Sampras Wins One for Books
Victory is 13th slam, 7th Wimbledon crown
July 9, 2000
Wimbledon, England -- PETE SAMPRAS wrote his history in the gloaming. He seized it under a sense of urgency rarely seen in the game of tennis. He earned it in front of his long-invisible father and mother. For all of those reasons, and the raw numbers that set him apart, Sampras became the complete Wimbledon champion last night.
The grounds of the All England Club were so dark on match point, it felt like Wimbledon was camping out. To finish this thing properly, Sampras didn't have a moment to lose. At the stroke of 8:57 p.m., his thunderous first serve glanced off the frame of Pat Rafter's shanked forehand, and there it was: 6-7 (12-10), 7-6 (7-5), 6-4, 6-2. Not so special on the printed page, but unforgettable in every other way.
Nobody wanted to see a Monday-afternoon carryover of this match. Nobody wanted to show up, watch about a half- hour of tennis and then wander off. That would have been Sampras' image in a nutshell -- vaguely unsatisfying. So he took this match, like a man defending his honor, and then he cried.
"I guess it all hit me in the end,'' Sampras said.
"And good on him,'' Rafter said. "Pete's an emotional guy, and in my eyes the greatest player ever.''
There had been a certain monotony to Sampras' Wimbledon career, due largely to an absence of memorable finals. Everyone knew he would eventually win his 13th major championship, surpassing Roy Emerson's age-old record. It seemed a foregone conclusion that he would match William Renshaw's mark of seven Wimbledon titles, set between 1881 and '89 (under a format known as the Challenge Round, Renshaw only had to play one match to win five of those titles). It was inevitable that Sampras would be linked with Fred Perry, Rod Laver, Bjorn Borg, John McEnroe and Boris Becker among the all-time performers at Wimbledon.
The beauty last night was that Sampras had to fight for it. He'd been battling painful shin tendinitis throughout the tournament, practicing just one day of the fortnight. After losing the first set --embarrassingly, on a double-fault -- he was down 1-4 in the second-set tiebreaker with a pair of Rafter services coming up.
"I was nervous, I was choking,'' he candidly admitted later. "I really felt like the match was slipping away.''
Like Rafter, Sampras had to deal with two lengthy rain delays, the second one lasting 2 1/2 hours. They were still in the first set around 6:30 when play resumed for good, leaving only a fleeting chance that the match would be completed before nightfall.
And in a very unusual circumstance for Sampras, his parents were there. As they came into focus for one of the few times in Pete's career, Sam and Georgia Sampras were suddenly the greatest tennis parents on earth.
While other parents were yelling, boasting, conniving and worse, Sam and Georgia left the young Pete alone. They paid for his tennis lessons in Palos Verdes, the fashionable Southern California beach town, but the specter of competition made them so nervous, they literally couldn't watch. In a given junior tournament, Sam would drop Pete off and then disappear, leaving him to go it alone.
"Maybe we're getting sort of heavy here,'' Sampras once said, "but I think that's where I got my independence, the way I am on the court. I was always out there by myself because my dad was going for a walk.''
Before yesterday, Sampras' parents had only seen him play one Grand Slam final -- the 1992 U.S. Open -- and he lost that one. "That was plenty,'' Pete said with a laugh. "They're so superstitious, they figured they brought me bad luck.''
"In about two minutes, I went from feeling completely out of it to being right back in the match. That's grass- court tennis. It can happen that fast."This time, with so much on the line, Pete insisted that they fly in for the final. Typical of Sam and Georgia, they wanted no part of the Friends Box and the inevitable television cutaways. "They were just fine being up in the cheap seats,'' Pete said.
They must have sensed impending disaster with Rafter serving at 4-1 in that tiebreaker, but Sampras won both of those points, the second on a double-fault. "In about two minutes, I went from feeling completely out of it to being right back in the match,'' Sampras said. "That's grass- court tennis. It can happen that fast.''
Then Rafter blew an easy cross- court forehand for 4-4, "and right there I knew I was screwed,'' Rafter said later. "That was a mental blow more than anything. I got a little bit tight.''
Sampras wound up winning the tiebreaker with a huge first serve and put-away volley. That was the match in essence, for Rafter not only failed to break serve in the two-hour, 57- minute match, he forced only two break points. "For all of Pete's weapons,'' Rafter said, "that serve is just awesome. I could never get on top of it.''
The general rule at Wimbledon is that it's too dark to play by 9 p.m. The courtside clock read 8:25 when a blistering Sampras ace closed out the third set, meaning he'd have to wrap it up quickly to avoid a two-day final. The good people of Centre Court had stuck it out, leaving only a few seats empty. The sky had cleared to powder blue, a cruel reminder of what might have been. As Sampras forged a 4-2 lead, it was 8:51 and looking desperate.
One of the great things about tennis is the absence of enforced time, the notion that theoretically, a match could last forever. It didn't seem so wonderful with Sampras needing a rapid-fire finish at dusk. But this was where his greatness truly surfaced. He hit an astonishing backhand service return winner, laced cross-court at full throttle, for a break point at 15-40. Then he banked it with dispatch. He had broken serve in just three minutes.
Now, with Roy Emerson and Willie Renshaw looming in the darkness and three dozen photographers cursing their bad luck, Sampras stepped up to serve. There would be no mistakes. At 40-love, he uncorked the blistering first serve to Rafter's forehand for the clincher. Make that four straight Wimbledon titles, a 28-match winning streak and a 53-1 record since 1993. And let the emotions flow.
Sampras has seldom been an endearing figure in triumph. He doesn't grasp the theatrical end of it, and his words often seem a bit dry. But this one was special. He bent over to cry for a moment and then, at the urging of coach Paul Annacone and his fiancee, actress Bridgette Wilson, he ambled into the stands in search of his parents. Finding them at last, he held them both at long embraces.
Tradition stops for nothing at Wimbledon, not even the onset of night. In a hasty but fitting ceremony, the Duke and Duchess of Kent still found a moment to chat up the ballboys and ballgirls. Important tournament officials were introduced. Fans lit the way with a hundred flashbulbs as Sampras walked the court's perimeter, holding aloft the winner's cup and looking like a character from an old Fillmore West light show. All in all, even Rafter had to admit, "a very cool scene.''
As the press conference unfolded later, people began to realize what it meant for Sampras' parents to be there. After all these years, it seemed almost surprising that he even had parents. "They always kept their distance,'' he said. "They did what good parents do. They love you and say the right things, good times and bad. They gave me the strength and the heart to be here. And when I come home, I'm the same Pete they always treated as a kid.''
All those years, he was the little boy who had been left alone to play.
Now there was a great convergence on the Centre Court, tennis lore and adulation
and family coming together in the only setting that made sense. There was
a clock on tennis last night, because history wouldn't have it any other
way.