A Champion's Mind - Pete Sampras

one thing I most needed—time to hit my shots.
When I played McEnroe in Toronto, he was in the waning years of his career. I was comfortable. I also
knew him a little bit. It’s funny how quickly you get over your awe of a top player when you come onto the
tour, especially if he’s your countryman and you have the inevitable string of experiences and contacts
with him. I can totally understand why Jimmy Connors was always such a loner—so standoffish and
aloof. He wanted his peers—all of them—to stay in awe. John had always been nice to me, and so had
Lendl. But where Lendl’s game still gave me pause, I was in a comfort zone with John, physically and
psychologically. At Toronto, I beat him 6–3 in the third, but I lost a heartbreaker to Michael Chang in the
semifinals, 7–5 in the third.
When Joe Brandi and I rolled into New York for the U.S. Open in late August of 1990, we bunked
together at the Parker Meridien. I wasn’t really a city guy; I was a shy nineteen-year-old going about his
business from the player hotel. I don’t remember if Brandi snored, but I know I slept very well in our
shared room, and it was because I had nothing to lose. There was no pressure. About the only other
person I spent time with during the tournament was my friend Jim Courier.
I started my quest at Flushing Meadows as a dark horse, although I was definitely on the radar of my
rivals, the pundits, and knowledgeable fans. Through 1990, I was slowly becoming a better mover and
all-around athlete, and my serve—already vastly improved—just kept getting better. There was no magic
bullet, coaching or techniquewise. Suddenly the big serve was just there, and getting bigger as the months
passed.
In the early rounds at the Open, I beat Dan Goldie, Peter Lundgren, and Jakob Hlasek. Those were
solid wins, and each one seemed to increase my momentum. I got hot and stayed hot, playing almost the
entire event in the proverbial zone—that tranquil state of mind and body in which nothing can go wrong,
you seem to have all the time in the world, the ball looks big as a grapefruit, and nothing can disturb or
stop you. If ever there was a “good” time for me to go up against Lendl again, it was then—in the
quarterfinals at Flushing Meadows. But the assignment was a tough one. Lendl was a multiple Grand Slam
champ with more big titles than McEnroe, and he was gunning to make an unprecedented nine consecutive
U.S. Open finals. He was at or very close to the peak of his powers and still driven to add to his résumé.
This would be different from the Wilander match in ’89.
I had reason to hope that I wouldn’t be blitzed like I had been in Milan. I had seen Ivan’s A game, so
there would be no surprises. And my improved serve gave me more offense; it made me a little more
dangerous, and that had psychological as well as physical implications. In the six months since I had last
met Ivan, I’d grown stronger and sharper. I felt that, and I knew that I could give as good as I got. I was
confident that I could put Ivan under as much pressure when I was serving as he put me under when I was
returning. But it didn’t exactly make me comfortable knowing that the match might be decided by our
ground strokes because, in that department, Lendl still had me beat—hands down. My job was to make it
a service brawl.
I won the first two sets 6–4, 7–6, and the tennis was high-quality stuff. I was serving big, and my basic
strategy was to hold easily and slap a few forehand winners here and there—just enough to take
advantage of any momentary lapse or weakness in Ivan’s game or resolve. After the second set, though, I
made the classic rookie mistake. Finding myself in control, I thought I had it won—ignoring the fact that I
was up against a lethal opponent who had found his back against the wall on plenty of other occasions,
only to extricate himself. And that’s exactly when Lendl’s experience and determination kicked into high
gear.
Lendl came storming back, with the leverage of eight straight U.S. Open finals and eight Grand Slam
titles giving him emotional and physical fuel. He took the next two sets 6–3, 6–4. In the fifth set, though, it