SAMPRAS CHASES GRAND SLAM HISTORY CHAMP IS THREE SHY OF EMERSON'S 12 TITLES FINAL Edition

• Published in: Sun-sentinel (Fort Lauderdale, Fla.)
• Main Author: ROBIN FINN New York Times
• Format: Newspaper Article
• Language: English
• Published: Fort Lauderdale Tribune Publishing Company, LLC 27.01.1997
• Subjects: MELBOURNE, Australia

He turned his inexperienced opponent into a virtual statue and turned the site of his most painful Grand Slam memory into a showcase for his tennis talent, which has left him, as the decade wears on, virtually without a peer. Top-seeded Pete Sampras earned his ninth Grand Slam singles championship Sunday with a 6-2, 6-3, 6-3 demolition of this event's resident glamour boy: unseeded Carlos Moya. Besides the controversy over its killing heat and sluggish Slazenger tennis balls, the year's first major produced two momentous - if lopsided - finals. A day after Martina Hingis, 16, became the century's youngest Grand Slam champion by throttling Mary Pierce 6-2, 6-2, Sampras left himself just three titles shy of equaling Roy Emerson's men's record of 12 Grand Slam singles crowns. "Sure, when you look back at your career, that's what stands out, Grand Slam titles, and sure I want to win more of them, but I'm not consumed with Bill Tilden or Roy Emerson or Rod Laver," said the 25-year-old Sampras, referring to the men who won, respectively, 10, 12, and 11 Grand Slam titles.