Capriati, Just 16 But Revived, Stops Graf's Olympic Reign
Steffi Graf knew it, Jennifer Capriati tried not to think about it, and anyone looking down at the red clay at Vall d'Hebron had to suspect it. When Graf, the two-time defending gold medal winner, double-faulted to fall into a 0-40 cavern with the score dead even at one set apiece and 4-4 in the third, the tennis match was over.
"I was trying to get my second serve in and I lost totally the rhythm," said Graf, who gathered herself to win three points and reach deuce before it all blew away in a windstorm of steady backhands and a forehand on the line by Capriati. The chant began for the first time all day -- "U.S.A., U.S.A." -- and from there, it was just a few minutes to a final forehand in the net for Graf and a moment to remember the rest of her life for Capriati: a 3-6, 6-3, 6-4 upset that put the gold medal around her neck and tears in her eyes.
So the 16-year-old Capriati mounted the medal stand, put her hand over her heart and watched the American flag being raised in the same place that Boris Becker and Michael Stich had watched the flag of a united Germany go up beside that of South Africa. Becker and Stich beat Wayne Ferreira and Piet Norval, 7-6 (7-5), 4-6, 7-6 (7-5), 6-3, leaving South Africa with its first medal since 1960, after which it was banned from the Olympics because of its policy of racial apartheid.
"It was so emotional," Capriati said of her feelings as the national anthem sounded. "I had the chills the whole time. I just can't believe it. All week I watched the other athletes up there and I was with them and I thought, 'Wow, that would be so cool.' "
You say things like that when you are a teen-ager and have just finished two weeks in the Olympics, you have beaten the No. 2 player in the world, a player you have never beaten before in four attempts. Not to mention that you pulled off the biggest victory of your young career without the benefit of a regular coach and that this just happens to be the first time all year that you have made it to the final of a tournament.
The 23-year-old Graf understands. She won the gold medal in 1984, when tennis was an demonstration sport and she was 15. "It helped me to believe in myself," she said. "I'm sure for Jennifer, it's going to help her a lot, even more."
Capriati could use a reason to believe. She came into these Olympics ranked sixth but denying that she was burned out on the professional tour, which she had hit like lightning at 14. And she came here with only her ever-present father, Stefano, coaching her; her last coach, Pavel Slozil, had been fired in April.
Capriati did have the benefit of Manuel Santana, a Spaniard who won Wimbledon in 1966, and who, she said today, has been working with her for three weeks. He is an old family friend, and Capriati said of his role: "He's just helped me more on strategy. I've been more patient."
Graf will confirm that. "She was very steady from the baseline and she didn't give me a lot of errors like she sometimes does," said Graf. "She was patient, which I wasn't." Staving off 9 Break Points
Early on, Graf was the patient one. She held serve through nine break points and 16 see-saw minutes to take a 3-2 lead in the first set. At 3-4, Capriati double-faulted to both open and close the eighth game, and Graf held her serve to take the first set, 6-3.
The second set went on serve, with Capriati growing stronger by the minute, until Graf was broken for 5-3. It was Graf's previously inpenetrable forehand that betrayed her, not only on break point but 48 times in the match, 32 of those errors on ground strokes.
Both players were shaky at the start of the third set, with Capriati breaking serve and then Graf breaking back. Graf held on from there until the final turn of the screw at 4-4.
In the final game, Capriati took her time, and Graf won only a point. "I didn't want what happened in the first part of the third set to happen again," Capriati said. "It just went away from me. At that stage, you can't let breaks get away."
