AGASSI ON THE UPSWING

Inspiration came from all corners of the globe.

From visiting President Nelson Mandela and the children of South Africa.

From reading the works of Pope John Paul II.

From the indomitable spirit of teenager Kacey Reyes, the daughter of his trainer, Gil Reyes, who missed a year of school and needed two surgeries after breaking her neck in a sledding accident.

And, of course, from his actress wife Brooke Shields.

You might say it took quite a few people to put him back together again, but, ultimately, the glue holding the work-in-progress together is Andre Agassi himself. He was the one who had to lose the pounds slowing him down, lose his mid-career malaise and regain his lost confidence by dropping down to the minor leagues of tennis in Las Vegas and Burbank.

The dark days of 1997--a season in which he went 12-12 on the ATP tour--are slowly receding from memory, slipping away from sight in the rear-view mirror with the help of two tournament victories in the last four weeks. He will be aiming for three titles in five weeks at the Newsweek Champions Cup, which starts today at Indian Wells.

In San Jose, Agassi’s unexpected and surprisingly one-sided victory against No. 1-ranked Pete Sampras in the final had the impact of inspiring talk about his future, instead of his past.

Sunday, he solidified that initial tournament victory with another, beating Australian Jason Stoltenberg, 6-4, 7-6 (7-3), in the final of the Franklin Templeton event at Scottsdale, Ariz. Agassi is 16-2 on the tour in 1998, and the latest title is expected to elevate him from No. 50 in the world to somewhere in the mid-30s when the ATP rankings are released today.

Even Agassi didn’t think it would be Suddenly Andre.

“I expected the results to take longer,” he said last week in Scottsdale. “I was aware it could be a lot tougher than even what I was expecting. Regardless, I had to determine if I was committed to the work that was required.”

Certainly, Agassi could have sat back and enjoyed a happily-married life, instead of grinding it out at age 27 with the youngsters. After all, he had reached the top spot before and collected championships at Wimbledon, the U.S. Open and Australian Open.

For the first time in his life, he had strong doubts about his ability to regain the rarefied air of world-class tennis.

“I do need it,” he said. “I need this for me. I don’t need it for monetary reasons. I don’t need it for something that looks good, to prove something I haven’t accomplished yet.

“I think it was really the first time that I didn’t believe 100 percent that I could do it.”

Age has given way to reflection.

“In the past, I always thought I could do it,” he said. “I was young, I was cocky. I thought the best was ahead of me. I didn’t have the self doubts I did this time around.

“Now I’m really enjoying it. And I need that. I need to enjoy something that has been so good to me over the years.”

Even Sampras previously spoke about how tennis needed Agassi. Sampras was missing the rivalry. And what about that Nike commercial they once filmed together, driving around and setting up a court in New York? Sampras was finding it awfully alone in that cab.

Brad Gilbert, who has been Agassi’s coach since 1994, said that coming back to save men’s tennis wasn’t the right reason to return.

“Obviously, he is who he is and you can’t change it,” Gilbert said. “But you can’t worry about needing to save the sport. That’s the kind of [stuff] that leads you to burnout and leads you to get crazy and stuff like that.

“I think he’s out there now for the right reasons. He wants to be out there. He’s another one of these guys trying to work his [butt] off and do well.”

There are benefits to sliding out of the top 100--Agassi finished 1997 at No. 122--as strange as it may sound. He can pick and chose his tournaments at will, not having to commit to a specific number of events. And the dry spell makes him appreciate his success even more.

“The longer you wait for something, the more you appreciate it,” he said. “If you want a new car, or something, you have to wait for it. It’s the same kind of thing. I found myself enjoying it more, because it’s tougher.”

Agassi married Shields in April and resents the fact she has been blamed in some quarters for his slide.

At least he can joke about it. Sort of.

“It’s tough when you read articles to get a feel for it--to see where she fits into my world and where I fit into her world vs. what the media makes of it,” Agassi said. “I’ve been a little sarcastic toward the whole take on our relationship, based on the fact, when she came into my life, I was No. 1 in the world. And she was the reason I was No. 1, according to many theories.

“And then we get married and I’m not doing as well, and she is now the reason I’m not. So I tend to be a little sarcastic toward it [the various theories], in sort of a comical way.”

Agassi has a sharp wit, actually. At San Jose, he teased Sampras about his girlfriend, actress Kimberly Williams, during the post-match ceremony, saying: “You’re still talking girlfriend. You’re 26 years old, for crying out loud.”

Then, at Scottsdale, he is asked about Monica Seles. Does he keep in touch with Monica?

“Lewinsky?” Agassi said with a straight face, before smiling.

Hey, everyone is smiling now in the Agassi camp. Instead of viewing a five-set loss to Alberto Berasategui in the fourth round of the Australian Open as a missed opportunity, he and Gilbert took it as a sign of progress.

And it was.

“I think it really happened between San Jose and Australia. I was practicing hard,” Agassi said. “The next day I would come back better than the day before. I feel I was improving when I was sleeping.”

Said Gilbert: “You have to give [Berasategui] his props. But if Andre had been a little bit better, no matter how well that guy played, he [Agassi] wouldn’t have lost.”

He hasn’t lost since, a startling statistic when you consider that it wasn’t so long ago Agassi made the dramatic decision to play two challenger events. In Las Vegas, he lost in the final and won at Burbank in early December.

It wasn’t quite like Agassi had to chase after his own tennis balls. But . . .

“There’s no electronic scoreboard,” he said, smiling. “As long as the court dimensions are the same, as long as they don’t change the lines on the court.”

Said Gilbert: “It’s kind of like a baseball player going down to triple-A, just to get their stroke back. He did everything. He just took it upon himself and said, ‘This is gonna stop.’ ”

Gilbert said he once played a satellite event in Boston after he missing nine months because of an injury, trying to get some match play, saying: “I didn’t want to look at some guy and get my butt kicked. I still got my butt kicked, anyway.”

Agassi gained respect from the players for the move afterward. Still, at the time, he did feel some strange vibes from his new colleagues. It was like Michael Jordan had showed up at a CBA game, looking for his lost shot, or Wayne Gretzky playing an IHL game in Kalamazoo, Mich.

“Right away, it was like, ‘Oh,’ ” Agassi said of the reaction. “They were looking at me with a little bit of sadness. I played on those courts [in Las Vegas] when I was nine or 10.”

“There was never a question in my mind about doing it. It’s what life is all about. It’s nice to feel that respect now. It’s the ultimate compliment in life to have your peers pulling for you.”