Sharapova bounces back to defend Acura title

By: Marwan Razouk Staff Writer | Sunday, August 5, 2007 9:12 PM PDT ∞

Maria Sharapova chasing Patty Schnyder`s serve at the Acura tournament at La Costa.
John Koster / For The North County Times
Order a copy of this photo
Visit our Photo Gallery

---

LA COSTA ---- Maria Sharapova will go down as the final champion in Acura Classic history after beating Patty Schnyder 6-2, 3-6, 6-0 in the championship match on Sunday afternoon at the La Costa Resort and Spa.

Sharapova earned $196,900 and a new Acura MDX sport-utility vehicle for defending her title at the $1.34 million, Tier I event.

She joins an impressive list of former back-to-back winners that includes Steffi Graf (1989-90 and 1993-94), Jennifer Capriati (1991-92) and the only woman to win three consecutive Acura titles, Venus Williams (2000-02).

It is the first title of the year for Sharapova, who started slow against Schnyder before settling down, fighting back to win the second and third games after being down 40-0.

"It's always good to win a title and come back and back it up," said the top-seeded Sharapova. "I hit some pretty good, clean winners."

The 20-year-old Russian breezed through the rest of first set by hitting forehand winners all over the court and getting a handle on her new service motion after her first service game.

She was pretty happy with her backhand passing shots, too.

"I hit a backhand down the line that I thought to myself, 'That was pretty sick,' " she said.

Said Schnyder: "I try to go against her backhand, but what could I do? I try to push the rallies, make her run. But (the match) changed; I had my chances."

The second set proved to be the first hiccup of the week for Sharapova, who earlier in the week won in straight sets over Tamarine Tanasugarn, No. 13 Tatiana Golovin, Sania Mirza and Anna Chakvetadze.

But she found herself in a three-set battle after Schnyder fought back in the second, using a variety of shots to even the match.

Schnyder's momentum was short-lived. Sharapova played the third set as if the second never happened, finishing off Schnyder at love to win the U.S. Open series event.

Sharapova followed last year's Acura title by winning the U.S. Open.

She hopes to do the same this year, which would make her the eighth Acura champion to go on to win the same year's U.S. Open in the past 19 years.

Schnyder had entered the event as the No. 17 ranked player in the world and was seeded 11th. She earned upset wins over fellow Swiss player Martina Hingis, a five-time Grand Slam champion, fourth-seeded Nadia Petrova and Elena Demetieva. She was aiming for her 11th career title and first this year.

Sharapova was happy with a new service motion she has used in the last two rounds of the tournament after labeling it so-so for the first three rounds in winning her 16th career tour title and first since Linz, Austria, last year.

The No. 2-ranked player in the world has gone to an abbreviated motion that she implemented after a fourth-round loss to Williams at Wimbledon in order to minimize shoulder injuries for the rest of her career. A sore right shoulder forced her to skip Federation Cup in July and this was her first tournament back after her Wimbledon loss. Sharapova also missed time earlier this year when a hamstring injury forced her to retire from a semifinal match in Tokyo and to withdraw the following week in Dubai.

In the doubles final, Liezel Huber and Cara Black defeated Victoria Azarenko and Chakvetadze 7-5, 6-4.

A tournament-record 86,475 fans attended the seven-day event.

Contact staff writer Marwan Razouk at mrazouk@nctimes.com. Comment at sports@nctimes.com.