Women’s tennis at MSG had entered uncharted territory. At the season ending championships in the fall of 1990, Monica Seles and Gabriela Sabatini played the first best of five set match on the WTA Tour since 1901 at the world’s greatest sporting arena and they did not disappoint.
The lucky fans at Madison Square Garden witnessed an epic, close to four hour battle between two young women with contrasting styles. Seles with her two handed forehand and backhand eventually wore down the graceful but deceptively resilient Sabatini 6-4, 5-7, 3-6, 6-4, 6-2.
Monica Seles, the sixteen year old Yugoslavian prodigy, was ranked two in the world behind Steffi Graf, while the 20 year old Argentine, Gabriela Sabatini, was ranked fifth. Seles took out Graf in the semis in straights while Sabatini dispatched Mary Joe Fernandez in similar fashion.
Heading into the season ending championships, Seles and Sabatini had played one another just once before in Miami on hard courts in 1988. Seles defeated Sabatini in straight sets 7-6, 6-3. They would play a total of 14 times with Seles winning eleven before Gaby retired in 1996.
Surprisingly, two of Gaby’s three victories came on clay for Monica was an exceptional clay court player. Seles, exceedingly patient and mentally resilient, won the French Open three years in a row, the first in 1990.Contrastly, Gaby was mentally fragile, often unable to sustain a high level of play over the course of a long match and as a result, lost many she should have won.
In 1990, the four Grand Slam tournaments were won by four women. Seles was the youngest French Open champion as well as the youngest winner of the season ending championships at Madison Square Garden. Seles would go on to win 8 more Grand Slam titles and a total of three season ending championships before unofficially retiring in 2003. In 2009, Monica Seles was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in Newport, Rhode Island.
Gabriela Sabatini at age twenty won her only Grand Slam title at the 1990 US Open defeating Steffi Graf in straights. Gaby, with 27 career singles and 14 doubles titles, was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 2006.
On March 10, 2015 at the BNP Paribas Showdown, two incredible athletes and exemplary ambassadors of women’s tennis will once again take the court at the equally legendary Madison Square Garden. Seles and Sabatini competed during the most recent golden age of tennis and I for one am anxious to witness this historic exhibition; two hall of famers at New York’s cathedral of tennis.
Each November my father and I made our pilgrimage to the Garden to witness the top eight women battle at the season ending championships. Not only did we see Seles and Sabatini compete on more than one occasion, we saw Gaby win her second season ending title in 1994 and the following year when she played her final match at the Garden.
Fortuitously and most gratefully, I witnessed both their inductions into the prestigious International Tennis Hall of Fame and on March 10, 2015, dad and I will once again trek to our beloved Garden to relive wonderful memories of two of our favorite players and create equally treasured new ones.
Thank you for reading. Please take a moment to follow me on twitter @caporaleemmy. Support LWOS by following us on Twitter – @LastWordOnSport and @LWOSworld – and “liking” our Facebook page.
For the latest in sports injury news, check out our friends at Sports Injury Alert.
Have you tuned into Last Word On Sports Radio? LWOS is pleased to bring you 24/7 sports radio to your PC, laptop, tablet or smartphone. What are you waiting for?
