ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, August 3, 1996 TAG: 9608050130
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DOUG DOUGHTY STAFF WRITER
Karin Miller's look hasn't changed much since her first visit to Roanoke three years ago. Her outlook has.
Miller still has 10 rings in the lobe of her right ear and nine in her left, and she recently has been wearing a diamond in her nose. But she's no longer a little, 15-year-old tennis prodigy with hardly a care in the world.
Miller, who had contemplated turning pro, is waiting to hear if her recent application to Duke University has been accepted.
``If I'm doing well in a tournament, I'm like, `Maybe I should do this,''' Miller said Friday after defeating Kori Davidson-Karsay 6-3, 3-6, 7-5 in the third round of the U.S. Tennis Association Challenger of Roanoke. ``But then, if you're out of town and you lose in the first round, you're like, `Maybe I shouldn't.'
``It's hard. It goes back and forth, but right now I've made a commitment to go to school.''
Many of the players in the Roanoke tournament, particularly the American-born players, have been to college. Only a handful, most notably Miller and would-be Duke teammate Vanessa Webb, will be in school in the fall.
``My options were to take a year off [and] stay amateur, just go ahead and turn pro or try to go to school in the fall,'' said Miller, 18, the salutatorian of her graduating class in Bradenton, Fla. ``This keeps my options open.
``If I absolutely hate it, I'll come out and play. If I like it, who knows what I'll be doing in four years?''
She could be playing tennis. Duke won the ACC women's tennis championship and has a program ranked among the top 10 in the country. At 22, she wouldn't be any older than Davidson-Karsay, a former collegiate star who is married to former Oakland Athletics pitcher Steve Karsay.
Miller has every right to feel like a veteran, however. She has been on tennis' fast track since age 8, when she moved to Bradenton from Trenton, N.J., to enroll in a tennis academy operated by Nick Bollettieri, who has coached Andre Agassi and Monica Seles among others.
``He had noticed me at a tournament in Bradenton and offered me a scholarship for a year,'' she said.
Miller spent five years at Bollettieri's academy, but actually enjoyed her greatest success after leaving his tutelage, when she was No.2 in the country in the under-18 rankings in 1993.
``It was time to leave,'' she said of the break with Bollettieri. ``There were just too many people there and I needed more individual [attention]. I don't think you're meant to stay there together.
``It was good for me. I got a lot of court time in. I'd go to school in the morning and play four or five hours in the afternoon. But after five years of that, I'd had enough. I needed more quality than quantity.''
Miller, beaten in the first round at Hunting Hills in 1994, came back from a one-set deficit Thursday to defeat Audra Keller in the second round, then went three hours with Davidson-Karsay on Friday.
``I don't mind being out there a couple of hours,'' Miller said. ``Anything that goes long is good for me.''
Miller, who is a shade over 5 feet, isn't the most powerful player competing at Hunting Hills Country Club. However, she makes few errors and is almost impossible to pass.
``My size limits me in reach and maybe a little bit in power,'' she said, ``but it's good because I can get to a lot of balls. My feet are my weapon.''
Miller's feet may be her weapon, but it is her ears and nose that get the most attention. There is no therapeutic value to the earrings, with which Miller has become so comfortable that she does not remove them to sleep.
``I just take them out to clean them,'' said the tournament's third seed, behind Maria Jose Gaidano and Rachel Viollet. ``I've had them for two or three years. It was just a fetish that I had. People want to know, `How many do you have? Does it hurt? Did you do it yourself?'
``A few girls have tattoos. I don't. But I think I'm the only one with the ears and the nose. I don't wear anything on my wrists or necklaces. The nose I just added last weekend, but I've had it [pierced] before,'' Miller said. ``I do it for me, no one else. I just like it.''
LENGTH: Medium: 78 linesby CNB