Kim Clijsters wins her second straight U.S. Open

The 6-2, 6-1 thrashing of Vera Zvonareva was never in doubt and barely lasted long enough to cause a yawn from Clijsters' 3-year-old daughter, Jada. Zvonareva had two break points in the second set but squandered them both, never able to right herself after being broken at 2-3 in the opening set.

The match lasted an hour, tied for the shortest women's final on record -- Martina Navratilova, who was on hand for tonight's match, dispatched Helena Sukova in an hour in 1986.

The 15 total games were the fewest since Chris Evert (also on hand last night) defeated Evonne Goolagong in 1976.

Clijsters, who burst out of motherhood/retirement to win last year as an unseeded entrant, surprised no one this time around. She cruised through her first five matches before digging deep to rally past Venus Williams in the semifinals on Friday; that match's second set lasted two minutes longer than the entire final.

Zvonareva had a nice break-through season at age 26, reaching the Wimbledon and U.S. Open finals. She was solid in beating top seed Caroline Wozniacki in the semis, but Zvonareva's fragile nature reared itself tonight, when her slumped shoulders and on-court mutterings revealed a beaten finalist.

Clijsters has now won 21 straight matches at the U.S. Open, with titles in her last three tournaments here -- 2005, 2009 and now, none so easy as tonight's.