Evert Lloyd Roars Into Quarterfinals

Top-seeded Chris Evert Lloyd dominated unseeded Terry Phelps, 6-2, 6-0, in just 50 minutes Tuesday night in the quarterfinals of the $1.8-million Lipton International Players Championships.

Earlier Tuesday, 16-year-old Steffi Graf of West Germany held off a determined rally by Zina Garrison to join Helena Sukova of Czechoslovakia and Kathy Rinaldi in the semifinals.

“I just felt a little more pumped up for some reason,” Lloyd said. “I moved her all over the court. Her game is to play steady, but I think she felt she had to go for some shots against me she wouldn’t have against the other girls.”

Phelps said she never had a chance because Lloyd was at her best.

“She was toying with me, hitting the ball all over the place,” Phelps said.

The second-seeded Graf, who lost two match points in the 10th game of the second set, eventually wore down sixth-seeded Garrison and won, 6-2, 6-7, 6-3. Sukova, the seventh seed, beat 14th-seeded Barbara Potter, 6-1, 6-2. And the ninth-seeded Rinaldi won a battle of 18-year-olds, beating 12th-seeded Carling Bassett of Canada, 7-6, 6-2.

In the Thursday semifinals, Sukova plays Graf and Rinaldi plays Lloyd.

The day matches, originally scheduled for 11 a.m., finally got started at just after 2 p.m. But after two games, the rain began to fall again and the players were shuttled back to the players’ lounge for another 90-minute delay.

Top-seeded Ivan Lendl of Czechoslovakia, second-seeded Mats Wilander of Sweden and third-seeded Jimmy Connors all play in today’s men’s quarterfinals.

Lendl plays Joakim Nystrom, Connors meets Yannick Noah, Wilander takes on Guy Forget and Milan Srejber meets Stefan Edberg.