HOUSTON — Lleyton Hewitt of Australia held on to win his first tournament in two years Sunday with a 6-2, 7-5 victory over American Wayne Odesnik at the U.S. Men’s Clay Court Championships.
Hewitt won his 498th career match and moved closer to joining Roger Federer and Carlos Moya as the only active players with 500 or more victories. Hewitt also won his first clay court tournament since 1999.
Hewitt ranks 35th on the career victories list. He failed to win a tournament last year for the first time in his career while recovering from hip surgery.
“This is what all the hard work is for, to play weeks like this and have this kind of feeling at the end,” Hewitt said. “It makes going through the surgery and all the hard work worth it.”
Hewitt sailed to a 3-0 lead in the second set without much opposition from Odesnik, who was making his first appearance in an ATP final.
• Second-seeded Caroline Wozniacki defeated Canada’s Aleksandra Wozniak 6-1, 6-2 to win The MPS Group Championships in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla.
Wozniacki, from Denmark, won 84 percent of her first-serve points in the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour clay court season opener and took advantage of several mistakes.
Wozniak never mounted a charge and, down 3-1 in the first set, double-faulted away two games.
“This is a great start to the clay court season,” Wozniacki said. “I proved I can beat these better players.”
In doubles, unseeded Chia-Jung Chuang and Sania Mirza upset top-seeded Lisa Raymond and Kveta Peschke 6-3, 4-6, 10-7 to win the title.
• Juan Carlos Ferrero of Spain beat fifth-seeded Florent Serra of France 6-4, 7-5 to win his first title since 2003 at the Grand Prix Hassan II tournament in Casablanca, Morocco.
Ferrero, who was unseeded at the clay court event, broke Serra six times to win for the first time since the Madrid Masters in October 2003. That year, Ferrero won his only Grand Slam title at the French Open and lost in the U.S. Open final to Andy Roddick.
• Jelena Jankovic beat Carla Suarez Navarro of Spain 6-3, 3-6, 6-3 to win her first title of the season at the Andalucia Tennis Experience in Marbella, Spain.
The fourth-ranked Serb broke Suarez Navarro six times on the outdoor clay to improve to 3-0 against the Spaniard.
Footnotes.
North Carolina freshman forward Ed Davis said he will return to the team for the 2009-10 season. He averaged 8.2 points and 5.5 rebounds in North Carolina’s six NCAA Tournament victories.
Davis led the NCAA champion Tar Heels with 65 blocked shots.
• Buffalo Sabres coach Lindy Ruff will lead the Canadian team at the world championships. Nashville Predators coach Barry Trotz and Dave Tippett of the Dallas Stars will serve as assistants.
• Gotta Have Her defeated Reba Is Tops by a nose to win the $100,000 Las Cienegas Handicap at Santa Anita in Arcadia, Calif.
• Rain forced postponement of the MotoGP motorcyle season opener in Doha, Qatar.
The Associated Press
