March 27, 1997
KEY BISCAYNE, Fla. -- Top seed Martina Hingis, who said Wednesday night she was unbeatable, had to rally to defeat Jana Novotna in their semifinal match 6-3, 2-6, 6-4 in the Lipton Championships on Thursday.
Novotna missed a golden chance to put Hingis against the wall in the third set. Novotna had a break point leading 4-3, but Hingis fought it off, went on to win that game, then the next two to close out the match.
Hingis, who has won 28 consecutive matches and will become the youngest top-ranked player ever when the new rankings come out Monday, will meet Monica Seles on Saturday.
It took Hingis nearly two hours to turn back Novotna's upset bid on a sunny, steamy afternoon. The court temperature of 105 degrees had Hingis leaning on her racket toward the end of the match.
IN WEDNESDAY'S QUARTERFINALS, Novotna outlasted eighth-seeded Iva Majoli of Croatia, 6-2, 3-6, 7-6 (9-7) in a match that lasted two hours and 24 minutes.
Novotna has made the semifinals or better in each of the four tournaments she has played this year.
Hingis will take over the top spot from injured Steffi Graf of Germany. She shall be 16 years, six months of age on Monday, when she replaces Seles as the youngest No. 1 ever. Seles was 17 years, three months and 19 days of age when she passed Graf on March 11, 1991.
Graf, the three-time defending champion, has been on the shelf with an injured left knee and is not expected to return to the Tour until April at the Rexona Cup in Hamburg, Germany.
SATURDAY'S FINAL WILL PIT THE FUTURE No. 1 against former No. 1 Seles, who beat Barbara Paulus 6-1, 6-0 in 51 minutes. Seles, playing her first tournament this year, lost to Hingis 6-2, 6-0 in their only previous meeting last November in Oakland, Calif.
Seles, who won here in 1990 and 1991, had not played a tournament since last November, when she was forced to retire in her first-round match at the WTA Championships. She broke her right index finger and was unable to defend her Australian Open title in January. She also has been at the side of her father, Karolj, who is suffering from stomach cancer.
In the men's draw, Jim Courier advanced to Friday's semifinals by beating No. 4 seed Goran Ivanisevic 6-2, 7-6 (7-2). Courier, seeking his biggest tournament title since 1993, will next face No. 2 Thomas Muster, who beat Jonas Bjorkman 7-5, 6-2.
Top-ranked Pete Sampras plays Spaniard Sergi Bruguera in the other semifinal.
SAMPRAS MOVED INTO the Lipton semifinals for the fifth consecutive year when Germany's Hendrik Dreekman, his scheduled quarterfinal opponent, withdrew due to injury. Sampras is 30-5 lifetime at the Lipton Championships.
Bruguera needed just 54 minutes to beat Russia's Andrei Medvedev, 6-0, 6-3, in the quarterfinals.
The 25-year-old Sampras, who won this year's Australian Open, Sybase Open and the Advanta Championships, had his 17-match winning streak stopped by Bohdan Ulihrach of the Czech Republic at the Champions Cup earlier this month. He can move past his idol, Australian great Rod Laver, into eighth on the all-time tournament titles list by winning here. Sampras has won 47 titles in his career.
OF THE WORLD'S TOP 20 male players, only number four Yevgeny Kafelnikov of Russia, 14th-ranked American Todd Martin and No. 17 Stefan Edberg of Sweden were missing from the draw. Kafelnikov is still nursing his broken right hand, Martin is recovering from an elbow injury and Edberg is retired.
Mary Pierce of France, ranked 13th, is suffering from a strained right calf and was not entered. Sixth-ranked Conchita Martinez of Spain also is missing.
Other than the Grand Slams, the Lipton Championships is one of a handful of tournaments that blend the men's and women's tours.
The prize money is lucrative, with the men's winner receiving $360,000 and the women's champion $215,000.
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