Thursday, Sept. 9, 1999 | 10:38 a.m.
SUN WIRE REPORTS
NEW YORK -- The ball ticked the net and plopped onto Las Vegan Andre Agassi's side of the court like a cracked egg into a frying pan. Instead of giving up on the point, Agassi sprinted from the baseline and turned his racket into a spatula.
On the run, he flipped the ball back over the net and had the snap reflex to field a sharp volley by a hard-charging Nicolas Escude and put it away for a winner. At that moment, deep in a first-set tie breaker, Agassi seemed to nip the spirit of Escude.
From there, a relentless Agassi reconfirmed his status as the player to beat at the U.S. Open with a 7-6 (7-3), 6-3, 6-4 victory over Escude on Wednesday night to advance to the semifinals against third-seeded Yevgeny Kafelnikov.
"Whoever wins has a pretty good chance of finishing the year as No. 1," Agassi said of his semifinal match. "He's had such a great summer since Wimbledon. He's a big guy, moves well, hits well, does everything well. It's good for it all to come down to this one match."
Kafelnikov, the 1999 Australian Open champion, had to feel the sting of a record 48 aces from 12th-seeded Richard Krajicek, one of the three men Kafelnikov had deemed capable of winning this Open. But Kafelnikov used his passing shot to keep Krajicek, the 1996 Wimbledon winner, from making a complete recovery from a two-sets-to-none deficit and, with a magnificent parting shot, sent Krajicek home a loser by slamming an ace of his own, his 10th of the match, to seal a 7-6 (7-0), 7-6 (7-4), 3-6, 1-6, 7-6 (7-5) victory.
The Russian had sprinted ahead, 6-2, in the final tie breaker only to watch the Dutchman creep back into contention. A flawed forehand on his first match point made it 6-3, Krajicek's 47th ace made it 6-4, and Kafelnikov put his hands over his eyes in disbelief when Krajicek spoiled his third match point with a 48th ace.
Krajicek's aces broke the record held by Goran Ivanisevic, who fired 46 in losing to Magnus Norman at Wimbledon two years ago.
The men's semifinal matchups were to be completed today as No. 5 Gustavo Kuerten played Cedric Pioline of France in a day match and No. 7 Todd Martin faces Slava Dosedel of the Czech Republic at night. The winners will face each other on Saturday.
Meanwhile, Richard Williams, father and co-coach of Serena and Venus, confidently predicted before the U.S. Open that his daughters would face each other in the title match.
They're one step away.
Serena Williams joined sister Venus in the semifinals at the USTA National Tennis Center by overpowering fourth-seeded Monica Seles 4-6, 6-3, 6-2 Wednesday. Earlier, defending champion Lindsay Davenport survived two match points before defeating No. 5 Mary Pierce 6-2, 3-6, 7-5.
In Friday's semifinals, Venus Williams, at 19 a little more than a year older than her sister, will face Martina Hingis in a rematch of the 1997 final, when the Swiss miss captured her only U.S. Open title. The other semifinal pits Serena Williams against Davenport.
"My dad has been right about a lot of things, you have to admit," Serena Williams said after her latest victory. "But I still have one match to go."
For the third straight match, Serena Williams dropped the opening set 6-4. For the third straight match, she swept the next two sets by spraying the court with powerful groundstrokes while running down virtually every shot that came to her side.
She pounded 12 aces, running her ace total for the tournament to 42, more than any other woman, and completely dominated play in the final two sets.
"Now it's Venus' and Serena's time," Seles said.
Davenport barely kept alive her bid to repeat as U.S. Open champion, thanks to an auspicious shower and a double-fault on match point by Pierce, who for most of two sets dictated points with deep, hard groundstrokes and pushed Davenport to the brink of defeat.
But Pierce failed to put the match away when she served at 5-4 in the third set.
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