WASHINGTON -- With her player choking, Billie Jean King had to do some serious coaching.

From her courtside seat, King settled Meghann Shaughnessy's nerves before the collapse turned into defeat. Shaughnessy finally won on her sixth match point, opening the Fed Cup quarterfinals with a victory as the Americans took a 2-0 lead over Italy on Saturday.

	“	This is very important for [Shaughnessy] to come back out and prove to herself that she can finish. ... There was some history that she has to overcome. ”
		— Billie Jean King

"I just told her she has to accept responsibility -- it doesn't matter if you're choking out of your wazoo or whatever," King said. "You've got to accept it and find a way to get through it. Even if it's ugly, just find a way."

Shaughnessy nearly blew a 5-1 second-set lead before holding off Francesca Schiavone 6-3, 6-4. Chanda Rubin followed with a 6-3, 6-3 victory over Rita Grande, putting the United States one win away from advancing in the best-of-five competition.

Rubin plays Schiavone and Shaughnessy plays Grande in the reverse singles Sunday, followed by Rubin and Lisa Raymond vs. Tathiana Garbin and Antonella Serra-Zanetti in the doubles. The winner plays the Belgium-Slovakia winner in the semifinals in November. Belgium led 2-0 after Saturday's singles.

Shaughnessy was cruising in clinical fashion, scoring 13 consecutive points on her serve and outhustling her opponent, but her game went from confident to tentative as her second-set lead shrank from 5-1 to 5-4. She hit four unforced errors on match points before Schiavone's long forehand ended the 32nd-ranked Italian's valiant comeback attempt.

Shaughnessy said she started holding back, hoping Schiavone would make the mistakes in the final games.

"Being Fed Cup, I definitely had a few more nerves out there with me today," Shaughnessy said. "So I'm just really happy that I pulled it through."

Had it been a regular women's tour event, Shaughnessy would have been alone on the court trying to calm herself. Instead, she had King sitting next to her during the changeovers.

"She was telling me to start hitting the ball," Shaughnessy said, laughing.

In her only previous Fed Cup singles match, Shaughnessy held match point against Barbara Schwartz before losing in a U.S. defeat by Austria last year.

"This is very important for her to come back out and prove to herself that she can finish," King said. "There was a lot going on out there. There was some history that she has to overcome."

Shaughnessy was so bothered by her performance Saturday that she stayed for extra practice after the matches were over.

"She can't stand the fact that she was choking, and she's going back out on the court," King said.

Rubin, ranked No. 8, and 18th-ranked Shaughnessy are the headline players on a U.S. team missing its top stars. Venus and Serena Williams, Monica Seles, Lindsay Davenport and Jennifer Capriati are not playing because of a combination of injuries, prior commitments and disputes with King.

Italy is without its top player, Silvia Farina Elia, who has a foot injury.

In the second match, Rubin found an extra gear in the seventh game of the first set. She won 10 of the final 11 points of the set, finishing with a forehand winner.

Rubin lost her serve to start the second set but rallied to tie at 2-2 and remained in control from there. She finished the match with a backhand half-volley down the line.

The United States has never lost to Italy in Fed Cup play, winning all eight meetings since 1963. The Italians will have to win all three matches Sunday to end the streak.

"It's going to be very difficult for us," captain Corrado Barazzutti said. "But we are here to play and to fight."