Painful as It Was, Sampras Finishes Job

It was one of those tender moments that will become part of the sport’s lore. U.S. tennis coaches, for years to come, will tell their students, eyes swelling with tears and hearts with pride, how Davis Cup captain John McEnroe, in his own soft and gentle way, inspired an injured Pete Sampras to get through the deciding match of a Davis Cup quarterfinal.

“He told me,” Sampras said, “to just suck it up for the next 45 minutes so we can get out of here.”

McEnroe, the soul that Mother Teresa missed, said that when he realized that Sampras had hurt his leg early in the first set, “My heart temporarily stopped.”

But the mouth still worked fine, as a chuckling Sampras related, shortly after finishing off Slava Dosedel of the Czech Republic, 6-4, 6-4, 7-6 (2), to clinch the 3-2 victory for the U.S team, before 12,002 Sunday at the Great Western Forum.

“I could see it in his eyes when I told him I kind of hurt my leg,” Sampras said. “He didn’t want any part of it.”

When asked if there had ever been a time when the strain he suffered in the upper part of his left leg in the first couple of games made him think about defaulting, Sampras laughed again and said, “John would have choked me.”

In seriousness, Sampras said he never would have quit, no matter how bad the injury became, and it is bad enough for him to have scheduled an MRI test today. He said this was just too important to not fight through. He had been stunned by Jiri Novak in the opening match Friday, and his team had been in a shocking position, trailing the Czechs, 2-1, after the doubles Saturday. That was a sort of double-edged sword for Sampras, who had a huge amount of face and prestige to lose by losing, but a corresponding amount of each to gain by winning.

“This was a redemption,” Sampras said. “I’ve never played a fifth match in the Davis Cup. The way I felt Friday, with my family and friends here, it was more than a loss.”

Sampras is 28 now, and while he grew up and learned the game in Palos Verdes, he went off at a very young age, pretty much on his own, to find the kind of fame and fortune that one does by becoming the winningest tennis player of the 1990s and, probably, the best tennis player ever. For years, his home base was Florida, where there are lots of other tour players, lots of warm weather and no state income tax. But a year or so ago, Sampras moved back to this area, and a big part of that was the lure of the proximity of family and friends that seems to come with age and maturity.

That made Sunday’s victory, over a game but overmatched Dosedel, especially sweet.

And it was, by no means, easy.

He had to struggle to fight off three break points early in the first set, just after he hurt his leg. And he got only one break of serve in each of the first two sets and needed a tiebreaker in the third to push the U.S. into the Davis Cup semifinals.

But there were some revealing--and amazing--statistics that told much of the story. Sampras had 18 aces and 56 winners, including those 18 aces, and won 90% of the points he played after a successful first serve. After those early break points, Dosedel did not get another. Frequently, when Sampras’ first serves in the 125-mph range missed, he merely hit a second in at about 120. Playing at this high-risk level, he had only three double faults.

McEnroe called Sampras’ serve the best ever in tennis and said, as a player: “I just dreamed about [having] that type of serve.”

Czech captain Jan Kukal called the Sampras serve “unreturnable for anyone today.”

Dosedel, the always-friendly, part-time actor, whose rackets have smiley-faces painted on the strings, was having trouble getting the sides of his mouth to curl up afterward.

“On his serve,” he said, “it was no chance.”