The backhand drop shot from the baseline landed softly over the net, spun back and died, as savvy a stroke as any pro could play.
In this case, the pro was Venus Williams, 14 years old and playing her first tournament since she was 11, and that cute little drop shot was the pivotal point in the first set of a 6-3, 6-4 victory in the Bank of the West Classic on Monday night over former NCAA champion Shaun Stafford."Smart shot, V," Williams' coach, Rick Macci, shouted to her from the first row behind the baseline. It was a point that not only broke Stafford's service and gave Williams a 5-2 lead in the set, but it was one more piece of evidence that showed just how different Williams might be from other former phenoms.
Unadorned by any endorsed outfits, Williams wore a plain peach T-shirt with WTA on one sleeve, and a simple beige skirt with no logo.
Unlike Jennifer Capriati, who had $5 million worth of endorsements before she turned pro, Williams didn't just slug from the baseline as Capriati did at the same age. She mixed in the occasional drop shot and lob, and came in more often than most players to put away volleys. Despite her 6-foot-1 frame and long strides, she moved fluidly and fast and wasn't often out of position.
Aside from this match being her pro debut, it also was Williams' first match on an indoor carpet. She said it was slower than the hardcourts she's used to, but she appeared to have little trouble adjusting.
"Nothing fazes her," Macci said. "It doesn't matter what the court is and she doesn't care about her rackets. She just doesn't make a big deal out of things."
The victory set up a match Wednesday night between Williams and top-seeded Arantxa Sanchez Vicario, the French and U.S. Open champion this year.
"I don't have to watch her," Sanchez said as she left before Williams took the court to go to the Rolling Stones concert next door in the Oakland Coliseum. "I'm sure I'll be seeing a lot of her."
While the Stones' concert was packed, the Coliseum Arena was nearly empty, just a few hundred fans - and almost an equal number of media - witnessing this moment of tennis history.
One of the loudest voices belonged to Venus Williams' father, and he was rooting against her.
He didn't want her to win, he said, didn't want her to get intoxicated with victory so soon in her pro career. Better, he thought, she lose and go home, take tennis a little slower.
Richard Williams didn't get his way when he tried to discourage his daughter from turning pro at 14, and he didn't get his wish Monday night.
"I was hoping Shaun would win," he said. "I really feel when juniors start off winning, it's like a drunk - after he has one drink, he wants another one. When a young player wins, they want to just keep winning, keep playing. I'm more interested in her education than her tennis. We don't look at things like winning and losing."
Asked whether Venus was bothered by him rooting against her, Williams said, "That's nothing new for Venus. She'd probably be the first to wonder if I started rooting for her."
Williams never even bothered to sit between changeovers.
"Maybe she doesn't know she's allowed to sit," Macci said during the match. "Maybe she thinks she needs a ticket." He then wrote in his notes, "Why don't you sit down?"
Williams said she had a good reason for standing.
"I don't sit down in practice," she said.
Macci found more serious lapses. At one point, he wrote on his yellow pad, "Volley, Volley, Volley. Where is it?"
But he and Williams and her family could hardly be disappointed in so fine a debut.
"I really wasn't sure how I was going to do, but once I got out there, I just did my thing," Williams said.
Pam Shriver, a teen phenom herself once, was mightily impressed.
"She has a lot of weapons," Shriver said. "In one match, it's hard to tell. She'll need patience and time, on and off the court. It's going to be great to have her on the tour, 14 or not. She'll just need tennis in the right doses for the next several years."
Stafford helped Williams by double-faulting five times, including three times in losing the second game of the match. If Williams was nervous, she didn't show it. Stafford, a 25-year-old former NCAA champion, was the one who looked more out of control.
"I think, for the most part, both of us were tight," Stafford said. "She moves extremely well for her height. She has a good serve, and it's going to get better. My performance wasn't that great, but she played well. She's 14 and capable of doing anything."
Williams won the first point, drilling a serve that sent Stafford lunging wide to her right off court, then following with a backhand crosscourt approach that Stafford could barely get her racket on. But Williams lost that first game when she hit a forehand wide at deuce, then couldn't reach a forehand in the corner by Stafford.
The blue beads on her braided hair clicking as she shook her head, Williams sighed, strode around the net and broke back with the aid of double-faults.
Williams played tentatively much of the 1-hour, 22-minute match, as if she didn't want to risk too much too soon by going to the net.
"She's playing too vanilla," Macci said. "She's trying to go corner to corner. She should be coming in more, going down the line, mixing it up. She can do that."
Williams' father, Richard, carried a lucky rock in his pocket as he paced the arena halls before the match. When the match started, he left his seat after she lost her first game. He returned a few minutes later, then kept going in and out of the arena.
The second set was 4-4 when Williams ripped a backhand down the line that Stafford smacked wide to drop the game. On the changeover to serve for the match, Williams fairly skipped to the other side. She needed only four serves, taking the game at love when Stafford hit a backhand return long.
Williams then showed her only real emotion of the match, jumping up and down at the net.