Young rallies against Lopez

By Lisa Dillman

March 16, 2008 12 AM PT

Times Staff Writer

Proof that tennis life, indeed, does exist after going 0-11 was out on Stadium Court 3 during a wind-swept Saturday afternoon, taking the form of 18-year-old Donald Young.

This was a rare lefty vs. lefty contest: Young vs. Feliciano Lopez of Spain, and the accompanying soundtrack was an almost constant beat of flags from various nations on top of the stands flapping loudly in the wind.

If conditions inside the main Stadium Court at the Pacific Life Open in Indian Wells were difficult -- one winner, Novak Djokovic, called it the “ugliest match” he had played -- life for the proletariat on the outside courts was considerably more complicated.

Young led by a set and 3-0 before losing the second in a tiebreaker. He used a bathroom break to compose himself and steadied enough to beat Lopez, 6-4, 6-7 (3), 6-2, avenging his loss to the Spaniard at the U.S. Open last year in four sets.

“Yeah, it was tough,” Young said. “I’m just happy to be the one with the ‘W’ at the end of the day. I don’t really know how balls were going in. You couldn’t really hit your shot with the serve.”

Still, the top-seeded players, while needing to be resourceful with the tricky conditions, mostly emerged unscathed with the exception of No. 10 Tomas Berdych of the Czech Republic, who lost to Stanislas Wawrinka of Switzerland, 2-6, 7-6 (3), 6-4.

On the women’s side, top-seeded Ana Ivanovic of Serbia faltered in the second set before beating Ioana Raluca Olaru of Romania, 6-1, 5-7, 6-0, and Lindsay Davenport had a short afternoon of work, playing just one set against Gisela Dulko of Argentina. Dulko retired because of a strained right quadriceps after Davenport won the first set, 6-2,

In other second-round matches, No. 2 Rafael Nadal of Spain, the defending champion, beat Santiago Giraldo of Colombia, 6-3, 6-3, and No. 3 Djokovic was pushed in the second set before beating Andreas Seppi of Italy, 6-3, 7-6 (3).

Nadal will next play Young, and he admitted he did not know much about the American. In fact, the majority of questions were about his friendship with Lopez.

“If I play Feliciano, I’m going to start to win the match tomorrow on the golf course,” Nadal joked.

It wasn’t as though anyone was doubting Young’s ability to win against Lopez, but Young admitted to succumbing to nerves when he had the chance to serve it out in the second set.

There was a time, not long ago, when Young’s early struggles had him wondering when -- or if -- his breakthrough would come on the main ATP tour. He lost his first 11 matches, including a 6-0, 6-0 defeat against Carlos Berlocq at Miami in 2006.

Young, now ranked 86th, was candid about his thoughts during the losing streak.

“Just when am I going to win one? That was pretty much it,” he said. “When was I going to win one? Come on. Please. Guys I was beating, they were winning ones and I wasn’t. It was really disappointing, but I figured out how to win one.”

The Berlocq loss was especially humiliating for the kid who was on the cover of many sports sections at age 14.

“Yeah, Miami hurt a lot. I’ve never lost 0-0 in my life, and then I lost 0-0 at one of the biggest tournaments I played,” Young said. “That wasn’t too confidence boosting at all. Actually shut it down pretty bad.

“And then on TV I got talked about bad, you know. And then he loses 0-0 to [James] Blake. It just looked really bad, so it hurt my feelings a lot.”

Unwittingly, he became the poster boy for what is said to ail the wild-card system. But he made a concerted effort to curtail his social life to devote himself more fully to tennis. Finally, he had his first ATP victory just before the U.S. Open last year, beating Amer Delic at New Haven, and followed up by pushing Nikolay Davydenko to three sets in the next round.

Not that he recommended anyone go 0-11.

“It was definitely a learning experience,” Young said. “I wouldn’t say 11 was good for me, but, you know, I did it.”

lisa.dillman@latimes.com

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

Featured matches

Today at the Indian Wells Tennis Garden:

STADIUM COURT, 11 A.M.

Tommy Haas, Germany, vs.

Andy Roddick

Eleni Daniilidou, Greece, vs. Maria Sharapova, Russia

Roger Federer, Switzerland, vs. Guillermo Garcia-Lopez, Spain

NOT BEFORE 7 P.M.