Davenport overcomes errors to advance

NEW HAVEN, Conn. - Newport Beach’s Lindsay Davenport rallied from a

set down and advance to the Pilot Pen final with a 4-6, 6-2, 6-0 win over

Ruxandra Dragomir.

Davenport will play the winner of the other semifinal match between

Venus Williams and Monica Seles.

Things were not all smooth for the Newport Beach native, dropping the

first set on a combination of shaky serves and several unforced errors.

After falling behind, 1-2, in the second set, the 23-year-old

proceeded to rip off 11 consecutive games from Dragomir for the win.

The top-seeded Davenport has not lost to Dragomir in five meetings.

“I was getting frustrated. That probably worked to my advantage

because then you just stop thinking about things,” said Davenport. “You

start playing.”

Davenport had only two aces, but scored on 67% of her first serves,

double faulting twice.

Dragomir came into the match after playing a long set in the morning

to finish her semifinal against Sandrine Testud, the eighth seed. Their

match was suspended Thursday night due to darkness. Dragomir won 5-7,

6-4, 7-5.

“Against her I have no chance to come to the net because the ball is

going so fast and so hard it doesn’t give me time to get to the net,”

said Dragomir, who did not lose her humor. “Today, I had no chance. Maybe

just to pick up the balls from the net. But we have ball kids, so I

didn’t need to do that.”