How did Davenport win the Olympics?
The Answer is that she played very very well.
She beat Huber (who had made that years Aussie Open final) and Majoli (who won Roland Garros the following year) who were both very close to top five during that period (both achieved their carrer high ranking of 4 in 1996), she beat MJ Fernandez who was top 10, and in the final she beat Sanchez Vicario for the first time when Arantxa was coming off finals appearances at Wimbledon and Roland Garros. Thats 4 TOP TEN PLAYERS. Also present were Novotna (knocked out by sanchez), Seles, (knocked out by Novotna), Martinez (then world #2 eliminated by Fernandez) and Date (who had just played that glorious semifinal at Wimby versus Graf).
Davenport was not too far away from her 98-2000 level when winning the 1996 Olympics, the difference was that from 1994-1996 Lindsay could play a string of great matches but struggled to be CONSISTENT from tournament to tournament, thats why her ranking was not so good.
To downgrade that Gold Medal winning performance by saying that "no one was playing well" is a fallacy. Just because today's top players were not on the scene yet does not mean that the performance was any less exceptional. With the very notable exception of a Graf, the field was A-Class - a genuine Grand Slam field. It was as good as the field that Seles beat to win her AO in 1996, and Lindsay probably had a tougher road.