Day One of U.S. Open Goes Simply According to Plan : Tennis: Only one seeded player falls, but even that isn't big surprise.

By LISA DILLMAN

Aug. 31, 1999 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

NEW YORK — “Sedate” is certainly not a word associated with the U.S. Open, especially when Jeff Tarango and Goran Ivanisevic happen to be in the same ZIP code.

But Monday was as close to tranquillity as you were going to get during a windy, chilly opening session here. Only one seeded player on the women’s side was dismissed by the end of the day--Irina Spirlea of Romania having defeated No. 6 Amanda Coetzer of South Africa, 6-1, 7-5.

Even that, however, was hardly the upset it seemed, since Spirlea, a former top-10 player, had reached the semifinals at the Open two years ago.

A brief wave of excitement did cut through the night at the National Tennis Center when top-seeded Martina Hingis of Switzerland fell behind in the second set against the hard-hitting Kveta Hrdlickova of the Czech Republic before prevailing, 6-1, 7-5. The 74th-ranked Hrdlickova led, 4-2, in the second set and squandered a chance to go up 5-2.

Ever since Hingis melted down in the French Open final against Steffi Graf, she has displayed curious spells of vulnerability.

She went out in lackluster fashion to qualifier Jelena Dokic in the first round at Wimbledon, winning only two games. This time, Hrdlickova’s inability to execute a series of simple volleys let Hingis off the hook.

“A wake-up call, a little bit,” Hingis said.

Wimbledon was more than that, obviously. After a brief split, she reunited with her coach and mother, Melanie Molitor, and returned to win two of the next three tournaments.

“I just missed the game, that was the most important thing,” she said Monday. “I definitely know what I want. I was watching Wimbledon and I was feeling like I should be playing. It’s a good experience to have and I definitely won’t make that mistake again.”

The beneficiary of the mistake, Dokic, went on to reach the quarterfinals at Wimbledon. Since then, the 16-year-old Australian who was born in Belgrade, has been little more than a rumor, playing only one WTA event because of age-eligibility restrictions.

It has been a rough post-Wimbledon for the precocious teens--Dokic and semifinalist Alexandra Stevenson. Between them, they have won one match on the tour.

Here, Dokic said the rust and lack of match play had hurt her against 10th-seeded Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario of Spain. Sanchez-Vicario trailed 4-1 in the first set and then hardly looked back, winning, 7-5, 6-1.

“[The restriction] limits you because you can’t play everything,” Dokic said. “You’ve got to pick your tournaments. Even after this now, I’ve hardly got anything to play. I’m struggling to find tournaments where I can go to, what time I’m going to play them. I can’t just go to any tournament.”

This puts an extraordinary amount of pressure on the youngster to perform.

“Exactly,” Dokic said. “I’ve said this a lot of times, but when you’re competing with players that can play 30 tournaments a year, nearly three times as much as I can, I’ve got to come [to] a tournament and do well because if I don’t, I don’t have another week to fix it up.”

The up-and-coming youngsters had a better day on the men’s side. Justin Gimelstob, Paul Goldstein and Cecil Mamiit of Los Angeles all won their first-round matches. Gimelstob, who once played at UCLA, beat Andrea Gaudenzi of Italy, 6-1, 6-3, 6-2, and Goldstein beat Scott Draper of Australia, 6-3, 6-1, 6-0.

Mamiit, who won an NCAA singles title when he was at USC, had a roller-coaster ride in five sets, as he defeated Ivo Heuberger of Switzerland, 6-4, 6-3, 3-6, 3-6, 6-3, in 3 hours 10 minutes.

He was thrilled at winning his first match at the U.S. Open in three attempts. Mamiit signed autographs and posed for pictures courtside while he conducted interviews.

“I just fought, kept fighting and fighting,” said Mamiit, who had only four unforced errors in the fifth set. “I had sort of a mental block in the third and fourth sets. I was kind of spazzing to find out what was going on. I think I tried to rush and end the point.

“This is the start. It was a good start for me. In previous years, I struggled to win a match here. They are thrillers, but next time I’ll try to end it in three.”

Goldstein, who played his collegiate tennis at Stanford, had a bittersweet experience defeating Draper. Draper’s wife died in July after fighting a lifelong illness. They were married less than two years, and Draper almost did not play the Open.

“Believe me, I didn’t want to come,” Draper said. “My heart didn’t want to come. . . . I think you can’t walk away. You’re not going to get anywhere in life just walking away from things.”

Said Goldstein, “You play the match with a heavy heart. You have a lot of compassion. You admire someone for going out there in those circumstances and competing the way he did.”

U.S. Open Notes

Pete Sampras, who injured his lower back in practice Sunday, did not practice Monday, even though he was scheduled to do so. He requested and received a Wednesday start for his first-round match. . . . In night matches, No. 2 Andre Agassi defeated Nicklas Kulti, 6-0, 6-1, 6-3, and No. 10 Marcelo Rios outlasted Martin Damm, 6-4, 7-6 (7-5), 3-6, 5-7, 6-1.

Today’s Featured Matches

MEN

* Slava Dosedel, Czech Republic, vs. Jim Courier.

* Patrick Rafter (4), Australia, vs. Cedric Pioline, France.

* Bohdan Ulihrach, Czech Republic, vs. Gustavo Kuerten (5), Brazil.

* Tim Henman (6), Britain, vs. Guillermo Canas, Argentina.

WOMEN

* Corina Morariu vs. Lindsay Davenport (2).

* Serena Williams (7) vs. Kimberly Po.

* Barbara Rittner, Germany, vs. Monica Seles (4).

* Nathalie Tauziat (11), France, vs. Alexandra Stevenson.