Sampras pulled out because of a hip injury that he sustained during his semifinal loss Thursday to Andre Agassi in the Australian Open. Sampras announced his withdrawal Friday after taking medical advice.

"It was distressing and real tough to swallow, but it was not entirely unexpected," McEnroe, the U.S. Davis Cup captain, wrote in a syndicated newspaper column. "To tell the truth, I don't think Pete really wanted to make the trip in the first place.

"Would he have been with the team if he'd won that fourth-set tiebreaker against Agassi?"

Agassi is on McEnroe's team for the Harare duel. But he has lost Todd Martin, who has been struggling with a viral infection.

"Losing Todd was a complication: to lose Pete as well means I'm put in the middle of a selection crisis," McEnroe wrote.

He said Jim Courier has an excellent Davis Cup record, but lost in the first round of the Australian Open and isn't playing with confidence these days. And Chris Woodruff has a strong backcourt game, McEnroe said, "but Davis Cup would be a completely new experience for him."

Too much speed
Australian Open organizers have admitted they were surprised by the speed of the Melbourne Park courts for the season-opening Grand Slam and promised to try to decrease the speed of the courts next year.

Following repeated complaints from players that the fast-paced courts favored big servers and reduced the ability to rally, Australian Open chief executive Paul McNamee said a review of the facilities had been conducted.

Court maintainers "had never really produced a quick court for us and we weren't looking that way or thinking that was going to happen," McNamee told the Herald Sun newspaper of Melbourne.

The courts are "certainly quicker than previous years, that's well documented. It certainly won't be quicker" next year. "You would expect we'll be backing it off a bit."

Pete Sampras, a winner of 12 Grand Slam titles, was among the players critical of the court surface, saying the surface and the balls had contributed to the fastest conditions he ever faced.

Great week for top seeds
No. 1 Andre Agassi versus No. 2 Yevgeny Kafelnikov. No. 1 Martina Hingis versus No. 2 Lindsay Davenport.

The last time the top two seeds made it to the finals in both men's and women's singles of the Australian Open was in 1993. In that year, No. 1 Jim Courier beat No. 2 Stefan Edberg, and top-seeded Monica Seles defeated No. 2 Steffi Graf.

It's only the fourth time in the Open era that the No. 1 and No. 2 seeds have advanced to the final in both events.

Double the fun
Women's doubles champions Rennae Stubbs of Australia and Lisa Raymond of the United States say they're best friends. Obviously they accept the good and the bad from each other.

After edging three-time doubles titlist Martina Hingis and her partner Mary Pierce in three sets, Stubbs and Raymond said it was sweet revenge.

"Lisa lost in the final to her three years ago with Lindsay (Davenport) and then we've lost to her twice in a row, so Lisa's been the queen of losers to Martina," said Stubbs.

"I lost to her one year, I think I started it off," said Raymond.

The pair combined to win five doubles titles last year, but the Australian Open championship was their first Grand Slam success.