Coetzer caught up with just about every drop shot and took the sting out of Spirlea's rocket forehands, winning 6-3, 6-4 for her first top-tier victory on the WTA Tour.

``If I had to pick one title that I would want to have my name on, this would be the one,'' said Coetzer, the No 4 seed who had never made it past the quarterfinals of this event in eight previous tries.

Spirlea, the No 9 seed from Romania, was the talk of the tournament, with third-set tiebreaker wins over top-seeded Lindsay Davenport and No 3 Monica Seles. But Coetzer, a South African who spends about half the year at Hilton Head, drew on her speed and endurance.

Coetzer won $150,000 in the season's first clay-court event and gave the crowd its first hometown champion in the tournament's 26 years. Coetzer survived what became an exodus of top players including ConchitaMartinez and Arantxa Sanchez Vicario.