Sports briefs 2/6/05

Basketball

* Houston Comets forward Tina Thompson is six months pregnant with her first child and will miss part of the WNBA season.

Thompson, the team's career leader in scoring and rebounding, said Friday the baby is due in mid to late May. The WNBA season begins May 21.

Horse racing

* Saint Liam waged a neck-and-neck duel with favorite Roses in May, then pulled away rounding the final turn and won the $500,000 Donn Handicap by 3 1/4 lengths Saturday at Gulfstream Park.

Jockey John Velazquez went 3-for-3 in stakes races before finishing second aboard Roses in May in the year's first Grade 1 event.

Closing Argument held off previously unbeaten High Fly down the stretch to win the Holy Bull Stakes, an early two-turn test for 3-year-olds. Velazquez rode Proud Accolade to victory in the Hutcheson Stakes, the day's other race for Triple Crown aspirants.

Tennis

* Top-ranked Lindsay Davenport had seven aces in a straight-sets victory over Svetlana Kuznetsova on Saturday to advance to the final of the Pan Pacific Open, a tournament she has won four times.

Davenport, defending champion of the $1.3 million tournament, used a strong serve and solid groundstrokes to win 6-1, 7-6 (2) over the third-seeded Kuznetsova on carpet at Tokyo Metropolitan Gymnasium.

Davenport will face Wimbledon champion Maria Sharapova in today's final. The second-seeded Sharapova was a 6-1, 7-6 (3) winner over Japan's Shinobu Asagoe.