Sharapova into third round

There was a 17-year-old American girl kicking up a lot of buzz with a major upset at the U.S. Open Thursday, but Maria Sharapova made sure it was not at her expense.

Hours after Melanie Oudin of Marietta, Ga., took out the No. 4 seed, Elena Dementieva, in the day session, Sharapova launched the late-night portion of the program by overpowering Christina McHale, the 17-year-old from Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 6-2, 6-1, at Arthur Ashe Stadium.

Night-session ticket holders had to wait about two hours to get in because of James Blake's late-starting match, and Sharapova took barely more than half that - and hour and 13 minutes - to dispatch McHale, who was playing in just her third Grand Slam match and couldn't handle Sharapova's pace and power. Channeling a touch of the samurai in a black dress and flowing white headband, the 22-year-old Russian carved up the Jersey teen with monster groundstrokes that added up to 23 winners to just six for McHale.

Next up? Oudin, who outlasted Dementieva in three sets yesterday and aims to match her career best after reaching the round of 16 at Wimbledon this summer.

"I've got a tough round ahead of me," Sharapova said. "I'm sure she's gonna swing and have nothing to lose. Which she doesn't."

Sharapova - the 2006 Open champ who returned in May from a nine-month layoff with a shoulder injury that kept her out of last year's Open - has dropped only six games in her two matches so far.

Sharapova made the final in her Open tuneup in Toronto by playing six matches in seven days, which made her confident that her surgically repaired shoulder was ready for Flushing Meadows.

"I'm certainly playing better than when I first came back," she said. "That belief in the game, that confidence is coming back."