NEW YORK -- While Pete Sampras was featured in the marquee match Friday night at Arthur Ashe Stadium, his next opponent was toiling in the relative obscurity of adjacent Louis Armstrong Stadium. Hard as it is to believe, Paradorn Srichaphan and Greg Rusedski are two of the hottest players in the game.

	Greg Rusedski needed all of five sets to outlast Paradorn Srichaphan.

Sampras may discover this on Sunday, when he meets Rusedski in the third round of the U.S. Open. Rusedski outlasted Srichaphan (barely) in a ridiculous, slashing match, 3-6, 7-6, 7-6, 6-7, 6-4, that lasted 3 hours, 44 minutes.

After losing three straight five-sets matches here, Rusedski was an ultimate-set winner.

"It's great to get through," Rusedski said. "Obviously, I would have liked to get through easier. It gives me confidence. I had so many chances ... he just stays in there. He competes really well he goes for his shots."

Rusedski, just shy of his 29th birthday, seems to have been around forever. He turned professional in 1991, but it wasn't until six years later when his ranking shot up to No. 6 and he became a usual suspect in the second week of the Grand Slam events. He reached the U.S. Open finals that year -- his best Slam result to date.

After finishing in the top 10 in 1997 and 1998, injuries caught up with the hulking Canadian-born serve-and-volley technician. He is ranked No. 26 in the ATP Champions Race and coming off an unconscious streak, during which he defeated the top three ranked players in a span of 12 days.

Rusedski, who now lives in England, knocked off Marat Safin in the first round at Cincinnati, then took out Lleyton Hewitt and Tommy Haas a week later in Indianapolis on his way to winning his second tournament of the year.

Srichaphan, a 23-year-old from Thailand, is one of the great stories in tennis this year. After hovering on the cusp of the top 100 for the past three years, Srichaphan has had a breakout season, reaching three finals and winning the U.S. Open tuneup event in Long Island.

It all began in Bangkok when his father, Chanachai, put a racket in his hand at the age of seven. Eventally, Chanachai -- who learned the game from instructional videos and taping matches off the television -- quit his job as a banker to devote all his attention to teaching Paradorn and his older brothers Naratorn and Tanakorn. Dinner was not a time for conversation; the family watched tennis on the VCR. Eventually, all three brothers would play Davis Cup tennis for Thailand, a country of 62 million people.

And now, in his sixth season as a professional, those tennis tips between bites have paid off for Srichaphan. His father, amazingly, remains his coach and Srichaphan is ranked a giddy No. 29 in the ATP Champion's Race.

After never reaching the third round of a Grand Slam tournament before this year, he has now done it three times in a row. He even beat Andre Agassi at Wimbledon. Srichaphan has been en fuego lately, reaching the final at Washington, losing to James Blake, and winning all six of his matches at Long Island, including Haas in the semis and Juan Ignacio Chela in the final. The only concern, really, was the number of matches he has played -- 14 in 18 days and counting. Now that won't be a problem.

At the outset Friday, however, it looked like Srichaphan was going to roll. Serving with his herky-jerky motion, he almost blew Rusedski off the court, winning six of the first set's nine games. Srichaphan was quicker and more agile than Rusedski, but as the match wore on, he seemed to shrink in the big moments.

In the second-set tie-breaker, he never recovered from a netted forehand on the third point. In the third-set tie-breaker, he made three straight forehand cross-court winners to take a 4-2 lead. Then, leading 5-3, he tightened perceptibly and floated a nervous backhand into the net. Rusedski closed him out with a forehand cross-court winner when Srichaphan went the wrong way.

By now, with the Sampras-Kristian Pless match over, the Armstrong crowd, growing more raucous by the minute, began to swell.

Srichaphan almost went out when he was serving to level the fourth set at 5-all. Rusedski squeezed him to 30-all -- a point away from match point -- but Srichaphan produced a bold forehand pass and a successful overhead to send the match lurching into its third straight tie-breaker.

This time, Srichaphan was up to it. At 2-all, Rusedski gave him a gift -- a double-fault -- and Srichaphan went on to level the match.

In the fifth set, Srichaphan finally gave in to his nerves. He was broken to open the set and with Rusedski holding a break point in the third game, Srichaphan double-faulted to go down 0-3. Rusedski, baring his teeth and tugging on his socks with a trademark service ritual, bent with a service break but never quite broke.

Next up is Sampras, to whom Rusedski has lost eight of nine career matches. Is he concerned that Sampras will come into Sunday's match with two easy three-set wins?

"I'm in the best shape of my life," Rusedski said. "Obviously, it helps Pete a little bit. He'll be favored so I have nothing to lose."

Greg Garber is a senior writer at ESPN.com.