Seles Capitalizes on Errors for Victory Over Capriati

Monica Seles, who struggled with her timing all week, found her game during the third set to defeat Jennifer Capriati, 6-3, 5-7, 6-2, in the finals of the IGA U.S. Indoor Championships Sunday at Oklahoma City.

Seles, who lost to Capriati in the quarterfinals during Capriati’s run to the Australian Open title, came up with her only ace in the third set and managed to break Capriati’s serve twice.

“I was so disappointed with my match yesterday, and I said I better play some good tennis or it’s going to be a quick match,” said Seles, who had trouble winning her semifinal match against Shinobu Asagoe of Japan, 6-7 (5), 6-2, 6-2. “Maybe that got me more relaxed.”

Seles won the first set easily. Capriati, in her first tournament since Australia, double faulted to lose her first service game, then lost her second game after falling behind, 15-40.

They traded breaks in the first two games of the second set, then stayed on serve. The set appeared headed for a tiebreaker before Capriati broke Seles at love in the 12th game to win the set, with Seles double faulting on the final point.

At 2-2 in the third set, Seles earned a break when Capriati hit a backhand into the net after falling behind, 30-40.

“I just made a few errors that I shouldn’t have made,” said Capriati. “It just changed the momentum again and she just picked up her game after that.”

After Seles held serve, the seventh game went to deuce before Capriati double faulted and hit a backhand long to give Seles a 5-2 lead.

“I’m definitely not going to be disappointed with today. I’m just proud of myself for coming back this week and playing well,” Capriati said.

*

Gustavo Kuerten of Brazil surged through the first set in 26 minutes in beating home-crowd favorite Jose Acasuso, 6-1, 6-3, to win the Copa AT&T; Cup at Buenos Aires.

Baseball

Frank Thomas didn’t practice with the Chicago White Sox at their spring training camp in Tucson for the fifth day in a row and the unhappy star had another telephone conversation with Manager Jerry Manuel.

Thomas claims his $9.9-million salary is too low, especially when compared to Alex Rodriguez’s $252-million, 10-year contract with Texas.

“I understand he and Jerry had a very encouraging conversation,” General Manager Kenny Williams said, adding he hoped Thomas would be in camp by Tuesday, the mandatory reporting date under baseball’s collective bargaining agreement.

Sammy Sosa will report to the Chicago Cubs’ camp today in Mesa, Ariz., well after his teammates but a day ahead of the mandatory deadline. Manager Don Baylor intends to ease Sosa into workouts, meaning he won’t face pitchers and may not play in Thursday’s exhibition opener against San Francisco.

Football

At this rate, only a handful of people will be tuning in to the XFL by the end of the season. The preliminary ratings for the new league jointly owned by NBC and the World Wrestling Federation plummeted further for the fourth Saturday night telecast, losing another 24% from the week before.

The 2.9 overnight rating for the Chicago Enforcers’ 13-0 victory over the New York/New Jersey Hitmen means only an average of 2.9% of U.S. television households in the 49 largest markets were watching at any given moment.

That follows overnight ratings of 10.3, 5.1 and 3.8, respectively, for the XFL’s first three weeks on NBC.

Miscellany

Tuto scored twice, including the tie-breaking goal with four minutes left, as the Urawa Red Diamonds of Japan’s J-League defeated the Galaxy, 2-1, in an exhibition match at Urawa, Japan. Rookie Brian Mullan scored in the 55th minute for the Galaxy, who finished their three-match Asian tour 1-2.

Stephanie Graf defeated Olympic 800-meter champion Maria Mutola for the third time in two weeks, coming from behind to set a season’s best at an indoor invitational meet in Lievin, France. Graf finished in 1 minute 57.53 seconds. Mutola finished .49 seconds behind.

The Continental Basketball Assn. has filed for bankruptcy, with a number of its former teams seeking money from the defunct league. The league filed Friday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Grand Rapids, Mich., home of one if its 10 former teams. Under Chapter 7, assets will be sold to help pay creditors.

Passing

Phil Collier, who covered baseball for 40 years for San Diego newspapers and is in the writers’ wing of the Hall of Fame, died Saturday at his home after a long battle with cancer. He was 75.

While at the San Diego Union, Collier started covering the Dodgers after they moved to Los Angeles in 1958.