EW YORK - Less than a week after jumping into the US Senate race, Republican Rick Lazio - an obscure-to-unknown congressman from Long Island - is running neck and neck with First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton.
A poll of 713 likely voters, taken over the past three days, shows Clinton at 45.8 percent and Lazio at 43.8 percent. Because the poll, released yesterday, has a 3.8-percentage-point margin of error, the two candidates are essentially tied.
Even the pollster, John Zogby, was surprised by how quickly Lazio has caught up. ''Wow!'' he said. ''This is going to be just as tight as Hillary versus Rudy.''
''Rudy'' refers to Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, who dropped out of the race a week ago, citing concerns about treatment for his prostate cancer. Giuliani also announced May 10 that he and his wife were separating in the wake of the disclosure of his extramarital affair.
The remarkable thing about yesterday's Clinton-Lazio poll is that its numbers are nearly identical to the final Clinton-Giuliani poll - suggesting that Clinton's biggest obstacle in this contest is her own negative image.
She is improving on this score. When asked for their opinion of Clinton, 59 percent said they had a favorable view - more than in previous polls - but 38 percent still have an unfavorable view, and two-thirds of those people label their view ''very unfavorable.''
Among several key groups of voters - suburbanites, people who live upstate, and whites in general - more than 40 percent have a negative impression of her.
Only 15 percent of those polled have an unfavorable opinion of Lazio. However, 43 percent say they do not know enough about him to form an opinion. The latter figure has good and bad implications for Clinton.
The bad news: Even with so many voters unfamiliar with Lazio, she still cannot do any better than tie him. The good news: There's still plenty of time for a negative image of him to take shape.
Still, the little that the public has seen of Lazio so far has, at the very least, not hurt him.
A week ago, when it became clear he would replace Giuliani in the race and hardly anybody outside Long Island knew anything about him, a Zogby poll showed Clinton ahead 45.7 to 32.2, with 17.4 percent undecided.
Since officially announcing his candidacy Saturday, Lazio has appeared on nationwide TV and made quick-dart visits all over the state, and has picked up more than 11 points. Another 7 points have moved from Clinton's camp to the uncertain column. Clinton, meanwhile, has not moved a hair.
Compared with when she was running against Giuliani, Clinton appears to have widened her lead in New York City (where she leads Lazio, 62 percent to 30 percent) and among Jews (56-32). But upstate, where she and the mayor were tied, Lazio has pulled ahead (46-41). And he maintains Giuliani's solid margin in the suburbs (54-36) and among Catholics (52-39).
The poll indicates the two are tied among independent voters and Protestants. Lazio also picks up a little bit of strength among African-American voters: Against Giuliani, Clinton led 94 percent to 2 percent; now, she beats Lazio 85-9.
The poll results were released as the National Abortion Rights Action League of New York endorsed Clinton. It had been neutral, but swung to Clinton because of Lazio's support for a ban on so-called ''partial-birth abortions'' and his opposition to federal funding for abortions.
