UPDATE 1-NBA-Microsoft's Ballmer and Seattle group set to buy Kings-report

* Deal worth $500 million
* Report says team will move to old Supersonics home
* Sacramento mayor desperate to keep team
SEATTLE/SACRAMENTO, Jan 9 (Reuters) - A group of investors led by hedge fund manager Chris Hansen and Microsoft Corp CEO Steve Ballmer is close to a deal to buy the Sacramento Kings basketball team for $500 million and move the franchise to Seattle, Yahoo Sports reported on Wednesday.
The Maloof family, which has wrangled with the city of Sacramento for years over a new arena and held talks with other cities about moving the team, has now agreed to sell, the report said, citing league sources.
Reuters could not confirm the report. The Sacramento Kings did not immediately respond to phone calls or emails seeking comment.
Under the reported deal, the Kings would play for two seasons in KeyArena, the stomping ground of the Seattle Supersonics before the team's 2008 move to Oklahoma City, and then move into a new facility, Yahoo reported.
The National Basketball Association franchise is Sacramento's only major sports team, and its mayor, Kevin Johnson, is a former NBA star.
"I'm going to make every effort that I can possibly do to identify a potential buyer that will ensure that the Sacramento Kings remain in Sacramento," Johnson told reporters on Wednesday.
American cities often clash over sports franchises, which are seen as economic engines and a source of civic pride. The value of sports franchises has soared in recent years, largely as a result of pay television contracts.
Johnson promised to locate buyers, mentioning billionaire supermarket mogul Ron Burkle as having expressed an interest in the past.
"It appears to me for the first time that they have possibly shown a desire to sell the team, and that's what I think is significant today," Johnson said, referring to the Maloof family.
Seattle sports fans were infuriated by the loss of the Supersonics and have pined for a new NBA team ever since. Hansen last year gained city council approval for a new $490 million arena near the waterfront south of downtown.
Ballmer, the NBA and representatives for Hansen all declined to comment. Seattle city officials told Reuters they were aware of the rumors, but were not in a position to comment.
SOFTWARE AND SPORTS
Ballmer's potential involvement reflects a strong connection between the software giant and local sports.
Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen owns the NFL's Seattle Seahawks and the NBA's Portland Trail Blazers, and is a part-owner of the Seattle Sounders, the soccer team. Microsoft's longtime head of human resources, Lisa Brummel, is a part-owner of the Seattle Storm women's basketball team.
Ballmer himself is an avid basketball fan and sometime player, who used to scrimmage regularly before work with other employees in a gym near the company's campus.
When the Supersonics moved to Oklahoma City and became the Thunder, its owner faulted Seattle officials for not coming up with a plan to replace the aging KeyArena. Many fans, though bitter, still sport Supersonics jerseys on the streets of Seattle.
Professional sports have enjoyed a recent resurgence in the city, with the NFL's Seahawks enjoying success on the field in a relatively new stadium, and the Sounders soccer team boasting the best attendance in the MLS.
Despite resistance from unions and others who fear a third stadium by the city docks will crimp freight transport, the majority of locals favor a new basketball arena and local politicians now embrace the idea.
The city council in October signed off on an agreement struck between would-be franchise owner Hansen, Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn and King County Executive Dow Constantine.
But McGinn was coy when asked about the report on Wednesday.
"I know as much as you do about the Sonics," McGinn told reporters at a re-election news conference on Wednesday. "But if it's true, ain't it cool?"
Industry observers say there are still a number of factors that could undermine any potential agreement.
Hansen has spent millions of dollars on land south of downtown Seattle to house a new arena, but locating it there is contingent upon the outcome of an environmental assessment and a review of other potential sites.
"It's not a done deal. There are discussions, I'm told," said Marc Ganis, president of consultancy SportsCorp Ltd in Chicago, who is not involved in the deal. "There are lots of unknowns. I think $500 million sounds like the right range."
The Kings have appeared to be on the brink of leaving their host city in past years.
The Maloofs opened talks with officials in Anaheim to move the team to the Orange County city in 2011, but NBA officials convinced them to give Sacramento another year to get a deal for a new arena in place. Then, last August, reports circulated that the Maloofs were talking with officials about moving to Virginia Beach, Va.
"We want to be an NBA city with an NBA team, and we want that team to be the Sacramento Kings," Johnson said on Wednesday.

Read More..

Microsoft's Ballmer and Seattle group set to buy Kings - report

October 29, 2012. REUTERS/Robert Galbraith
SEATTLE/SACRAMENTO (Reuters) - A group of investors led by hedge fund manager Chris Hansen and Microsoft Corp CEO Steve Ballmer is close to a deal to buy the Sacramento Kings basketball team for $500 million and move the franchise to Seattle, Yahoo Sports reported on Wednesday.
The Maloof family, which has wrangled with the city of Sacramento for years over a new arena and held talks with other cities about moving the team, has now agreed to sell, the report said, citing league sources.
Reuters could not confirm the report. The Sacramento Kings did not immediately respond to phone calls or emails seeking comment.
Under the reported deal, the Kings would play for two seasons in KeyArena, the stomping ground of the Seattle Supersonics before the team's 2008 move to Oklahoma City, and then move into a new facility, Yahoo reported.
The National Basketball Association franchise is Sacramento's only major sports team, and its mayor, Kevin Johnson, is a former NBA star.
"I'm going to make every effort that I can possibly do to identify a potential buyer that will ensure that the Sacramento Kings remain in Sacramento," Johnson told reporters on Wednesday.
American cities often clash over sports franchises, which are seen as economic engines and a source of civic pride. The value of sports franchises has soared in recent years, largely as a result of pay television contracts.
Johnson promised to locate buyers, mentioning billionaire supermarket mogul Ron Burkle as having expressed an interest in the past.
"It appears to me for the first time that they have possibly shown a desire to sell the team, and that's what I think is significant today," Johnson said, referring to the Maloof family.
Seattle sports fans were infuriated by the loss of the Supersonics and have pined for a new NBA team ever since. Hansen last year gained city council approval for a new $490 million arena near the waterfront south of downtown.
Ballmer, the NBA and representatives for Hansen all declined to comment. Seattle city officials told Reuters they were aware of the rumors, but were not in a position to comment.
SOFTWARE AND SPORTS
Ballmer's potential involvement reflects a strong connection between the software giant and local sports.
Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen owns the NFL's Seattle Seahawks and the NBA's Portland Trail Blazers, and is a part-owner of the Seattle Sounders, the soccer team. Microsoft's longtime head of human resources, Lisa Brummel, is a part-owner of the Seattle Storm women's basketball team.
Ballmer himself is an avid basketball fan and sometime player, who used to scrimmage regularly before work with other employees in a gym near the company's campus.
When the Supersonics moved to Oklahoma City and became the Thunder, its owner faulted Seattle officials for not coming up with a plan to replace the aging KeyArena. Many fans, though bitter, still sport Supersonics jerseys on the streets of Seattle.
Professional sports have enjoyed a recent resurgence in the city, with the NFL's Seahawks enjoying success on the field in a relatively new stadium, and the Sounders soccer team boasting the best attendance in the MLS.
Despite resistance from unions and others who fear a third stadium by the city docks will crimp freight transport, the majority of locals favor a new basketball arena and local politicians now embrace the idea.
The city council in October signed off on an agreement struck between would-be franchise owner Hansen, Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn and King County Executive Dow Constantine.
But McGinn was coy when asked about the report on Wednesday.
"I know as much as you do about the Sonics," McGinn told reporters at a re-election news conference on Wednesday. "But if it's true, ain't it cool?"
Industry observers say there are still a number of factors that could undermine any potential agreement.
Hansen has spent millions of dollars on land south of downtown Seattle to house a new arena, but locating it there is contingent upon the outcome of an environmental assessment and a review of other potential sites.
"It's not a done deal. There are discussions, I'm told," said Marc Ganis, president of consultancy SportsCorp Ltd in Chicago, who is not involved in the deal. "There are lots of unknowns. I think $500 million sounds like the right range."
The Kings have appeared to be on the brink of leaving their host city in past years.
The Maloofs opened talks with officials in Anaheim to move the team to the Orange County city in 2011, but NBA officials convinced them to give Sacramento another year to get a deal for a new arena in place. Then, last August, reports circulated that the Maloofs were talking with officials about moving to Virginia Beach, Va.
"We want to be an NBA city with an NBA team, and we want that team to be the Sacramento Kings," Johnson said on Wednesday.

Read More..

UPDATE 8-NBA results

Jan 10 (Infostrada Sports) - Results from the NBA games on Wednesday (home team in CAPS)
TORONTO 90 Philadelphia 72
Utah 112 CHARLOTTE 102
CLEVELAND 99 Atlanta 83
BOSTON 87 Phoenix 79
Milwaukee 104 CHICAGO 96
NEW ORLEANS 88 Houston 79
SAN ANTONIO 108 LA Lakers 105
OKLAHOMA CITY 106 Minnesota 84
DENVER 108 Orlando 105
LA CLIPPERS 99 Dallas 93
Memphis 94 GOLDEN STATE 87

Read More..

Pa. governor sues NCAA for Penn State sanctions

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. (AP) — The NCAA imposed landmark sanctions against Penn State over the Jerry Sandusky sex abuse scandal in a cynical ploy to weaken the university and enhance its own dismal reputation, Pennsylvania's governor claims in an unprecedented federal antitrust lawsuit against college sports' governing body.
Gov. Tom Corbett said the NCAA veered dramatically from its own disciplinary rules and procedures when it decreed last summer that Penn State would pay a $60 million fine, and the football team would suffer a four-year postseason ban and a dramatic reduction in the number of athletic scholarships it could offer.
Corbett wants a federal judge to throw out the sanctions, saying they have harmed students, business owners and others who had nothing to do with the former assistant football coach's crimes against children.
"A handful of top NCAA officials simply inserted themselves into an issue they had no authority to police under their own bylaws and one that was clearly being handled by the justice system," Corbett told a news conference on Wednesday.
In a statement, the NCAA said the lawsuit has no merit and called it an "affront" to Sandusky's victims.
Penn State said it had no role in the lawsuit. In fact, it agreed not to sue as part of a deal with the NCAA to accept the sanctions, imposed last July after an investigation found that coach Joe Paterno and other top officials covered up sexual-abuse allegations against Sandusky, a former member of Paterno's staff, for more than a decade in order to shield the university from bad publicity.
The lawsuit filed Wednesday represents an about-face for Corbett. Six months ago, he encouraged Penn State to "accept the serious penalties" imposed by the NCAA.
The deal was highly unpopular with many fans, students and alumni. Corbett, who is up for re-election next year, deflected a question about whether his response has helped or hurt him politically.
"We're not going to get into the politics of this," he said.
Corbett, who appeared on national TV and Pennsylvania talk-radio shows in the state's two largest cities Thursday morning, defended his change of heart.
In an interview on KDKA radio in Pittsburgh, Corbett said he changed his mind after concluding that top NCAA officials had bypassed internal committees set up specifically to review and impose sanctions.
"My thought process at the time was, well, if you belong to an association, you have to play by the rules of the association," the governor said. "We looked at the rules of the association and we think that the association didn't play by the rules."
Corbett, a member of the Penn State board of trustees by virtue of his office, said he waited until now to sue over because he wanted to thoroughly research the legal issues and avoid interfering with the football season.
The state's lawsuit alleges the NCAA violated the Sherman Antitrust Act, which prohibits agreements that restrain interstate commerce. It claims the NCAA "cynically and hypocritically exploited the tragedy" in order to "gain leverage in the court of public opinion, boost the reputation and power of the NCAA's president, enhance the competitive position of certain NCAA members, and weaken a fellow competitor."
The NCAA punished Penn State "without citing a single concrete NCAA rule that Penn State has broken, for conduct that in no way compromised the NCAA's mission of fair competition, and with a complete disregard for the NCAA's own enforcement procedures," the suit added.
Legal experts called it an unusual case whose outcome is difficult to predict.
Howard Langer, a Philadelphia-based attorney specializing in antitrust law, said the state must show the NCAA acted in a way that hurt competition and inflicted the "type of injury that antitrust laws were intended to remedy."
The NCAA has faced antitrust litigation before, with mixed results. In 1984, the Supreme Court ruled against the NCAA's exclusive control over televised college football games. And in 1998, the Supreme Court let stand a ruling that said the NCAA's salary cap for some assistant coaches was unlawful price-fixing.
But federal courts have consistently rejected antitrust challenges to NCAA rules and enforcement actions designed to preserve competitive balance, academic integrity and amateurism in college athletics.
In this case, the courts might not be as sympathetic to the NCAA, said Matthew Mitten, director of the National Sports Law Institute at Marquette University Law School in Milwaukee.
"It's difficult to justify the sanctions as necessary to protect the amateur nature of college sports, preserve competitive balance or maintain academic integrity," he said.
Joseph Bauer, an antitrust expert at the University of Notre Dame law school, said of Corbett's line of reasoning: "I don't think it's an easy claim for them to make, but it's certainly a viable claim."
Sandusky, 68, was convicted in June of sexually abusing 10 boys over a 15-year period, some of them on Penn State's campus. He is a serving a 30- to 60-year prison sentence.
Michael Boni, a lawyer for one of the victims, said he does not consider the lawsuit an affront. But he said he hopes Corbett takes a leading role in pushing for changes to state child-abuse laws.
"I really question who he's concerned about in this state," Boni said.
Corbett, a Republican, said his office did not coordinate its legal strategy with state Attorney General-elect Kathleen Kane, who is scheduled to be sworn in Jan. 15. Instead, the current attorney general, Linda Kelly — a Corbett appointee — granted the governor authority to pursue the matter.
Kane, a Democrat, ran on a vow to investigate why it took prosecutors nearly three years to charge Sandusky. Corbett was attorney general when his office took over the case in 2009.
Kane had no comment on the lawsuit because she was not consulted about it by Corbett's office.
Paterno's family members said in a statement that they were encouraged by the lawsuit. Corbett "now realizes, as do many others, that there was an inexcusable rush to judgment," they said.
The NCAA erased 14 years of victories under Paterno, who was fired when the scandal broke in 2011 and died of lung cancer a short time later.
An alumni group, Penn Staters for Responsible Stewardship, applauded the lawsuit but said Corbett should have asked questions when the NCAA agreement was made.
"If he disapproved of the terms of the NCAA consent decree, or if he thought there was something illegal about them, why didn't he exercise his duty to act long before now?" the group said.

Read More..

Jones, Te'o, 2 of college football's good guys

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — Alabama center Barrett Jones was hobbling toward the plane, awkwardly clutching crutches and a bag when a helping hand reached out.
"Here, let me get this for you," said Manti Te'o, Notre Dame's star linebacker.
Just a show of good manners from one of college football's best to another as they started an awards circuit that took them from New York to Houston to Orlando. And now they'll meet again, even farther south in the BCS championship Monday.
Jones and Te'o are the most acclaimed players on teams with national honors galore, and their upbeat personalities give college football just what it needs right now — an image boost — after being hit wave upon wave of scandal from State College, Pa., to Miami over the past couple of years.
Both players could be drawing sizable NFL paychecks right now, but they opted to stick around for their senior seasons and wrap up degrees. It's no coincidence that their teams have wound up here playing for a national title.
Te'o's answer Thursday to why he stuck around was telling. Representing Notre Dame, his native Hawaii and his teammates is "one of the biggest pleasures and honors that I get."
"And to just be an example to (Hawaiians) of somebody who made that leap of faith to leave the rock just for a few years and to find comfort in knowing that Hawaii will always be there," said Te'o, the Heisman Trophy runner-up. "You can do a good amount of service to the state by sacrificing a few years away from home to help live your dream, and by you helping to live your dream, you help other people's dreams seem that much more real."
It almost sounds too good to be true.
But teammates, coaches, friends and even acquaintances insist Jones and Te'o are just what they seem: good guys with strong faiths who work hard on and off the field.
They're not just Boy Scouts, though. OK, Te'o actually is an Eagle Scout.
He's also a rugged player who overcame the loss of two loved ones this season. Jones looks like a 6-foot-5, 302-pound version of the kid next door with his boyish blond hair, but he also gutted out most of the Southeastern Conference championship with a sprained left foot.
Te'o has even been known to write poetry, reciting a sizable poem during a talk last summer at Honolulu's newly formed Downtown Athletic Club.
"It was really well done," said Bobby Curran, a Honolulu radio show host who was emcee for the event. "When do you see vicious linebacker types reading poetry? The kid is so self-assured. He didn't have any hesitation. There was no awkwardness or embarrassment or any of that."
Jones grew up learning the violin and memorizing dozens of Bible verses, and was a pretty darn good Scrabble player. He spends his spring breaks on mission trips overseas to places such as Haiti and Nicaragua.
Tide coach Nick Saban has called the lineman "as fine a person as you're ever going to be around — me or you or anyone else — in terms of his willingness to serve other people."
Like Te'o, he says and does the right things.
Without profanity. "He's never cursed," insists Alabama tailback Eddie Lacy. "Ever."
Adds right tackle D.J. Fluker: "There is not a dark side" to Jones.
Their accomplishments almost have to be divided into on the field and off the field for brevity's sake.
Te'o is the first player to ever get a clean sweep of the following litany of awards: Butkus, Nagurski, Lombardi, Bednarik, Maxwell, Lott and Walter Camp player of the year.
Notre Dame defensive coordinator Bob Diaco said Te'o has responded to all that hardware by practicing harder than he had all season.
"For as talented a player he is, he's a better person," Diaco said, adding that his star defender is "happy, full of life."
"On a day where maybe as a coach you might be feeling a little down or maybe slightly distracted with the world's problems, Manti is easy to see, look at and see his face and immediately be energized," Diaco said. "So that's just the kind of guy that he is."
Te'o is an Academic All-American with a 3.324 GPA in design.
Te'o, a Mormon, showed his character when his girlfriend and grandmother both died within a few hours of each other. He had huge games against Michigan State and, the next week, against Michigan on the day his girlfriend was buried.
"Courageous, is one of the best words I can come up with to describe him," said Mickey Standiford, a member of the Mormon church in South Bend attended by Te'o, who is close with Standiford's family.
"To face those adversities and be able to still focus and have that determination, I think, to want to succeed for them. He wanted those games to be tributes to them. He didn't want it to be about him and the fact that he was out there doing it. It was more that he wanted to bring light to them. Courageous, determined, focused and just family is the most important thing to him."
Jones won the Outland Trophy as a left tackle last season, the Rimington Award as the nation's top center in 2012 and the Campbell Trophy, the Heisman's academic equivalent.
He just finished graduate school in accounting.
"I just feel like I've been gifted with a mind that enjoys school and enjoys learning," Jones said. "I wanted to leave with a master's degree. That was my goal the whole time."
He made a strong impression on Rich Houston, director of Alabama's master of accountancy program. Houston taught Jones in advanced auditing in the fall of 2011, a discussion-heavy course that students call "the current events class."
"The class was at 8 in the morning," he said. "He was always there, and he was the No. 1 participant in class in terms of both quantity and quality. And that includes having some fairly high-profile people in the accounting profession come into the class. He would ask great questions of those people, engage in conversation.
"Even if he wasn't an athlete, I'd be saying all the same things about him. Just what a really, genuinely good kid he is."

Read More..

AP: Criminal cases made Pa. AG hand over NCAA suit

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Pennsylvania's attorney general said she granted Gov. Tom Corbett the authority to file a federal antitrust lawsuit against the NCAA because the litigation could present a conflict of interest as her office prosecutes three Penn State administrators.
Attorney General Linda Kelly told The Associated Press on Thursday that "an actual conflict of interest could, and likely would, arise if this office were involved in both cases."
"The size and scope of that criminal case, which includes extensive grand jury testimony and other confidential information related to the university, made it untenable for the Office of Attorney General to pursue a civil lawsuit involving the NCAA's sanctions of Penn State," Kelly said. "Given the serious nature of both these cases, keeping these matters separate is the best course of action for the people of Pennsylvania."
Graham Spanier, Gary Schultz and Tim Curley face endangering the welfare of children, obstruction, conspiracy, failure to report suspected child abuse and perjury charges for allegedly covering up complaints and suspicions about Sandusky, a former defensive coordinator who was convicted last summer of 45 counts of child sexual abuse, including attacks inside campus facilities.
Corbett sued the NCAA in federal court on Wednesday, saying a set of penalties imposed against Penn State over its handling of the matter should be thrown out on antitrust grounds. The school agreed to a $60 million fine, a four-year ban on post-season play, a reduction in scholarships and the elimination of more than 100 wins under former coach Joe Paterno.
The NCAA has called Corbett's lawsuit meritless and an affront to the victims of Sandusky, who is now serving a 30- to 60-year state prison sentence for abuse of 10 boys over 15 years.
Spanier, forced out as president last year after Sandusky's arrest, remains a faculty member but is on paid leave. Curley is serving out the last year of his contract as athletic director, also on leave. Schultz, the school's vice president for business and finance, has retired.
All three have said they are innocent.
Under state law, the attorney general pursues and defends lawsuits involving most state agencies, but can delegate that power for reasons of efficiency or if it is otherwise deemed to be in the best interests of the state.
Kelly said her office received a request from Corbett's lawyer James D. Schultz on Friday, Dec. 14, for permission to sue the NCAA. Her office granted it three days later, she said. That authority, signed by the chief of her litigation section, can be terminated or amended by the attorney general's office, and it does not cover any appeals.

Read More..

Tennis-More woe for Sydney organisers after Tsonga withdrawal

SYDNEY, Jan 5 (Reuters) - Fresh off losing their top two men's seeds, Sydney International organisers were left with a nightmare scenario on Saturday when their top two local hopes were drawn against each other in the first round.
Just hours after top seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga and his French compatriot Richard Gasquet withdrew from the Australian Open warmup tournament, Australian number one Marinko Matosevic was drawn against compatriot Bernard Tomic in the first round.
The 27-year-old Matosevic, who was the ATP Tour's most improved player last year after jumping from 201 to 49th in the world, has moved ahead of Tomic, who faded in 2012 after a meteoric rise in 2011 and finished the year ranked 52nd.
The 20-year-old Tomic, who was also dumped from the Australian Davis Cup team because of doubts about his commitment, has actually been in good form at the Hopman Cup in Perth, winning all three singles matches, including a 6-4 6-4 victory over world number one Novak Djokovic.
World number eight Tsonga was earlier forced to withdraw from the Sydney tournament with a hamstring injury that he sustained at the Hopman Cup and he will be facing a battle to be fit for the Jan. 14-27 Australian Open in Melbourne.
"Unfortunately Jo-Wilfried Tsonga sustained an injury in Perth and has been forced to pull out ... with a left hamstring injury," Sydney tournament director Craig Watson said in a statement.
Gasquet, who would have been top seed after Tsonga's withdrawal, pulled out for "personal reasons", Watson said.
The 10th-ranked Gasquet reached the final of the Qatar Open against a resurgent Nikolay Davydenko and possibly felt he had enough match practice under his belt before the year's first grand slam begins at Melbourne Park on Jan. 14.

Read More..

Tennis-Li gets Melbourne boost with Shenzhen title

Jan 5 (Reuters) - Top seed Li Na survived a mid-match meltdown to overcome Czech Klara Zakopalova 6-3 1-6 7-5 in the final of the inaugural Shenzhen Open on Saturday, earning the Chinese a seventh career title.
World number seven Li, who won the 2011 French Open, looked in danger of disappointing the home fans after surrendering her serve in the first game of the deciding set.
Li, who beat fellow Chinese Peng Shuai 6-4 6-0 in Friday's semi-finals, hit back to win five of the next six games but from 5-2 up allowed fifth seed Zakopalova to draw level at 5-5.
In a topsy-turvy finish encapsulating the match, Li collected herself to put together two solid games and give her a boost ahead of the Australian Open, which begins on Jan. 14.
Li reached the final of the year's first grand slam in Melbourne in 2011 before going on to become China's first major singles champion in Paris.
Saturday's victory was Li's second WTA title in China, following her breakthrough at Guangzhou in 2004 when she became the first Chinese winner on the women's tour.
The $500,000 Shenzhen tournament became the third event in China on the WTA calendar for 2013 as tennis continues to expand in the country after Li's recent success.

Read More..

Li gets Melbourne boost with Shenzhen title

Top seed Li Na survived a mid-match meltdown to overcome Czech Klara Zakopalova 6-3 1-6 7-5 in the final of the inaugural Shenzhen Open on Saturday, earning the Chinese a seventh career title.
World number seven Li, who won the 2011 French Open, looked in danger of disappointing the home fans after surrendering her serve in the first game of the deciding set.
Li, who beat fellow Chinese Peng Shuai 6-4 6-0 in Friday's semi-finals, hit back to win five of the next six games but from 5-2 up allowed fifth seed Zakopalova to draw level at 5-5.
In a topsy-turvy finish encapsulating the match, Li collected herself to put together two solid games and give her a boost ahead of the Australian Open, which begins on January 14.
Li reached the final of the year's first grand slam in Melbourne in 2011 before going on to become China's first major singles champion in Paris.
Saturday's victory was Li's second WTA title in China, following her breakthrough at Guangzhou in 2004 when she became the first Chinese winner on the women's tour.
The $500,000 Shenzhen tournament became the third event in China on the WTA calendar for 2013 as tennis continues to expand in the country after Li's recent success.

Read More..