September, 3rd 2004
US Open
Seventeen minutes into Jennifer Capriati's third
round match against 88th-ranked Vera Douchevina, the eighth seed was already reaching for the cruise
control button, up a set, 6-0, with her eyes trained on a short afternoon's worth of work.
Capriati had squashed the Russian's hopes of an upset, breaking the teenager
on her first two service games of the match to race out to a 3-0 advantage.
And in an eye-blink, the first set was over, and it looked like Douchevina's
journey through the women's draw had come to an end.
Douchevina was predictably
nervous from the outset, sticking easy volleys into the net, not swinging at
a deep ball hit on the baseline from Capriati, whiffing on a backhand that
was right in her hitting zone and not being able to get her racket around on shots.
"It was a combination of me coming out really pouncing on her," said
Capriati. "She made quite a few mistakes - probably nerves."
The former junior champions' movement was missing, and after Capriati
lassoed an errant screaming liner from Douchevina with her racket, the ball
spinning softly on the strings of her Prince racket without falling to the
ground, the match was beginning to look more like an exhibition than a
contest with a berth in a Grand Slam Round of 16 on the line.
But by the time Douchevina finally won her first game on the first service
of the second set, something had changed.
"She came up with some really good shots," said Capriati, who made 24
unforced errors. "And I think I just sort of, you know, let up a little
bit or just, you know, started getting into her game a little bit."
Earning the first break point of the match against Capriati, Douchevina's
confidence was restored after going up 2-1 in the set, and a clean backhand
winner boosted her to a 3-1 lead.
Capriati had let down her guard
after the first set blitzkrieg, and Douchevina stepped up with a flurry of
backhand winners to impressively take the second set tiebreak.
The turning point of the match came midway through the third set. With
Douchevina on serve at 2-3, she fell behind triple-break point. One huge
Capriati cross-court forehand later snagged last year's US Open semifinalist
a commanding 4-2 lead that would she would not relinquish.
Ultimately, Douchevina was done in by committing 28 unforced errors, a
winner-to-errors margin of negative four.
"I took my foot off the gas a little bit, and I just was saying to myself,
'Just go for it, whatever the result is,'" said Capriati, who will now
face No. 12 Ai Sugiyama in the fourth round, with a monster marquee match-up with No. 3
Serena Williams looming in the quarterfinals.
"I'm just trying to, no matter what the score is, keep telling myself to,
like, move forward and hit out on the ball. Because I think in the end, in
the long run, it's going to help me win these big matches."
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