AUSTRALIAN OPEN

HENIN REACHES THIRD ROUND, EXTENDS STREAK TO 30

Win No. 30 in Justine Henin’s current streak gave her a few things to work on in her next match at the Australian Open.

Top-ranked Henin, who skipped Melbourne last year because she was going through a divorce and had to default in the 2006 final because of a stomach illness, needed four match points to clinch Wednesday’s 6-1, 7-5 secondround win over Russian Olga Poutchkova.

She was broken at love when serving for the match at 5-3, then set up double match point with a curling forehand winner in the next game before Poutchkova ran off four points to level at 5-all.

VENUS, FEDERER ADVANCE

Venus Williams played her first match in three years at the Australian Open on Tuesday night.

She downed China’s Yan Zi 6–2, 7–5 but hit 29 unforced errors and only 19 winners.

Roger Federer wasted no time in the start of his bid for a third consecutive Australian Open title.

Sick and tired of talk about his stomach bug, Federer wanted to show he was in Grand Slam form.

He left no doubts with a 6–0, 6–3, 6–0 win over Argentina’s Diego Hartfield on Tuesday night. In eight previous trips to Melbourne, he had never swept the opening set.

HOCKEY

HABS DOWN ISLANDERS

Tomas Plekanec scored in each of the first two periods, and Cristobal Huet stopped 17 shots for the Montreal Canadiens, who welcomed the New York Islanders home from a long trip with a 3–1 defeat last night.

Plekanec netted an evenstrength goal in the first, when Huet faced only one shot, and added a short-handed tally in the second as the Canadiens won for the sixth time in nine games (6–1–2).

Huet bounced back from a subpar game for him and his teammates Saturday in a 4–1 road loss to the Rangers, when he was pulled after allowing four goals on 28 shots through two periods.

His only blemish against the Islanders came when Richard Park smacked a rebound past him with 9:04 left. Park’s first goal in 11 games brought New York within 2-1.

LACROSSE

DUKE LACROSSE PROSECUTOR FILES FOR BANKRUPTCY

The disgraced former prosecutor who led the debunked Duke lacrosse rape case filed for bankruptcy yesterday, citing more than $180 million in liabilities — the majority from the threat of two pending lawsuits.

Mike Nifong reported $243,898 in assets of real and personal property to U.S. Bankruptcy Court. The filing came the same day he and other defendants were required to respond to a sweeping federal lawsuit filed in October by the three exonerated players whom Nifong had falsely accused of rape.

In the lawsuit, attorneys for Reade Seligmann, Collin Finnerty, and Dave Evans accuse Nifong, the city of Durham, police investigators and others of conducting “one of the most chilling episodes of premeditated police, prosecutorial and scientific misconduct in modern American history.”

FOOTBALL

TITANS FIRE NORM CHOW

The Tennessee Titans fired offensive coordinator Norm Chow on Tuesday after a season of struggling to score points and reaching the playoffs for the first time since 2003.

Titans coach Jeff Fisher confirmed the dismissal in a short statement. Chow, who had been on staff for three years, did not immediately return a telephone message left by The Associated Press.

But Fisher said the day after his Titans (10-6) lost an AFC wildcard game to San Diego 17-6 that improving the offense was his top priority this offseason. They ranked 21st overall in total offense and became the first team with only nine touchdown passes to reach the playoffs in a 16-game season.

WOMAN ALLEGES ‘PACMAN’ JONES PUNCHED HER

A woman is seeking an arrest warrant against suspended Tennessee Titans cornerback Adam “Pacman” Jones, claiming he punched her at an Atlanta strip club.

Fulton County Magistrate Court officials told the Associated Press yesterday that Wanda S. Jackson asked for the warrant after a January 3 altercation at the Body Tap Strip Club. Jackson, an attorney, says in her filing that she was in the club’s office when an angry Jones accused managers of stealing his money and bracelet.

“I was sitting in the office and he lunged at me numerous times in an effort to do grave bodily harm,” Jackson wrote in the warrant application filed January 7. “Veronica Jones, an owner, went into the hall to deal with a member of his entourage. I followed to gawk. He was in the hall, surprisingly reached over or around a security guard and sucker punched me in my left eye.”