Sharapova and Vujacic call it quits

MOSCOW, Sept. 1 (UPI) -- Maria Sharapova says she and former Los Angeles Lakers guard Sasha Vujacic have called off their engagement since he signed on to play basketball in Turkey.

The Russian tennis star said she and her now-former fiancee weren't seeing enough of one another since he joined the Turkish League and, in fact, hadn't seen each other at all since spring.

"Our career schedules just made it extremely difficult to see each other with the traveling, and especially his career move to Turkey," she said in an interview posted on her Web site.

The couple had met when Vujacic was lighting up Los Angeles as a member of the glitzy Lakers, but his career took him to New Jersey and then on to Istanbul's Anadolu Efes squad, Russia's RIA Novosti news agency said.

"But we have a tremendous amount of respect for each other," Sharapova said. "Still would love to call him as a friend. Yeah, we spent really great years together."