Defending Champ Spadea Into Quarters at Scottsdale

No. 2 seed and defending champion Vince Spadea, earlier in the week suffering from the flu, a bad back and tendinitis in his shoulder, pulled out another thriller Thursday at The Tennis Channel Open in Scottsdale with a three-set win over Serb Janko Tipsarevic to advance into the quarterfinals.

"I just buckled down at crunch time and made no errors and just made him beat me," Spadea said. "I went for my shots. My focus really was my strength at that point. I stayed tough."

Belgium's Christophe "The Roach" Rochus ousted No. 5 seed Kevin Kim, dropping only four games.

"I didn't know what to expect this week," said Rochus, who came to Scottsdale from a minor-league challenger event in France. "I didn't get in until Tuesday and I had to adjust to the courts, coming from indoors to outdoors."

Also into the quarters were un-seeds American James Blake (d. countryman Salzenstein) and Italy's David Sanguinetti (d. (LL) Goldstein in three).

Friday's QF line-up at TTC Open is Sanguinetti vs. The Roach, Giovanni "Little L." Lapentti vs. (3) Mario "Baby Goran" Ancic, Arthurs vs. Weiner, and Blake vs. (2) Spadea in an all-American (Spadea leads career meetings 6-3, including the last four).

"I owe him some revenge, he's gotten me bad a few times," said Blake, who was fed a bagel set by Spadea in San Jose. "I need to try and get him back."