Americans Advance in Grand Slam : Tennis: Wheaton beats Noah, and Gilbert rallies to defeat Svensson. Lendl also wins his match.

American David Wheaton outlasted Yannick Noah of France today, 7-6 (7-2), 6-7 (5-7), 6-3, to advance to the quarterfinals of the $6-million Grand Slam Cup.

Another American also reached the quarterfinals of the richest tournament in tennis history when Brad Gilbert rallied to beat Jonas Svensson of Sweden, 2-6, 6-3, 6-4.

Also today, second-seeded Ivan Lendl beat Sweden’s Christian Bergstrom, 6-4, 6-0, to remain the top-seeded player in the tournament.

The 16-player tournament showcases most of players with the best records in the four Grand Slam tournaments of the year--Wimbledon and the Australian, French and U.S. Opens.

In a highly entertaining match that lasted two hours and 32 minutes, Wheaton survived 22 aces fired by Noah.

The American scored the only break of the match in the eighth game of the decisive set and then held his own serve at love to clinch the encounter.

“I never think about the money during a match but when I was serving for the match at 5-3 in the third set, I literally started shaking,” Wheaton said.

Wheaton, who is ranked 27th in the world but is seeded eighth in the tournament, had only 10 aces but had stronger nerves when the match got into the decisive phase.

Gilbert came into the tournament as a replacement for the injured Andre Agassi. He is ranked 10th in the world, nine places higher than Svensson, but is unseeded here.

Several players have been unhappy with the line calls and Gilbert protested when a young judge signaled he had not seen a ball that appeared to be out on the first of three set points in the second set.

British umpire Stephen Winyard ruled that the ball was in, giving Svensson the chance to stay in the set. Gilbert ranted at the red-faced line judge but was forced to accept the decision.

But though he dropped the second set point as well, Gilbert produced a winning serve on the third.

The controversy fired up Gilbert, who broke Svensson in the opening game of the deciding set after the Swede, a French Open semifinalist, had saved three break points.

Though Svensson fought hard in a series of long games, he invariably lost out in the baseline rallies and rarely threatened Gilbert on his serve.

“I started a bit sloppy in the first set and got a bit frustrated,” Gilbert said. “But he competed well.”