| Associated Press
WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. -- Defending men's champion Andre Agassi
and 1997 winner Martina Hingis were seeded No. 1 Monday for next
week's U.S. Open tennis championships.
Agassi, who edged Todd Martin in a five-set final last year, was
seeded No. 1 at America's premier tennis tournament for only the
second time in his career. He was the top seed in 1995 when he lost
the title match to Pete Sampras, and he was unseeded when he won
the U.S. Open in 1994.
Agassi being seeded No. 1 makes it the ninth consecutive year an
American has been top-seeded in the men's singles.
Brazil's Gustavo Kuerten, the reigning French Open champion,
received the No. 2 seeding, joining Marcelo Rios of Chile (1998)
and Guillermo Vilas of Argentina (1975) as the only South Americans
to be seeded as high as No. 2 in U.S. Open history.
Hingis, who has played in the last three women's singles finals,
is seeded No. 1 for a fourth consecutive year. Lindsay Davenport,
the 1998 winner, is seeded No. 2 for a third consecutive year,
while Wimbledon champion Venus Williams is seeded No. 3 for a
second straight year.
Reigning French Open champion Mary Pierce of France rounds out
the seeded fourth, followed by defending women's champion Serena
Williams.
Jennifer Capriati is seeded No. 15, her first U.S. Open seeding
since 1993.
The seedings were made directly from the Aug. 21 Sanex WTA Tour
rankings and ATP Tour Entry System.
Following Agassi and Kuerten in the men's rankings are: Norman,
Sampras, Yevgeny Kafelnikov, Marat Safin, Thomas Enqvist, Alex
Corretja, Lleyton Hewitt, Cedric Pioline, Tim Henman, Juan Carlos
Ferrero, Franco Squillari, Nicolas Kiefer, Mark Philippoussis and
Nicolas Lapentti.
Monica Seles is seeded sixth in the women's singles, followed by
Conchita Martinez, Nathalie Tauziat, Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario, Anke
Huber, Sandrine Testud, Anna Kournikova, Amanda Coetzer, Dominique
Van Roost, Capriati and Julie Halard-Decugis.
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