because points turn into games, games turn into sets, sets turn into matches. A match as tough as today’s is just not over until that last point is hit.”

Saturday’s match involved a more dramatic comeback than usual. Spadea was serving to go up 5-4 in the fourth set, while leading two sets to one. Chang, whose mobility was compromised by cramps, said it was a bleak moment.

“To be honest with you, I don’t really know how I was able to win today’s match, I really don’t,” he said.

To be honest, it was business as usual. Chang hangs in long enough so that he can count on his opponent to lose either interest or stamina.

Spadea is young and fit, and as tiring as the match was, he was prepared to play more. What he found out was the importance of mental stamina, which in his young body gave out before his cardiovascular system.

“I was in control of the match,” Spadea said. “It’s hard to say, it’s not like I just kept it close and it just happened to go five sets. It was my match to win. Whether he was playing well or not, I was the better player for most of the third and fourth sets. I guess that’s why it’s three out of five.”

Chang will never give up, and Spadea has now learned that he must seize the match, lest even his aggressive play will be met and blunted by some clever Chang counterattack.

“He’s going to make you work for every ball,” Spadea said. “He’s going to make you hit the shots at 6-all and 5-all that you hit at 1-love.”

Spadea moved forward at every opportunity. Chang’s poor serving--he got in only 35% of his first serves and double-faulted 13 times--gave Spadea enough break points to keep him hopeful.

Chang’s hope was reclaimed at that aforementioned bleak moment. He broke Spadea in the ninth game of the fourth set, lost his serve in the next game, but then won the next 11 points and the set.

The fifth set was not the corner-to-corner hitting that the two had displayed earlier, but fatigue had become a factor. As Spadea learned.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Featured Matches

Today’s featured matches at the U.S. Open:

DAY SESSION

Beginning 8 a.m. PDT

STADIUM COURT

* Men--Paul Haarhuis vs. Stefan Edberg; No. 1 Pete Sampras vs. Alexander Volkov.

* Women--Sandrine Testud vs. No. 2 Monica Seles.

GRANDSTAND

* Men--No. 4 Goran Ivanisevic vs. Hendrik Dreekmann; Mark Philippoussis vs. No. 16 Cedric Pioline.

* Women--Asa Carlsson vs. No. 4 Conchita Martinez; Amanda Coetzer vs. Lisa Raymond.

NIGHT SESSION

Beginning 4:30 p.m. PDT

STADIUM COURT

* Women--No. 8 Lindsay Davenport vs. Linda Wild.

* Men--No. 12 Todd Martin vs. Tim Henman.

GRANDSTAND

Beginning 5 p.m. PDT

* Women’s Doubles--No. 6 Lori McNeil-Gabriela Sabatini vs. No. 12 Kristie Boogert-Irina Spirlea.