Masters Tennis Tournament in New York Begins Tuesday

They were classic confrontations, the clashes pitting the Bjorn Borg against John McEnroe--the stoic Swede versus the brash but brilliant American.

And nowhere were their battles more electrifying than in the season-ending Volvo Masters Tennis Championships at Madison Square Garden. Borg won both meetings, but four of their six sets went to tiebreakers.

McEnroe now rules supremely after his 1981 victories over Borg in the finals of both Wimbledon and the U.S. Open sent the Swede into retirement. But his reign at the top is being challenged by Mats Wilander, who, like Borg, hails from Sweden, has a two-handed backhand and has successfully conquered Grand Slam tournaments on both clay and grass.

Both are seeded in the $400,000 Volvo Masters, which begins its six-day run at the Garden on Tuesday--McEnroe No. 1 and Wilander No. 4. If they meet, it would be in the semifinals, the same spot McEnroe and Borg first clashed on the synthetic court at the Garden in 1980.

Seeded second is Jimmy Connors, who captured the Masters in 1978, while Ivan Lendl of Czechoslovakia, the winner here in 1982 and 1983, is seeded third. The 12-player field and seedings are based on points accumulated in Volvo Grand Prix tournaments throughout the year, with the top four seeds receiving first-round byes.

“You have the top players in the world who have proven themselves,” Connors said of the season-ending tournament. “It is a top field, a field any tournament should, could and will have.”

Tuesday night’s pairings will pit two members of Sweden’s Davis Cup squad, Henrik Sundstrom and Anders Jarryd, against each other, followed by young Aaron Krickstein against Johan Kriek. The Sundstrom-Jarryd winner will face McEnroe Thursday night, while the Krickstein-Kriek winner will meet Wilander Thursday afternoon.

Wednesday night, Sweden’s Joakim Nystrom will battle Vitas Gerulaitis, while Eliot Teltscher will take on Czechoslovakia’s Tomas Smid. The Nystrom-Gerulaitis winner will play Lendl, with the Teltscher-Smid survivor taking on Connors in Friday’s quarterfinals.

The semifinals will be held Saturday afternoon and the final at 12:30 p.m. EST Sunday, with the winner collecting $100,000. The last two days will be nationally televised by NBC.

McEnroe dominated men’s tennis in 1984, winning 12 of the 14 tournaments he entered, while compiling a 79-3 match record. His only losses of the year were to Lendl in the French Open title match, to Vijay Amritraj in the ATP Championships and to Sundstrom in the Davis Cup finals in December when the New York left-hander still was hampered by an injured wrist.

By winning the Volvo Grand Prix points race, McEnroe earned $600,000.

Connors won five tournaments last year, collecting $400,000 from the bonus pool, while the Swedish foursome combined to capture 12 titles.

Sundstrom, who was victorious at Bari, Monte Carlo and Bastad, was the only player in 1984 to defeat Connors, Lendl and Wilander.

Wilander burst into prominence in 1982 when he became the youngest male player ever to capture a Grand Slam tournament, winning the French Open at the age of 17. He successfully has moved to other surfaces, winning the Australian Open on grass the last two years and defeating McEnroe and Lendl en route to victory at the ATP Championships on hardcourt in 1983, where he also repeated as champion in 1984.

Krickstein was a late starter, moving into the select field when Andres Gomez of Ecuador was forced to drop out with an injured shoulder. At 17, Krickstein, of Grosse Pointe, Mich., becomes the youngest player ever to play in the Masters.

He reached five finals during the year, winning three, including Geneva where he toppled Wilander in the semifinals and Sundstrom in the final.

“My right foot was hurting during the match,” Krickstein said of his victory over Sundstrom. “So when I returned home I went to (Washington) D.C. where I had it X-rayed. It was broken.”

Top-seeded in the six-team doubles portion of the tournament are Mark Edmondson of Australia and Sherwood Stewart. The defending champions, McEnroe and Peter Fleming, are seeded No. 2.

First-round pairings in the doubles will pit Ken Flach and Robert Seguso against Kevin Curren of South Africa and Steve Denton, the winners to meet Edmondson and Stewart, and Heinz Gunthardt of Switzerland and Balazs Taroczy of Hungary against the Czechoslovakian pair of Smid and Pavel Slozil. The winners of that match will face McEnroe and Fleming in the semifinals.

The doubles winners will split $34,000.