AGASSI IS FAR FROM DONE, GILBERT SAYS.

Byline: Joe Jares

Brad Gilbert has spoken:

His pupil, Andre Agassi is nowhere close to over the hill.

Anyone with great potential as a tennis player should skip college.

Just because Pete Sampras is not the jerk that Jimmy Connors and John McEnroe were, he hasn't received his due.

Gilbert, articulate and opinionated, played briefly at Pepperdine (one trimester), then won 20 tournaments in 12 years on the ATP Tour. He was noted for winning matches as much with his head as with his physical skills.

The term ``winning ugly'' wasn't coined for him, but it could have been.

His chief occupation at present - and the reason he's at the Infiniti Open at UCLA - is helping to resurrect Agassi's career.

The 27-year-old husband of Brooke Shields lost in the first round at Washington, D.C., last week, has a 6-7 record in singles play this year and has plummeted to No. 31 in the world.

Agassi tries to get back on track tonight in a first-round match against ex-UCLA star Justin Gimelstob.

According to Gilbert, Agassi is not ready to retire to a life as Mr. Shields.

``He's been working hard the last three or four days,'' said Gilbert. ``I think he's going to play way better this week. . . . We just practiced the last three days in Vegas, where it was 111 degrees. He's been running and he's in way better shape.

``The game is still there. We had a talk the other day and I told him he's got to be out there for Andre. Not for me, not for his dad, not for anybody other than himself.

``And the game has not passed him by, and I told him he should still have another three, four Grand Slam titles in him.''

(Agassi already has three, and has been a Grand Slam singles finalist seven times. He has won 34 pro tournaments and been ranked No. 1 in the world.)

Does the wealthy Agassi still hunger for titles?

``I wouldn't be here if he didn't,'' said Gilbert.

Agassi's opponent tonight, the 6-foot-5, promising Gimelstob, 20, wasted two years by playing for UCLA instead of going on tour, according to Gilbert. ``If you've got aspirations to be a great player,'' he said, ``school isn't where it's happening.''

He pointed to Paul Goldstein of Stanford, who was one of America's best juniors.

``Now he's just a struggling college player,'' said Gilbert. ``Now it looks like he'll be a doctor.''

Gilbert said colleges have good coaches and could be a developmental factor for American men again if, among other moves, they would limit teams to one foreigner and allow struggling pros to come back off the tour, pay their own tuition and resume collegiate play.

When the subject got around to Sampras, Gilbert said he's disgusted by the criticism of the world No. 1 for being dull.

``Like Bjorn Borg had any personality,'' he said. ``I mean, Jimmy Connors is the biggest jerk of all time. John McEnroe would go ballistic on the court.

``As far as I'm seeing, Pete handles himself with nothing but class. The guy has respect. The ATP and everybody has dropped the ball in not giving him his `props.' ''

Gilbert puts Agassi much closer to Sampras than Connors and McEnroe in the class department (``very moralistic and nothing but aces'').

OK, OK, Brad, but how are you going to get moralistic Andre back to Grand Slam-contending form?

``Just start off by winning the first point, the first game, the first set,'' said Gilbert. ``You can't win the U.S. Open here. You've got to win the first game against Justin Gimelstob, and that's all we're thinking about right now. ``Just start on the path to recovery.''