RICK MACCI: Gabriella goes after the ball, it's like a heat-seeking missile.
GABRIELLA PRICE: I'm 4 foot 3, and 60 pounds.
MARC PRICE: Gabriella always wants to win at every single thing she does.
MICHELLE PRICE: You can see that she has that passion, and she really wants it.
GABRIELLA PRICE: I wanna be one of the best tennis players of all time.
[MUSIC]
MARC PRICE: Rick's trained so many great professionals.
And that's why we come here, for the Rick Macci Tennis Academy, to give her this opportunity.
[MUSIC]
RICK MACCI: [Coaching] If I say "Check," you go back the same way, okay?
RICK MACCI: Good, recover.
RICK MACCI: Gabriella Price is the closest thing I've ever seen to a Jennifer Capriati
at this age.
But Gabriella is even a little further along athletically.
RICK MACCI: [Coaching] Pull the left in.
GABRIELLA PRICE: Rick is really, like, nice to me, and he always helps me with things.
RICK MACCI: Well I've been coaching tennis, you know, 30, 35 years, and a lot of kids
that I've had since a young age have gone on to become household names.
Jennifer Capriati, Venus and Serena Williams, Andy Roddick.
GABRIELLA PRICE: When I'm playing with people, he tells me what to do and stuff, when I'm
playing matches on his court.
RICK MACCI: [Coaching] 20 balls to a side, you gotta put it in.
RICK MACCI: The first thing I look for is what I call the x-factor, and it's how they
compete.
RICK MACCI: [Coaching] Dig!
Dig!
Good.
RICK MACCI: But it's really the toughest thing to teach a kid, that you'll just run over
broken glass to get a ball, and run back over it to get the next one.
And I see it in Gabriella Price.
GABRIELLA PRICE: Rick says, "If you wanna be great, you have to run for every ball."
RICK MACCI: [Coaching] Show me how bad you want it!
Good fight, Gabby.
GABRIELLA PRICE: He says, "What's in your chest?"
RICK MACCI: [Coaching] What's in your chest?
Come on, Gab!
GABRIELLA PRICE: That means he says, what do you have inside?
Like, to get the ball.
RICK MACCI:[Coaching] Awesome.
Water.
Great Job.
Grab some water.
GABRIELLA PRICE: That was one of the easiest ones.
RICK MACCI: [Coaching] She's a beast!
She said that was easy.
MARC PRICE: Whatever Rick tells her to do here, I reinforce at home with her.
MARC PRICE: [Coaching] Get ready!
Good.
Get ready.
MICHELLE PRICE: You can see that she has that passion, and she really wants it.
We don't want it for her.
She wants it for herself.
And, and - MARC PRICE: Correction.
MICHELLE PRICE: What?
MARC PRICE: I want it for her.
MICHELLE PRICE: Well - MARC PRICE: I do want it for her.
Listen - MICHELLE PRICE: Okay, fine.
Yeah.
MARC PRICE: [Coaching] On your toes.
Elbow up.
Brush hard.
Come in!
MICHELLE PRICE: Marc is a great tennis player, and I always told him, "I don't want you living
vicariously through her."
And when he starts going a little nuts with the pressure -
MARC PRICE: [Coaching] Open.
Come on, go, go, go.
No.
MICHELLE PRICE: - you know, I talk to him and I say, "Okay, simmer down a little bit."
MARC PRICE: I will push her.
She has to be pushed.
MARC PRICE: [Coaching] Come forward, come forward.
Volley.
Go back.
MARC PRICE: She has to be given the education, what it takes to maybe succeed.
She's not gonna know this on her own.
MARC PRICE: [Coaching] Stand over there.
I'm gonna hit you a short ball - RICK MACCI: There has to be parental involvement.
That's what people don't understand.
Behind any kid who goes on to greatness, there has to be a parent that's plugged in.
MICHELLE PRICE: And of course we want her to succeed.
We want the best for her.
But at the end of the day, it's actually up to her.
RICK MACCI: [Coaching] Very good.
[MUSIC]
GABRIELLA PRICE: When I started playing tennis, I was 4-years-old.
My dad fed me one ball, and then I almost took his head off.
GABRIELLA PRICE: Here I come!
GABRIELLA PRICE: I have a house in New York, but this is my house that we stay at when
we go to Florida.
GABRIELLA PRICE: My family is very competitive.
GABRIELLA PRICE: [To brother] I wanna do this.
GABRIELLA PRICE: Everything we do, somebody always has to win.
My dad sometimes says, "Oh, nobody wins."
But my brothers, they're like, screaming, "I did better than you."
[MUSIC]
RICK MACCI: Gabriella's gonna be the youngest player in the tournament.
And the smallest.
But one of the feistiest, too.
GABRIELLA PRICE: Players that I play that are bigger and stronger than me, I really
don't get intimidated because my abilities are just as good.
[MUSIC]
RICK MACCI: When Gabby loses, she doesn't deal with it good.
And she shouldn't.
RICK MACCI: So that's all part of the process.
You're gonna miss, you're gonna fail, and you're gonna lose.
And that's how you succeed.
GABRIELLA PRICE: It's sometimes hard to not be upset because when you miss a shot, you
always wanted to win that point, so it's kinda hard to forget about it.
But you have to forget about it.
[MUSIC]
MARC PRICE: She's not doing anything with the ball.
[MUSIC]
OPPONENT: Oh, come on!
[MUSIC]
MARC PRICE: How bad do you wanna win?
There's no second chance in this tournament.
You need to be - look - focused and positive, like this.
You don't look over here at the cameras; you don't look at your brothers; you don't look
at your mom; you don't look at me.
We cannot help you.
You need to help yourself.
You need to be mature enough where Gabby needs to help herself.
Okay?
I love you either way.
Kiss.
High-five.
Come here.
GABRIELLA PRICE: Sometimes he's strict because he wants the best for me, he said.
MARC PRICE: Not fighting.
She's not fighting at all.
FAN: You're playing great, Gab.
Keep it up.
[MUSIC]
GABRIELLA PRICE: When I was losing 5-4, I kind of told myself, "Just keep the ball in
the court, and focus, and just - win."
GABRIELLA PRICE: [Playing] Out!
Let's go.
GABRIELLA PRICE: [Playing] Come on!
MARC PRICE: Oh yeah.
Way to play.
RICK MACCI: Gabriella's tougher than tough than tough, and that's what you want.
MARC PRICE: Way to play, Gabriella.
[MUSIC]
RICK MACCI: She's working harder than ever.
She wants it more than ever.
And I couldn't be more proud of her.
[MUSIC]
MARC PRICE: It is commitment.
It is time.
It does take a lot of energy.
But she is 9.
I totally respect the life that she lives every day.
It's not easy.
RICK MACCI: It's a journey.
It's a long-term process.
She has to work hard.
There's gonna be ups and downs.
We're not gonna know how this spits out probably 'til another 7 or 8 years, but I just see
qualities that spell greatness.
GABRIELLA PRICE: To be great you have to have great footwork.
You have to have great strokes.
You have to have a great attitude.
You have to have great everything.