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Winner Shows What's Inside

July 9, 2000

WIMBLEDON, England -- This was supposed to be the moment Pete Sampras stood apart from all the rest, serving his way to a record 13th Grand Slam title with a victory over Patrick Rafter in the Wimbledon final.

In reality it was the day he showed more than ever that he's just like the rest of us, a person subject to fear and jitters, a child who feels just a little bit prouder of his accomplishments if mom and dad are around to see them.

Most tennis fans know Sampras as the guy who serves an ace, wipes the sweat off his brow with his thumb, drops his head, adjusts the strings on his racket, walks to the other side and serves another ace--his expression never changing.

Sampras dropped the wall Sunday and opened the door to the inner workings of his mind.

He's a sports fanatic who took encouragement this week from a phone conversation with a 21-year-old ("But a pretty good 21-year-old," Sampras said), a guy by the name of Kobe Bryant.

"Kobe called to say good luck," said Sampras, who attended several Laker games this year and wore a Laker cap around the All England Club earlier in the week. "He said, 'You get through it, it feels that much sweeter.' "

Sampras even displayed a previously unseen spirituality.

"I had my parents on my side, I had God on my side," Sampras said.

"I'm not getting religious," he rushed to add. "But I needed a little help from upstairs."

Sampras had to draw on whatever resources he could. That wasn't confidence running through his head Sunday; it was doubt.

He was standing on the court where he had won six championships in seven years, at a tournament where he had won 52 of his previous 53 matches. But having lost the first set in a tiebreaker, and down 4-1 in the second-set tiebreaker with two Rafter serves to come, Sampras felt vulnerable.

He had struggled just to get to this final, restricted by his own body more than the competition. An inflamed left shin prevented him from practicing between matches, and he said several times that if this had been a lesser tournament he would have just gone home. So Sampras didn't step onto Centre Court with his usual swagger Sunday.

"There have been times when I've walked into the Wimbledon finals so confident," Sampras said. "When I played [Cedric] Pioline [in 1997], I knew I was playing too well. Whereas this one, I wasn't playing well. I was struggling with my game."

Sampras admitted to having "a little bit of insecurity playing [Sunday]. I felt the nerves a little bit more.

"I don't care how many times you've been, who you are, if you're Michael Jordan. You choke. I was feeling it today in the tiebreakers.

"I was feeling the heart rate going up and I'm like, 'This is it. This is grass court and it can change within two minutes. And I can lose my title really quickly.' "

No one has lost the first two sets of the Wimbledon final and come back to win since 1927. Fortunately for Sampras, Rafter felt the magnitude of the moment as well. Rafter hit a volley into the net, then double-faulted to let Sampras back in.

"I just got a little bit nervous," Rafter said.

Sampras won the tiebreaker, and from that point on the oncoming darkness was more of a threat to stop him than was Rafter.

Rafter had difficulties getting his first serve in and had even more trouble returning Sampras' 130-mph serves in the twilight.

Sampras logged 27 aces in the match, which pretty much sealed an event that, in his mind, was supposed to end this way.

"I believe in destiny," Sampras said. "I do. I believe things happen for a reason."

Take the back injury he suffered in last year's U.S. Open. It was while he was off the tour and recuperating in Los Angeles that he met his fiancee, Bridgette Wilson.

"If I didn't hurt my back I wouldn't have met her," Sampras said.

So maybe it was fate that Sampras didn't break the record of 12 Grand Slam titles he shared with Roy Emerson in his first three opportunities.

Perhaps it was fate that Sampras' parents, Sam and Georgia, chose this occasion to see him in a Grand Slam final for the first time since he lost the 1992 U.S. Open to Stefan Edberg.

They have stayed away largely because they get too nervous watching their son. But he wanted them there this time. Sampras felt it was especially important for them "to see the court and the place that has been such a big part of my career."

There wasn't much negotiation after he beat Vladimir Voltchkov in a semifinal Friday.

"He asked, they came," Wilson said.

These things matter when you're a kid, and again when you get older.

Sampras didn't go to college, so the tennis tour served as that escape phase most kids go through, when they're eager to flee their parents and prove they can do things by themselves. Then you close in on 30--Sampras will be 29 next month--and all of a sudden you start inviting your parents to your parties.

"When you're so goal-oriented and focused on one thing you just lose sight of your family when you're 22, 23 and you're just so consumed with your sport," Sampras said.

"You hurt your back and you spend time at home and you get back in touch with your family. It was a sobering back injury that kind of woke me up to, 'Wow, I'm not going to play this game forever. Let's appreciate what you've done a little bit.' The older you get, other things are more important than tennis.

"It was important to me that they were here, that they were part of it. Because those are the memories that you have when you're done playing."

You can accumulate plenty of memories when you win 13 Grand Slam titles, seven Wimbledon championships (equaling another record), finish six consecutive years (from 1993 to 1998) as the No. 1-ranked player and win at least one Grand Slam title for eight consecutive years.

Those are only the numbers. It's the people that stick with us, and it was the person inside Pete Sampras, the player who put up all those numbers, who emerged Sunday.

 

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