Connors Is Main Draw in Men’s Semifinals

Jimmy Connors, who has done more for being 39 than anyone since Jack Benny, awoke to these newspaper headlines Friday morning:

--He Does It Again

--Jimbo!

--The Jimmy Open

There are three other players in the men’s semifinals at the U.S. Open, but Connors is clearly the leader in column inches, covering himself in newsprint and glory.

Connors meets 21-year-old Jim Courier in the second men’s semifinal today, after three-time U.S. Open champion Ivan Lendl and Stefan Edberg have played in the first.

Both Courier, who won the French Open in June, and Edberg are slight favorites, but there can be no discounting Connors’ role in deciding where the 1991 title is going.

Connors is the oldest U.S. Open semifinalist since 1974, when Ken Rosewall was 10 months older than Connors is now. It is Connors’ 14th Open semifinal in 21 years and is guaranteed to move him up as many as 100 places on the computer, to about No. 70.

To put Connors’ achievement in perspective, there was a senior men’s match the other day between 1972 NCAA champion Dick Stockton of Trinity and 1973 NCAA champion Sandy Mayer of Stanford. Connors won the NCAA title at UCLA in 1971.

But after wrist surgery last fall, Connors was not sure he would be able to play tennis again.

“A lot of people don’t even have one chance, let alone two,” Connors said. “If somebody has given me a second chance like this, I am not going to blow it. There is just no way. I am going to take full advantage of it. I am going to do whatever it takes to do it the right way.”

Courier may not let him. So far, he hasn’t lost a set on his way to the semifinals and has been a factor in each of the four Grand Slam events this year--the fourth round of the Australian Open, a victory in the French Open and the quarterfinals at Wimbledon.

Connors and Courier have never played one another.

Lendl, 31, has history on his side. He won all of his eight other Open semifinals. Lendl, who is 14-10 against Edberg, is 69-9 at the Open and is looking for his 19th Grand Slam tournament singles final.

Edberg’s goal is No. 1. If Edberg, 25, wins today, he will replace Boris Becker, who lost in the third round, at No. 1 on the computer.