25 Years Ago: Venus Williams' titanic day in Oklahoma City

The 17-year-old won her first WTA title—and 30 minutes later, stepped back onto the court with Serena before winning their first doubles title as a sister act.

ByJohn Berkok

Published Mar 01, 2023

The date was March 1st, 1998. Titanic was everywhere—No. 1 song, No. 1 album, No. 1 movie. That day it actually became the first movie in history to gross $1 billion worldwide.

But that wasn’t the only piece of history being written that day, because over in Oklahoma City, two of the most legendary names in tennis history were cruising to the first WTA titles of their career.

The day began with a 17-year-old Venus Williams capturing the first WTA singles title of her career, defeating South African Joanette Kruger, 6-3, 6-2, to lift the trophy in the Oklahoman capital.

“This one I will probably always remember,” Venus said afterwards.

“I can say it all started back in Oklahoma City.”

Advertising

Venus would win her second WTA singles title just a few weeks later in Miami. As of now, she has 49 career WTA singles titles.

Venus winning the final wasn’t a surprise—she was the higher-ranked player, No. 14 to No. 27. It was her 6-7 (5), 6-2, 6-3 semifinal upset over No. 2-ranked Lindsay Davenport that truly turned heads, not only because of the ranking difference, but because Davenport had won all three of their previous meetings, including just a few weeks earlier in the quarterfinals of the Australian Open.

But after falling behind 4-1 in the first set to her countrywoman, Venus had enough—she wound up losing the set but won the war, clawing back for a come-from-behind three-set victory.

“I was tired of losing to her all the time,” she said afterwards. “There comes a point where you have to break through. You can’t let someone beat you four times in a row.”

And though Kruger was also having a titanic week herself—she actually took out Serena in the quarterfinals, 6-1, 6-1—there would be no letdown for Venus in the final.

“It’s never the finals until it’s the finals,” Venus said.

“There’s no letdown for me.”

At the trophy ceremony, Venus told the crowd about her and Serena’s Supermarket Sweep experience at the nearby Snyder’s IGA earlier that week, an activity set up by the tournament to raise money for charity. “About the Supermarket Sweep, Serena and I, we took things to extremes as a custom, but it was so much fun,” she said. “If you guys ever get a chance to do it, I recommend it!”

Oklahoma City in 1998 was the first of Venus and Serena's 22 career WTA doubles titles together. They're 22-1 in finals together.

Advertising

And then, the icing on the cake: half an hour later, Venus returned to the court with Serena and the two won the first WTA doubles title of both of their careers, defeating Romanian-Australian pair Catalina Cristea and Kristine Kunce in the final, 7-5, 6-2.

It was just the fifth doubles tournament they had ever played together, and they didn’t drop a set all week.

Here are a few throwbacks to what the world was like on March 1st, 1998 (it’s mostly Titanic):

The No. 1 movie at the U.S. box office was Titanic
The No. 1 album on the Billboard 200 was the soundtrack of Titanic
The No. 1 song on the Billboard Hot 100 was “My Heart Will Go On” by Celine Dion, the signature song from Titanic (it debuted at No. 1 that week)
"Gettin’ Jiggy Wit It" by Will Smith, "Together Again" by Janet Jackson and Destiny’s Child’s first single, “No, No, No” (featuring Wyclef Jean) were also in the Top 10 that week
A few weeks later, Titanic won 11 Academy Awards (including Best Picture)
Martina Hingis was spending her 48th consecutive week at No. 1 on the WTA rankings (which Iga Swiatek is doing this week)
Pete Sampras was No. 1 on the ATP rankings
… and Sebastian Korda’s dad, Petr Korda, had just won his first Grand Slam title at the Australian Open.

Advertising

Baseline