The Final Top Ten

1998 Chase Championships
Semifinal

Steffi Graf def. Monica Seles 1-6,6-4,6-4

Steffi Graf will lose a match again someday. She will trudge off the court disconsolately, bemoan her failure to produce and wonder how much longer she wants to keep up the tennis chase.

There would be no such self-examination last night at the Garden, though. Not after The Great Graf Revival Tour scored another stunning triumph; after the world's most famous tennis fraulein outlasted Monica Seles in a brilliantly played quarterfinal in which they went at each other like gladiators with rackets.

"It's not possible to describe what I'm going through right now," Graf said after a 1-6, 6-4, 6-4 Chase Championships victory that took one hour, 49 minutes and five match points to complete. "It's a thrill to be where I am."

It was Graf's 12th consecutive triumph, and her 18th in her last 19 matches. Two weeks ago, on the mend from hand surgery in September, she wasn't even going to qualify for this top-16-only tournament, before winning two straight WTA Tour events.

Now she is certifiably the hottest player on the planet, and had to be nothing short of that to withstand her longtime rival's two-fisted torrent of winners.

"Someone who has done so well in their career, they don't just disappear," Seles said when asked if she was surprised by Graf's performance.

Still severely weakened by a stomach bug that has been tormenting her since Sunday, Seles put on a show at the outset that was straight out of a tennis time capsule. She blasted well-angled backhands, hit crackling returns, went for everything, needing just 23 minutes to take the first set.

It was exactly what she was hoping for.

"I knew if it went to a long match, I'd have difficulty," she said.

Graf began finding her forehand groove in the second set, and worked to keep the ball in play, make Seles move. She smacked a forehand winner to go up 15-30 in Game 9, broke Seles two points later, then closed out the set at 15 in the 10th game.

In the third set, Graf and Seles stayed on serve until another critical ninth game. Serving at 4-4, Seles played her loosest game of the night, and three missed forehands and a netted backhand later, Graf had a break at 15. When Graf whacked a service winner to go up 40-15, double match point, one game later, the end seemed imminent.

Except Seles had other ideas. She rallied courageously, moved Graf around. Graf missed two forehands. She had another match point, and hit a backhand long, and netted another backhand on match point No. 4, Seles keeping the pressure on.

Finally, on No. 5, Graf belted a forehand winner crosscourt, and pumped her arms to the rafters. The crowd stood and roared. A guy in the crowd yelled out, "Thank you both for a great match," and he was every bit on the mark as Graf was, on a night when her revival tour continued its remarkable march.

"It's been amazing," Graf said.