McEnroe a Champion Again

John McEnroe completed his daunting ATP Tour comeback in familiar winning form, teaming with Jonas Bjorkman on Sunday in San Jose to beat a couple of former Stanford All-Americans, 7-6 (2), 4-6, 10-7, in the finals of the SAP Open.

The match ended with a vintage piercing McEnroe backhand volley up the middle between Paul Goldstein and Jim Thomas.

When his volley ended the match, 47-year-old McEnroe’s face lit up and he embraced Bjorkman. A standing ovation from the crowd rained down on them and the crafty lefty, considered by many to be the finest doubles player in tour history, basked in victory yet again.

“I’m surprised that it went to the final tiebreaker, but the right team won,” McEnroe said.

Earlier in the day, 18-year-old Andy Murray used deft drop shots and backhand winners to upset third-seeded Lleyton Hewitt, 2-6, 6-1, 7-6 (3), in singles play for his first ATP Tour title.

McEnroe has stayed in decent playing shape and his hands remain sharp as he plays often on the senior pro tennis circuit.

“I felt like I had it in me, but I didn’t know quite what was going to happen,” said McEnroe, the oldest player to win an ATP title -- singles or doubles -- in the last 30 years.

It was McEnroe’s 78th career doubles victory, and first ATP final since winning a doubles tournament in Paris with brother Patrick in 1992.

Under new ATP Tour doubles rules, a match knotted at one set apiece is decided by a tiebreaker, with the first team to 10 points by a margin of two winning.

McEnroe jokingly said he would take a few months off before deciding if his comeback would continue any further. He took the wildcard from the tournament director to put a spotlight on the game of doubles, which is undergoing changes that shorten the matches and threaten to further marginalize its importance.

On match point in the third-set tiebreaker, Murray sliced a few shots to set up a crisp backhand crosscourt winner that Hewitt could only watch.

“Obviously, it’s the biggest moment in my life in tennis so far,” Murray said of the win, which earned him $52,000 and moved him into the top 50 in the tour rankings for the first time.

Carlos Moya of Spain survived a first-set scare to beat Italy’s Filippo Volandri, 7-6 (6), 6-4, for the Copa Telmex championship, his third ATP title in Buenos Aires, Argentina, since 1995.

Moya, who won his first pro title in the Argentine capital as an 18-year-old and repeated in 2003, completed the victory in 1 hour, 30 minutes before a crowd of 5,000 on the outdoor clay of the Buenos Aires Lawn Tennis Club.

“When I started this tournament this week I had a lot of confidence and was hitting the ball well,” Moya said. “But the early matches took a lot of effort.”

With Volandri winning his service game more easily but Moya serving better with three aces, the match started on serve until the Italian broke for a 4-3 lead.

But Moya rallied, capitalizing on Volandri’s unforced errors, saving set point at 3-5 and then winning three straight games to put the match back on serve at 6-5.

Mara Santangelo of Italy won her first WTA Tour title, beating a weakened Jelena Kostanic of Croatia, 3-6, 7-6 (5), 6-3, in the Bangalore Open final in India.

Kostanic, seeded sixth, finished runner-up for the second straight week, having lost the Pattaya Open final to Israel’s Shahar Peer.

India’s Sania Mirza and South Africa’s Liezel Huber won the doubles title, defeating Russians Anastassia Rodionova and Elena Vesnina, 6-3, 6-3.

Hometown favorite Arnaud Clement beat sixth-seeded Mario Ancic, 6-4, 6-2, to win the Open 13 tournament final in Marseille for his third ATP title on French soil.

Clement, ranked 65th in the world, cruised past the Croatian in 1 hour, 32 minutes before a supportive crowd in Marseille.

ARENA FOOTBALL

Philadelphia Sets a High

Mark in 75-59 Victory

Tony Graziani completed 19 of 27 passes for 282 yards and six touchdowns, helping the Philadelphia Soul set a franchise scoring record with a 75-59 victory over the New York Dragons in Philadelphia.

The Soul scored 27 points off Dragon turnovers, including Kevin Gaines’ 37th career interception -- moving into a tie for fifth place all-time.

Andy Kelly threw for 253 yards and two touchdowns, Tim Seder kicked four field goals, and Kansas City limited the Columbus Destroyers to 192 total yards in the Brigade’s 45-24 victory in Kansas City, Mo.

Kansas City held Columbus to 10 points in the first half, including Thabiti Davis’ interception return for a touchdown that cut the Brigade’s lead to 15-7 with 4:23 remaining in the second quarter.

Timon Marshall had career highs of 181 return yards and 262 total yards, and scored three touchdowns to lead the Grand Rapids Rampage to a 66-52 victory over the San Jose SaberCats in Grand Rapids, Mich.

Marshall had the longest scoring play in franchise history, a 58-yard kickoff return with 12 seconds left in the first half to give Grand Rapids a 29-26 lead.

Jay Taylor kicked a 17-yard field goal in overtime to give the Orlando Predators a wild 67-64 victory over the Tampa Bay Storm in Tampa, Fla.

Joe Hamilton completed 20 of 34 passes for 292 yards and six touchdowns for the Predators (3-1), who led, 40-14, with 7:12 left in the second quarter. Jimmy Fryzel had 11 catches for 158 yards and three scores.

MISCELLANY

Iditarod Champion Finds Marrow Donor

Four-time Iditarod winner Susan Butcher has found a bone marrow donor, her husband said.

Butcher is in a Seattle hospital battling acute myelogenous leukemia. The donor match is a 32-year-old woman and the backup is a man in his 30s. Their names were not released.

Butcher, 51, is scheduled for a bone marrow transplant in early April. She was diagnosed with the disease in early December.

Butcher and her husband, David Monson, plan to return to Alaska for three weeks in March before the transplant.

“Just in time for the start of the Iditarod,” Butcher said.

The more than 1,150-mile, sled-dog race starts March 4 in Anchorage.

The Australian Sports Commission reopened an investigation into claims that former Olympic champion Said Aouita encouraged athletes to use performance-enhancing drugs during his term as Australia’s distance coach.

Steeplechaser Melissa Rollison, interviewed by an Australian newspaper, renewed allegations that the Olympic 5,000-meter champion urged her to take human growth hormone during a training camp in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in 2004.

“He talked about it every day,” Rollison said. “We had to go to America because that is where you get HGH.”

Australian athlete Mark Fountain first levied similar allegations against Aouita two years ago. The Australian Sports Commission, Athletics Australia and the Australian Institute of Sport investigated the claims in Fountain’s letter, but found no evidence of malpractice.

Ryan Hall won the 12K title at the U.S. cross-country championships in New York.

Hall covered the frozen 7.5-mile course in 34 minutes, 38 seconds and easily defeated Jorge Torres, who finished in 35:05.

Max King was third in 35:20. Defending champion Dathan Ritzenhein got sick in the 22-degree temperature, and fell far off the pace. He was fourth in 35:27.

Carrie Tollefson, a 2004 Olympian, won the women’s 4K in 12:32. The 1999 NCAA athlete of the year from Villanova finished ahead of Lauren Fleshman (12:37), a three-time NCAA title holder while at Stanford.

Blake Russell, winner of the 8K on Saturday, took third in 12:39.

The top six finishers in each event qualified for the world championships in Japan on April 1-2.