Hewitt Wins Franklin Final

At 18, Australia's Lleyton Hewitt was a finalist at the Franklin Templeton Tennis Classic.

A year later, he's the champion,

Hewitt beat Britain's Tim Henman 6-4, 7-6 (2) on Sunday to win his fifth ATP Tour title and improved to 20-1 in 2000.

Only one other player has played in the finals in consecutive years. That was Andre Agassi and he won both times in 1993 and 1994.

"I've just been very lucky. I was lucky today," Hewitt said. "After taking the last three or four weeks off, I really didn't expect much here at all."

Henman, who hadn't dropped a set in the heading into the final and had notched 28 aces, has lost his last six finals on the tour.

"I wouldn't say that's a statistic to be particularly proud of," he said. "The only way to put it right is to get in the finals again and win a match."

Hewitt broke Henman's serve to take a 5-3 lead in the set.

In the second set, Henman rallied from a 5-2 deficit to take a 6-5 lead, but Hewitt held serve to force the tiebreaker. Hewitt won the first three points of the tiebreaker, lost the next two, and then won the final three.

"He had his chances to break service on me," Hewitt said. "In the second set, he seemed to be doing it pretty confidently. Then I just told myself to go after it."

With the victory, Hewitt moves into a tie for fourth in the ATP Champions points race. Henman is in seventh place.

Hewitt began the season with 13 straight victories, winning two tournaments in Australia. Last month, he won both of his singles matches in helping Australia to a first-round Davis Cup victory over Switzerland.

He has yet to win a Grand Slam event, but isn't concerned.

"I have a lot of good times left, don't I?" Hewitt said.

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