Manhattan Beach Tennis Tournament : Sabatini Stays Around to Face Navratilova for Championship

In the morning, there was a fire in the kitchen. In the evening, the lights on the court went out for 20 minutes.

Pam Shriver made a quick decision. She would not wait for the flood.

“I just wanted to get out of here before something else happened,” Shriver said.

So she did, riding out atop Gabriela Sabatini’s looping topspin. All in all, it was a quirky semifinal Saturday at the Virginia Slims of Los Angeles, where Sabatini joined Martina Navratilova in today’s final.

Sabatini beat Shriver, 6-4, 6-2, helped along the way with the lob of her life, and Navratilova steadied herself after a brief wobble to defeat Zina Garrison, 6-1, 6-4.

There is $60,000 at stake at Manhattan Country Club for either Sabatini or Navratilova, who holds a 10-3 margin in their prior meetings.

To get to the final, Sabatini had to face only two break points from Shriver and she saved them both. The key to the match was a wonderfully placed lob that followed an easy missed volley by Shriver in the seventh game of the first set.

Serving at 3-3, Shriver led, 40-15, but was taken to deuce. Then Sabatini lifted a lob that landed within the shadow of the baseline. Shriver’s own lob went long.

“The point before, the backhand volley was more important,” Shriver said. “If I make it, I’m up, 4-3. Instead, boom, that’s it.”

Even Sabatini had to admire her lob.

“That one was pretty good,” she said.

Sabatini broke Shriver on the next point and went on from there.

Shriver’s repertoire was limited, but what she did, she did well. She captured a bug and released it in the first row and twirled a towel as a wave broke out in the stands.

It was a wave of goodby.

Meanwhile, Navratilova was saying hello to her first hardcourt tournament final since the Australian Open in January. She cruised, sputtered and then accelerated again against Garrison, who was expected to make it closer.

So now, the headband-to-headband record reads Navratilova 24, Garrison 1.

Garrison came into the tournament bearing a belief that she is not really the No. 6 player in the world, and judging by her performance Saturday, Garrison is entirely correct. She should be ranked lower than that.

Actually, Garrison thought she should be ranked more like No. 4, but it’s difficult to believe a player ranked that high would commit so many costly mistakes when Navratilova seemed ready to topple:

--Four break points for 3-0, and Garrison misses them all.

--One point for 5-1, and she sends a forehand approach wide.

--Three more points for 5-3, and she double-faults, pulls an easy forehand wide and drifts a forehand volley long.

After all that, after losing the last five games, Garrison decided to take the next two weeks off to recuperate.

“I could have come here and lost in the first round and be really miserable,” Garrison said.

When she was falling behind two service breaks to 4-1, Navratilova was thinking Garrison actually might be something else--lucky.

The net cord belonged to Garrison as she began the second set. Several shots played touch and go with the net cord. Then Garrison missed one, which Navratilova interpreted as a sign.

“I knew the tide had turned,” Navratilova said. “Her luck had run out.”

At the same time, Navratilova knew she was rushing her serves, so she told herself to slow down.

Vital to Navratilova was her service game at 0-2. It was a 25-point game that went to deuce 10 times.

Although Navratilova was erratic--one sequence went ace, double fault, double fault--she pulled it out with a deft touch volley on the 10th deuce and a backhand crosscourt volley winner on her seventh game point.

“That game helped me stay in the set,” Navratilova said.

Staying mentally in the match was another thing. Navratilova said her concentration faded in and out like poor radio reception.

Navratilova called her problems “lapses” and said she was thinking of “personal” things.

“I had some weird thoughts going through my head,” she said, refusing to elaborate, then adding cryptically: “Stuff you should not be thinking about, like death.”

Coincidentally, Garrison was thinking along the same lines after blowing so many chances.

“I have to find out what it takes to have that killer instinct,” she said.

Navratilova said she got only five hours’ sleep Friday night and had to hit the snooze button on her clock radio a couple of times.

Then, when Navratilova was preparing oatmeal for breakfast, she had to break up a battle between her three dogs and her friend’s cat.

It was probably a better fight than the match.

But today’s final looks promising. Sabatini won the last time they played, 6-3, 6-2, on clay at Amelia Island, Fla.

Sabatini’s chillingly efficient backhand passing shots took their toll on Shriver, who was also impressed by the way Sabatini moves to her shots.

“She hits and she’s off,” Shriver said. “I tend to hit and watch and them I’m off. I’ve got to eliminate that watch . . . not my Rolex.”