Knowles suffers fourth straight loss

   Sacramento Capitals veteran Mark Knowles suffered his fourth consecutive doubles loss on the ATP World Tour on Wednesday.
   The third-seeded team of Knowles and Mahesh Bhupathi fell to Jonathan Erlich and Andy Ram of Israel 6-4, 6-3 in the first round of the $553,125 Winston-Salem (N.C.) Open.
   All four players have won Grand Slam men's doubles titles. Bhupathi has captured four, Knowles three, and Erlich and Ram one each.
   Knowles, who turns 40 on Sept. 4 and has three young children, has dropped to No. 38 in the world doubles rankings after being no lower than 11th from January 2002 through last August. He was No. 1 for parts of 2002, 2003 and 2005.
   In the doubles quarterfinals, former Stanford All-American Scott Lipsky of Huntington Beach and Colin Fleming of Great Britain beat Treat Conrad Huey, a Washington, D.C., native who plays for the Philippines, and Cory Parr of Jericho, N.Y., 7-6 (5), 6-4. Parr played on the courts where he starred at Wake Forest from 2005 through 2009.
   Two years ago, Huey reached the singles quarterfinals of the Sacramento Challenger as a qualifier and won the doubles title at the Tiburon Challenger with Harsh Mankad of India.
   U.S. Open qualifying -- Nicole Gibbs, a Stanford sophomore from Santa Monica, lost to Melinda Czink of Hungary 3-6, 7-6 (4), 6-0 in the first round of qualifying at the U.S. Open in Flushing Meadows, N.Y. Gibbs advanced to the NCAA singles semifinals in May on her home courts.