Williams Takes Davenport in Los Angeles Open

M A N H A T T A N  B E A C H, Calif., Aug. 13, 2000 -- Serena Williams issued a warningof sorts after beating the world’s two top-ranked players inconsecutive matches.

“I haven’t even begun. I’m just warming up, basically,” shesaid with a smile, having extended the family winning streak tofour tournaments today by rallying for a 4-6, 6-4, 7-6 (1) victoryover Lindsay Davenport to win the estyle.com Classic for the secondstraight year.

Following her win here last August, Williams went on to win theU.S. Open — her only Grand Slam championship.

Davenport, ranked second in the world, served for the match at6-5 in the third set, but Williams broke at love to force atiebreaker.

It was 1-1 when Davenport double faulted, and Williams then wonthe next five points to ending the 2-hour, 28-minute match.

Strong Post-Wimbledon Showing Williams took 11 of the match’s final 12 points to extend hercareer record against Davenport to 5-1.

“At 5-6, I was thinking I had to break or it’s the end of thematch,” Williams said. “I didn’t want that, I made it happen.

“Even today, I made too many errors. I don’t know how I pulledit through. I wasn’t the same spunky person you usually see.Obviously, my groundstrokes really came through for me. I didn’tserve very well.”

The tournament at the Manhattan Club was the first for the18-year-old Serena since Wimbledon, where she lost to older sisterVenus in the semifinals.

Venus Williams beat Davenport in the final at Wimbledon for herfirst Grand Slam title, then prevailed in the Bank of the West andAcura classics before taking this week off. Davenport was runner-upin the Bank of the West, too.

Davenport’s Opportunity Lost Seeded fifth in this tournament and ranked seventh in the worldmainly because she hasn’t played much this year, Serena rallied fora 4-6, 6-2, 6-3 victory over Martina Hingis, the world’s top-rankedplayer and No. 1 seed, in Saturday’s semifinals.

Williams won $87,000 and Davenport, seeded No. 2, earned $43,500from the $535,000 purse. The temperature was measured at 92 whenthe match began, but was several degrees higher on the court.

“I can’t remember a match where I had so many chances and itdidn’t go my way,” Davenport said. “So many times I was up and itseemed like my serve left me.”

Davenport committed 13 double faults, which she called “anextraordinarily high number for me,” and had nine aces.

Williams double-faulted eight times and had eight aces.

Final Tie Breaker Davenport broke Williams’ serve in the first, fifth and 11thgames of the third set, but Williams broke back in the fourth,sixth and 12th games.

“Even at 6-5 (in the third set), she came up with some greatshots,” Davenport said. “I got stuck hitting too many secondserves. I was bad serving at certain times of the match. Everythingelse went well.”

The only service break of the first set came in the ninth game,when Williams double-faulted twice — the second on game point.Davenport then held serve to win the set.

Davenport carried her momentum into the second set, breakingWilliams thanks in part to a double fault on the game’s final pointto take a 1-0 lead. That would be the first of five breaks in theset.

After Davenport held in her first seven service games of thematch, Williams broke in the sixth, eighth and 10th games of thesecond set to offset a break by Davenport in the seventh game.

Then came the back-and-forth third set.

“At the end, I switched up rather than doing the same oldthing,” Williams said, pointing out she charged the net more inthe late going. “That helped me a lot. If Plan A isn’t working, Ihave Plan B, Plan C and even Plan D.