Win Is All of a Peace

The angst is gone, the self-doubt, the slumped shoulders and grumpy face, the tossed rackets and long, languorous walks from one corner of the court to the other with her head down and her spirits low, all because of a missed forehand or a fluttery serve.

Lindsay Davenport has found peace on the tennis court. She has combined that with her wondrous groundstrokes, the shots hit so sharply and cleanly, so pure and so hard that the opponent must flail to retrieve them, and added a confident set of serves, up the middle and cleverly placed in the corners, and suddenly Davenport is the happiest player on earth.

Monday on the Arthur Ashe Stadium court, with fans firmly on her side, with the sun out and the wind swirling enough to be refreshing but not so much as to be annoying, Davenport sang out a joyous “Wow!” when Venus Williams lunged at one, last big serve and one, last time sent the ball out of bounds.

Davenport, seeded fifth, moved into the U.S. Open quarterfinals with a 7-5, 6-4 win over 11th-seeded Williams. Although Davenport hadn’t been happy to see Williams so early in the tournament, her draw may have become a little easier Monday night when the top-seeded defending champion, Justine Henin-Hardenne, was upset by 14th-seeded Nadia Petrova, 6-3, 6-2. Davenport, who has lost four straight times to the Belgian, was seeded to meet Henin-Hardenne in the semifinals.

Henin-Hardenne, who sat out most of the summer with a viral illness before returning to win the Olympic gold medal last month, had struggled throughout this tournament with a lingering cold. Petrova, who had never beaten Henin-Hardenne and who has never won a pro tournament, ended the match with a 114-mph ace.

It was the earliest exit for a top-seeded woman here since Billie Jean King fell in the third round of the 1973 Open. And the loss guarantees that Henin-Hardenne will relinquish her No. 1 ranking to either Davenport or No. 2 Amelie Mauresmo.

“I never felt good in this tournament. I never felt free in my head. I never felt 100% in the court,” Henin-Hardenne said. “... For sure, I’m still not at my best level physically. During the whole tournament, I was feeling less energy.”

In her next match Davenport will face the only unseeded player left in the women’s draw, 28-year-old Shinobu Asagoe of Japan, who knocked out 29th-seeded Eleni Daniilidou of Greece, 7-6 (4), 4-6, 6-3. Asagoe, ranked No. 62 in the world, has never been this far in a major tournament.

Also Monday, No. 9-seeded Svetlana Kuznetsova of Russia ended the surprising run of 29-year-old Mary Pierce with a 7-6 (5), 6-2 win. Kuznetsova will play her countrywoman Petrova in the quarterfinals.

There was the feel of finals around the battle between Davenport, 28, and Williams, 24. They have played each other 25 times now; Davenport has won 13 of them. Until Monday these two veterans had never met before the quarterfinals, but Williams has been sidelined too often by injuries and her ranking has dropped so low that Davenport found herself playing a fourth-round match against a woman who has won four Grand Slam titles and was twice a Grand Slam finalist last year.

“A pretty tough fourth-round draw,” Davenport had said. “But sometimes stuff happens.”

What happened Monday was that Davenport accepted that sometimes Williams would whistle a winner past her ear or retrieve a well-placed Davenport forehand that most players couldn’t get to. In exchange, Davenport played over and over to Williams’ unreliable forehand. It was a wise strategy; Williams committed 42 unforced errors.

Davenport never faced a break point until the final game of the match. Before that, she fell behind on her serve only once -- at 0-15 in the fourth game of the second set. She was so calmly efficient until the last game that there was little chance for the 20,000 fans to get involved.

“I wanted to win so badly,” Davenport said. “I played such a great, calm match until that last game, then I let a few errors creep in.”

Davenport and Williams played 24 points in that final game. After not facing a break point all match, Davenport needed to save five. After placing her serves with sneaky precision, Davenport tossed in two double faults. After accurately clobbering every easy sitter, after solidly knocking away every overhead, Davenport sailed her easiest forehand of the day two feet long.

“I felt OK until I lost about the second match point,” Davenport said. “Then you get a little like, ‘Oh, no, don’t do this.’ But when I went back to serve, I felt good.”

Good enough to pound in three tough serves after Williams held her final break point, and to punish her with deep, hard groundstrokes. Good enough to win her 21st consecutive match.

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At a Glance

Highlights from Monday at the U.S. Open:

RESULTS

Men, fourth round: No. 1 Roger Federer advanced to the quarterfinals when No. 16 Andrei Pavel withdrew because of a back injury; No. 5 Tim Henman won on a fifth-set retirement by Nicolas Kiefer; No. 6 Andre Agassi beat Sargis Sargsian in straight sets; No. 22 Dominik Hrbaty came from two sets down to beat Olivier Rochus.

Women, fourth round: No. 1 Justine Henin-Hardenne was upset by No. 14 Nadia Petrova. No. 5 Lindsay Davenport and No. 9 Svetlana Kuznetsova won in straight sets; Davenport beat No. 11 Venus Williams, and Kuznetsova defeated No. 27 Mary Pierce. No. 29 Eleni Daniilidou lost to Shinobu Asagoe.

TODAY’S FEATURED MATCHES

* Jennifer Capriati (8) vs. Serena Williams (3)

* Karol Beck, Slovakia, vs. Lleyton Hewitt (4), Australia

* Elena Dementieva (6), Russia, vs. Amelie Mauresmo (2), France

* Tommy Robredo (18), Spain, vs. Andy Roddick (2)

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Associated Press contributed to this report.