Sampras wins
Sampras wins third straight tennis title
OSAKA, Japan (Agencies): Pete Sampras subdued a brief, spirited challenge from a promising Frenchman yesterday to earn his third consecutive tennis title with a victory at the US$650,000 Salem Open.
Sampras added the Japanese crown to those he won last month at Indian Wells, California, and at The Lipton in Florida as he defeated Lionel Roux 6-2, 6-2.
Roux, ranked No. 212 on the IBM-ATP Tour computer list, made a brave showing in his first career final, which came at only his second top-level Tour event of the year. But the 20-year-old from Lyon was no match for the awesome skills of Sampras, who marks nearly a full year at world No. 1 next week.
The victory at the Esaka Tennis Center on a crisp spring afternoon with cherry blossoms starting to bud on nearby trees was the fifth for Sampras in 1994.
The Florida-based player won the New South Wales Open and Australian Open titles in January prior to his runaway success in the U.S. in March.
Sampras, already a star with his bank manager, just missed reaching the $1 million mark in prize money since the start of the year.
With the first-round defeat of world No. 2 Michael Stich of Germany this week in South Africa, Sampras is likely to widen his record margin atop the computer list. The American heads the table by more than 1,800 points - a history-making gap, which could increase to more than 2,000, according to a preliminary count by ATP Tour officials.
Sampras will be top seed in the Japan Open in Tokyo starting Monday and will be defending winner's points from 1993.
Sampras and Roux had never played prior to the final, and the seed needed a few games to get adjusted to the Frenchman's big- hitting style.
Sampras broke early in the first set for 2-1 and was never threatened thereafter.
He won the opening set on his second set point after dueling with Roux on the hardcourt. Sampras broke in the fifth and seventh games of the second set and claimed the victory on the first of three match points from a winning forehand chip shot.
Roux earned the final with upsets over fourth seed Ivan Lendl and No. 6 Aaron Krickstein.
Family Circle
In Hilton Head, South Carolina, Natalia Zvereva of Belarus was trounced in the first set in the semifinals at the $750,000 Family Circle Cup women's tennis tournament on Saturday, but came back to beat Mary Pierce of France 0-6 6-3 6-2.
In the other semifinal, second-seeded Conchita Martinez of Spain battled foot blisters and unseeded Iva Majoli of Croatia, who had back problems, for a 6-3 6-7 (7-3) 6-4 decision.
The 12th-ranked Zvereva, seeded sixth here, takes on the third-ranked Martinez in Sunday's final. The two have played six times before and are tied 3-3.
Zvereva reached the finals here once before in 1989, losing to Steffi Graf.
The 13th-ranked Pierce overwhelmed Zvereva in the 38-minute first set. Pierce, seeded seventh, lost only six points on her own serve and only lost 14 points of the 41 played in the opening set.
Zvereva changed her tactics for the final two sets of the two- hour match. She ran Pierce around more and employed the drop shot effectively.