SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. (AP) — If nothing else, Monica Seles’ nerves are as strong as ever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The former top-ranked player weathered her second straight high-intensity set to beat eighth-seeded Barbara Schett 7-6 (9), 6-1 Thursday and advance to the quarterfinals of the State Farm Women’s Tennis Classic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“At the end, it comes down to who’s better and who performs better under a tight bit of pressure, but still there’s an awful lot of luck involved,” said Seles who, after a six-month layoff because of a stress fracture in her foot, won her 45th career singles title last week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Seles is unseeded in a WTA event for the first time since 1989 because her victory Sunday in Oklahoma City, which lifted her to No. 9 in the world, was too late to affect the seeding in Scottsdale.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
She battled through four set points Wednesday before winning the second set 7-6 (7) and knocking Silvija Talaja out of the first round. The next day, she led 5-2 in the first set before Schett won four of the next five games to force a tiebreaker.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This time, Seles twice had Schett, Austria’s highest-ranked player (No. 13), within a point of elimination only to watch her tie it at 7 and 8.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Schett had a 9-8 lead the only time Seles faced set point, and Seles tied it for the last time with a forehand winner. Two points later, she ended the set with a service winner to Schett’s forehand.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“I have big trouble with her serve,” said Schett, winless in five matches with Seles. “I don’t really like her serve. I just don’t like left-hand serves. It’s good that there’s not too many left-handers on the tour.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The second set lasted only 21 minutes as Seles broke the frustrated Schett in the first, third and seventh games.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“When I felt the air go out of her was at 3-love,” Seles said. “I think she had those two breaks, I knew then.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. (AP) — If nothing else, Monica Seles’ nerves are as strong as ever. The former top-ranked player weathered her second straight high-intensity set to beat eighth-seeded Barbara Schett 7-6 (9), 6-1 Thursday and advance to the quarterfinals of the State Farm Women’s Tennis Classic. “At the end, it comes down to who’s better […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"default","ast-site-content-layout":"","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"default","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[58,56],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/monicaselessite.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7415"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/monicaselessite.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/monicaselessite.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/monicaselessite.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/monicaselessite.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7415"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/monicaselessite.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7415\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/monicaselessite.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7415"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/monicaselessite.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7415"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/monicaselessite.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7415"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}