31.03.2007

It wasn't Baryshnikov, but no one ever asked the great Russian to pirouette and slash a winner down the line on break point in a Masters Series semifinal.

It was the shot of the tournament, and you wouldn't have to argue too strenuously that it turned this windy, loud match around, sending Guillermo Cañas, who is rapidly becoming a minor legend in the 2007 season, on to a 7-5, 6-2 win over Ivan Ljubicic and into the final of the Sony Ericsson Open against Novak Djokovic.

Guillermo Cañas, shown, will play Novak Djokovic in the men's final Photo: Sun-Sentinel/Joe Cavaretta

A milli-second after Ljubicic golfed a 3-iron 15 feet over the baseline on match point Friday night, about 12,000 fans on the stadium court rose, applauding and screaming, a few snapping Argentine flags in front of themselves like matadors waving capes at their bulls.

It has been seven months since Cañas returned from a humiliating 15-month suspension for ingesting a banned diuretic, and now the pugnacious Argentine, a qualifier here, is headed for a Sunday final against a 19-year-old Serbian who has the composure and strokes of a future champion.

In one of the most disappointing men's semifinals in the 23-year history of the Key Biscayne tournament, Djokovic whisked through Scotland's Andy Murray 6-1, 6-0 in 62 minutes, leaving Murray, also 19, to describe this fiasco as "the worst match I've played since I came on tour."

There were rumors that he had a strained a groin muscle, which would explain this disaster, but ATP trainer Bill Norris dispelled that, saying that Murray had not been treated for any injury before the match.

All that was window dressing because the story of the day, of the tournament and maybe the season, has been the 29-year-old Cañas, who is 50-6 in all matches -- regular tour, Challenger and Davis Cup -- since coming back to competition in September.

In that time he has won five Challenger events, beaten No. 1 Roger Federer twice and is into the final of a Master Series event for the first time since he won the Canadian Open in 2002.

When he returned to play, his ranking had plunged to 514. With this one-hour and 34-minute triumph over the very shrewd but mistake-prone Ljubicic, Cañas reaches No. 31, and a win Sunday would put him in the low 20s when the new ATP rankings come out Monday.

For five service games, Ljubicic had Cañas completely under control, winning his first 14 and 20 of his first 21 points on serve.

But he couldn't break and, in the ninth game, Cañas produced two major efforts that changed the match. First, at 15-30 and with his Croatian opponent slugging a backhand passing shot down the line, he guessed to his right and punched a perfect volley into the open court.

Then, at 30-40, Ljubicic appeared to have saved the break with a perfect tap lob deep to Cañas' left corner. The Argentine raced back, trying to locate the ball, and when he got to a point where the sideline intersected the baseline, he spun and swung in one motion, crashing a drive down the sideline that left Ljubicic stunned.

Did Cañas know what he wanted to do with that ball when he caught up to it?

"Hit it," he said, making a roomful of reporters laugh.

Cañas served out the set at 40-30, and Ljubicic, though he had a break point in the second set, never again looked dangerous enough to win.

It's too bad Djokovic's brilliance before a half-empty afternoon crowd on the stadium court was upstaged by the Cañas match, but he will have his opportunity at noon Sunday to put a final stamp on this tournament.

He served flawlessly while Murray's performance was numbing -- 41 percent of his first serves into play, no breaks and only five winners.

It's not difficult to see Djokovic, with his nearly fully mature game, winning the tournament, and he received warm applause for his effort.

But the audience for the Cañas match was extraordinary.

You half-expected a hundred or more partisans to stream out of the stands and carry Cañas off on their shoulders.

"Yeah, it's a dream," he said as he thought about the eight matches, two in qualifying, that he has played in the past 12 days. And he's not ready to wake up yet.