Circuit Breakers

Bryce Alderton

The lights went out. They went out again. Then again.

But nothing was going to stop the Newport Beach Breakers from

defeating the visiting Sacramento Capitals, 23-14, in the hosts’

World Team Tennis home debut Tuesday night at the Palisades Tennis

Club.

After the Breakers’ Lindsay Davenport went up, 3-0, in her

five-game singles set against Elena Likhovtseva, the lights on center

court went out, causing a grown from the crowd of nearly 2,000 who

came to watch the unveiling of the second installment of World Team

Tennis to Newport Beach. Newport last competed in the circuit in

1994.

Play moved to an outside court to conclude the match. Davenport

eventually won, 5-4 (5-1) and then teamed with teammate Josh Eagle to

claim a 5-2 victory over the mixed doubles tandem of Likhovtseva and

Mark Knowles.

But talk after the match centered around the malfunction, which

club owner Ken Stuart described as “mechanical” and attributed it to

a “system overload.”

“This didn’t show up on the 30 nights we tested these lights,”

Stuart said. “An installer will be out first thing [this] morning and

will stay until 10 p.m. [tonight] to replace the equipment and will

be on-site Saturday [the Breakers’ next home match].”

Before the malfunction during Davenport’s singles set -- during

twilight -- the lights flickered on several times but then fizzled

out.

“It is a shame because of all the effort they put into it,”

Davenport, who reached the quarterfinals of Wimbledon last week,

said. “I was happy to finish the match. I feel sorry for the fans,

but what can you do? They made the best situation out of it.”

Brian MacPhie played his singles match against Daniel Nestor in

the waning moments where the waning light from the sky was the only

help to keep play going.

“Returning serve was the easiest thing, but when you had to set up

and hit the ball, that was when it was a problem,” he said. “If I

knew we would have had the problem solved, I would have waited 10 or

15 minutes, but we had to finish with the light we had.”

Sacramento Coach Wayne Bryan remained very upbeat despite the

inconvenience.

“This is the [most exciting] match I’ve been involved in,” Bryan

said.

MacPhie prevailed, 5-3. Davenport and Maria Sharapova swept, 5-0,

in women’s doubles, in the night’s first set.

The Breakers improved to 1-1 after dropping their opener to

Sacramento Monday night.

Fans will be able to exchange tickets from Tuesday night for one

of the Breakers’ matches July 16, July 20, or July 25.