Ron Kantowski watches as Andre Agassi gives the U.S. Open a match worthy of a champion

Monday, Sept. 4, 2006 | 7:45 a.m.

The last time I went to Buffalo Wild Wings at the Galleria mall to watch a live sporting event featuring a local team or entity, UNLV was playing football at Wyoming last fall.

The idea was to watch a game with Rebels fans, to get a feel for what they thought of new coach Mike Sanford and whether he was the right man to guide UNLV well, I was going to say back to the Promised Land but that would infer the Rebels had once been there.

Anyway, to make a 2-9 story short, there are 44 TV sets at that particular Wild Wings and nary a one was tuned to the Rebels' game. Not even one of the three postage stamp-sized sets in the men's room. And this was when you could actually watch the Rebels on TV.

So I was delighted to walk into the very same bar around 8:15 a.m. Sunday morning to find Andre Agassi's third-round U.S. Open match against Benjamin Becker showing on one of the big screens.

Kara the bartender told me that tennis is usually shown on the postage stamp-sized sets, if at all. But this was Andre Agassi at the U.S. Open. This was different. This was special. This was Our Guy, playing in one last tournament. And playing as if there were no tomorrow, or at least only a very few of them left.

That's why it was on the big screen. The best big screen, I might add, which would be the one facing away from the window. Medium definition might be the best way to describe it. This, I decided, despite the sound being turned down, would be the place to watch Andre Agassi, Our Guy, continue his magical run through the U.S. Open.

It would be me, Kara the bartender and zero of our closest friends. We were the only ones in the bar.

Kara the bartender said she didn't know much about sports but that the empty bar might explain why we don't have a pro team here.

I told her she knows more about sports than she thinks.

Andre lost the first set. No problem, I told Kara the bartender. If this B. Becker was that B. Becker - and this were 1989 - then Andre might have a problem. This B. Becker played tennis at Baylor. How good can he be? Besides, I told her, they've only played an hour. Agassi's not even limping yet.

As if on cue, a husky guy wearing a red shirt and blue jeans walked into the bar. He seemed more interested in playing the video golf game than watching Agassi and B. Becker play Pong with a real tennis ball.

"Becker?" asked the beefy guy incredulously. "He's still playing?"

No, I told him. This is Benjamin Becker not Boris Becker.

The beefy guy dropped another bunch of quarters into the video golf game. "Well, it still looks like he's giving Agassi the run-around."

Andre won the second set. The Other Becker won the third. The fourth was close, although the Other Becker was starting to play like a kid who had received a guitar for a Christmas present. He was losing rhythm and losing it fast. He got cramps and was starting to limp almost as badly as Andre.

"Rally time," said the beefy guy in the red shirt, who was now playing more attention to Pong on TV than his video golf game.

Sure enough, it was. Andre was doing it again. It wasn't even lunchtime, and Agassi was reaching into that well of forehand winners. Suddenly, he was ahead 5-4. Then it was set point.

"Better bring me a menu," I told Kara the bartender. "We're goin' five."

Or so I thought.

By the time I could order wings with the spicy garlic sauce, it was over. Game. Game. And, darn it, another game. Followed by the three words we knew were coming but still had trouble comprehending. Or accepting.

Set.

Match.

Career.

It was over.

In baseball, this is where they would have brought out the rocking chair, the fishing boat, the rod and reel, the horseshoe of flowers with "GOOD LUCK" spelled out in gold foil letters.

But Agassi had requested that nothing special be done to commemorate his last match. Instead, he did something special for us. He made us believe he could line up the stars with Jupiter and Mars one more time.

Up on the big screen, the crowd stood as one to produce a cheer we could not hear because the darn sound was still turned down.

The silence was deafening.