Show Her The Medal

This is the week Erica Sorgi should have been eagerly anticipating.

Sorgi, 17, tanned and fit, recent graduate of Capistrano Valley High, a member of the Mission Viejo Nadadores, will be competing in the U.S. Olympic diving trials this week. Today and Wednesday, she will compete in the three-meter event, then Friday and Saturday in the platform event.

If her name sounds familiar, it might be because Sorgi was in the opening scenes of “Jerry Maguire,” the hit movie about the cutthroat world of sports agents. As Sorgi did some diving approaches across a rug in her living room, where her parents, Edward and Anne, sat and watched, Tom Cruise’s voice-over said, “Erica Sorgi. . . . You’ll see her in the next Olympics.”

That was four years ago.

Six months ago, Sorgi quit diving.

And now those Olympics the movie referred to are almost here and Sorgi has no clue if she will be in Australia.

Sorgi, who won the three-meter and platform titles in 1999 at the U.S. Spring Nationals and the Speedo National Junior Championships, and who was first in the three-meter and fourth in the platform at the U.S. Summer Nationals, had been widely expected to make the two-woman U.S. team in both events.

Now, nobody knows what to expect from her.

Last summer, Sorgi lost the only coach she’d ever had. Hongping Li left the Nadadores to accept the job as diving coach at USC. Ever since, Sorgi has struggled

“From the first time I’ve known Hongping, he’s wanted to have a good college job,” Sorgi says. “I just never thought he’d take one until after the [2000] Olympics. I had a great time with Hongping and I really miss him. It was a hard thing to see him go.”

When Li left, Sorgi crumbled. Did she feel abandoned?

“In a way,” she says. “But my mind knew he had to take the job.”

Sorgi’s search for a new coach took her to Orlando, Fla., hoping to find in Jay Lerew a coach with whom she could bond. Sorgi moved in with the family of another diver, leaving behind her high school, her friends and, most significant, the family that has always been her support.

Her 15-year-old brother, Adam, played on the South Mission Viejo team that lost to Mexico in the Little League World Series title game three years ago. Adam understands the pressures of being a young, talented athlete. But it is 14-year-old Victoria--Tori--who touches Sorgi’s heart in a special way.

Tori, who loves swimming, who jumps into the pool whenever she can, has Down’s syndrome.

“When I’m with Tori and I get down on myself or unhappy with things, I can look at Tori and realize how Tori appreciates every little thing in her life,” Sorgi says. “She smiles at everything and there is so much she can’t have. So I tell myself that whatever problems I’m having aren’t important because I am blessed with so much.”

It’s a reminder that Erica has needed the last six months.

After five months in Orlando and a trip in January to Australia to compete, Sorgi was miserable.

“When she was in Australia, we were on the phone two, three, four times a day,” her mother says. “Erica was miserable. What did I do? I listened. That’s all I could do.”

Sorgi says she was homesick. She found it difficult being the new member at the Orlando club, especially one who competed at a high level and was used to having the full attention of her coach. So after the meet in Australia, Sorgi came home. And she quit diving.

“I wasn’t having fun diving,” Sorgi says. “I was having some personal issues I felt I needed to resolve. For a lot of reasons I just felt it would be better if I didn’t dive.”

So eight months after she had seemed poised to become a U.S. Olympic diving star, Sorgi stopped going to the pool. For two months, January and February, Sorgi was a student and an attentive sister to Tori. But she wasn’t a diver.

Her mother suggested Erica get a job or try another sport.

Erica had, after all, been busy all her life. She had been a promising gymnast. Even before she started diving as an 8-year-old, Sorgi had been an extraordinary tumbler, a limber gymnastics student.

When she was 12, Don Peters, the respected coach at SCATS in Huntington Beach, wanted Sorgi to join his gym. But he wanted her full attention. He wanted her to give up diving. That Sorgi couldn’t do.

“Gymnastics wasn’t as fun,” she says. “Diving was fun.”

A job didn’t appeal to Sorgi. And starting over in some other sport didn’t appeal to her either.

“I’m used to being at a high level in what I do,” she says. “I couldn’t see myself on the bottom rung.”

Sorgi had made some trips to the Nadadores’ diving well, however, having gone to socialize. Most of her friends were Nadadores divers. She got to know Russ Bertram, Mission Viejo’s new diving coach.

Bertram, 34, is a five-time former U.S. national champion and was a national team member for eight years. He had come from Florida State to Mission Viejo to replace Li. Sorgi says it was hard, at first, to think of Bertram as an authority figure.

“We were peers,” she says. “We were teammates together.”

When Bertram saw Sorgi at the pool, he gently encouraged her to come back. Away from the pool, Sorgi realized, her life was not fulfilling enough.

“Russ and I sat down and we worked some things out,” she says. “It isn’t easy. I was used to one coach. I didn’t know Russ’ style as a coach.”

Says Bertram: “We talked and talked. We decided this would work, that we could work together. Diving is an intimate sport. The coach-diver relationship is intimate. Every day you are face to face. You converse constantly. It’s tough when you lose that relationship.”

Li, through the USC sports information department, declined to talk about Sorgi. He gave no reason.

Bertram says it was natural for Sorgi to struggle through a time of change so close to the Olympics:

“She went to Orlando, she missed her family. Her coach had left to take a position he could not say no to. She kind of struggled with that decision of her coach. I still think it’s hard for Erica to look at me as her coach.”

Sometimes, there is obvious tension between Bertram and Sorgi.

At a practice last week, Sorgi was standing on the three-meter board. Bertram said, “I want you to wear a suit at nationals that has Mission Viejo on it.”

Sorgi frowned and said no. She said she didn’t like any of her Mission Viejo suits. She said at last year’s nationals, when Li was her coach, she didn’t wear a suit with the words Mission Viejo on it.

“It would be nice if you would do this at the trials,” Bertram answered.

“You find me one I like and I’ll wear it,” Sorgi said.

“We’ll talk about this later,” Bertram said, giving up the discussion.

“It’s been a tremendously tough year for Erica,” Bertram says now. “She has been under a lot of pressure. She has been looked at as the favorite for years. Diving is a very small sport. Everybody knows your business, so everybody knows about Erica’s problems and everybody whispers about her commitment to diving.”

Indeed, even as Sorgi has come back because, she says, she missed her teammates and the camaraderie, there is not a smile during one afternoon’s practice session. Not one until Anne arrives with Tori. When Erica sees Tori, she smiles, if only for a moment.

Sorgi has been struggling to master her toughest dives, the ones she was nailing last summer. Time off affects timing and confidence. Knowing that everybody in your sport is wondering what’s up, that’s not easy either.

Sorgi dropped out of the Southern Section finals in May at the last minute. At spring nationals, she pulled out of the platform competition after the first round. These actions have only intensified speculation.

“I don’t know how it will be at the trials,” Sorgi says. “I just don’t know how I’ll perform. But it won’t be the end of the world if I don’t make the team.”

She says the words, but does she mean them? Sorgi has accepted a diving scholarship to Stanford. When asked if she will keep diving on the national level after the trials, even if she doesn’t make the Olympic team, Sorgi says, “I don’t know,” but then adds that she will have to dive at Stanford to keep her scholarship.

Bertram says Sorgi “is the best jumper of any of the women divers” and says his new pupil is mentally and physically in the right place now.

But for four years Sorgi has been told by so many people, starting with Tom Cruise in a big-time movie, that she will be in the 2000 Olympics. In a teenage girl’s mind, nothing is worse sometimes than not living up to your image. Nothing can be harder than thinking you might let people down.

Now the time has arrived. Sorgi is supposed to meet the expectations. All she has ever wanted was to have fun. Meeting expectations, especially if those expectations aren’t your own, is not always fun.

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Diane Pucin can be reached at her e-mail address: diane.pucin@latimes.com.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

U.S. DIVING TRIALS

WHERE: Federal Way, Wash.

WHEN: Today-Sunday.

WHAT: 51 divers competing for eight spots on U.S. Olympic team.