A judge has suspended Durham
district attorney Mike Nifong, thwarting the intentions of the
prosecutor disbarred for his handling of the Duke lacrosse rape case to
stay in office for another month and assist in the transition to a
successor.
Superior court judge Orlando
Hudson said the order was based on the probability that Nifong engaged
in willful misconduct in office.
Tar
Heels send Cardinals packing in CWS
North Carolina starter Luke
Putkonen quieted the rowdy Louisville bats, giving up just three hits
and striking out seven to pick up his eighth win and end Louisville's
NCAA College World Series baseball run with a 3-1 win in Omaha on
Tuesday.
Indiana football coach Hoeppner succumbs
Indiana football coach Terry
Hoeppner, 59, passed away Tuesday morning at 6:50 a.m. at Bloomington
Hospital following a lengthy illness, according to the university's
athletic web site.
"Coach died due to complications
from the brain tumor for which he had been treated surgically and
therapeutically over the past 18 months, " said team physician Dr. Larry
Rink. "His family was at his side."
June 19, 2007
Floyd, Solares
win C-USA recognition in track
Ebonie Floyd of Houston and
Rice's Pablo Solares were voted the 2007 Conference USA outdoor female
and male track and field athletes of the year, respectively, by a vote
of the league's head coaches.
Floyd capped off her career by
earning All-America status at the 2007 NCAA Outdoor Track and Field
Championships. The sprint specialist won silver in the 100-meter (11.28
seconds) and bronze in the 200m (22.65).
Solares capped off a sterling
Rice career with three solid weekends of performances. He established a
personal-best time of 3:40.22 in the 1,500-meter to place ninth at the
NCAA outdoor championships.
Nifong stepping down July 13; Duke settles
Disbarred Durham district
attorney Mike Nifong has announced he will step down from that position
on July 13. Nifond said he will offer to assist in a transition with his
successor.
In related news, Duke officials
have announced that they have reached a settlement with David Evans,
Collin Finnerty and Reade Seligmann, the three Blue Devils lacrosse
players who were determined to have been victims of false accusations by
the Durham DA.
Terms of the settlement were not
announced.
Hawes planning to take his game up a level
Washington freshman center
Spencer Hawes has decided to forgo his remaining three years of college
eligibility, sign with an agent and remain available for the 2007 NBA
draft.
Hawes led the Huskies and ranked
10th among Pacific-10 Conference scorers with a 14.9 points per game
average. His 53.2 percent accuracy from the field was the league's
fourth-best figure. Hawes ranked second on the team and ninth among
Pac-10 players with an average of 6.4 rebounds per game.
June 18, 2007
Rice jumps on Tar
Heels early for 14-4 win
North Carolina fell in an early
6-0 hole and could not recover, losing to Rice 14-4 in the College World
Series on Sunday night.
The Tar Heels will face
Louisville on Tuesday at 2 p.m. EDT in an elimination game. The winner
of that game will have to defeat Rice twice to advance to the best
two-of-three championship series.
Memphis, Georgetown plan
hoops dates
Next season's Memphis basketball schedule will
include Georgetown, which reached last season's Final Four. The contract
calls for the teams to play four games over the next five years.
The series begins in 2007-08 with a game at
FedExForum in Memphis on a date to be determined. The Tigers return the
game in Washington, DC, in the 2008-09 season.
After a year hiatus in 2009-10, the final two games
are scheduled in 2010-11 (Memphis) and 2011-12 (Washington, DC).
Lynch named to
fill in for Hoosiers in 2007
Indiana athletic director Rick Greenspan has
announced that Bill Lynch, who has been the Hoosiers' assistant head
football coach and offensive coordinator since 2005, will assume the
responsibilities of head coach for the 2007 season as Terry Hoeppner
continues his leave of absence for health reasons.
"Most importantly, I wish Terry well with his ongoing
health issues," Greenspan said.
Indiana gets
verbal from top prep performer
For the second straight year, Kelvin Sampson has
landed a Top 10 player, according to foxsports.com.
The Indiana head coach wrestled in-state star Eric
Gordon away from Illinois less than a year ago and now the Hoosiers boss
has received a commitment from New York native Devin Ebanks.
Ebanks is a skilled 6-8 rising senior wing from
Brooklyn who took an unofficial visit to Bloomington last month.
June 17, 2007
Gavel comes down on
DA Nifong: disbarment
Durham County district attorney
Mike Nifong was disbarred Saturday for his rape prosecution of three
Duke University lacrosse players — a politically motivated act, judges
said, that he inexplicably prolonged for months after evidence showed
the defendants were innocent.
Swimmers getting the big freeze at Syracuse
Syracuse athletic director Dr.
Daryl Gross has announced that the university will field an
intercollegiate women’s ice hockey team beginning in 2008-09. The men’s
and women’s swimming and diving teams will be dropped after the 2007-08
season.
Sun Devils use long ball to subdue Anteaters
Arizona State homered three
times to beat the California Irvine Anteaters 5-4 in front 19,638 at
Rosenblatt Stadium in Omaha in the first round of the College World
Series on Saturday. A solo shot by Ike Davis in the bottom of the eighth
was the difference, as ASU improved to 49-13.
The Sun Devils will play Oregon State in the next round of
double-elimination bracket play. The defending champions topped Cal
State Fullerton 3-2 on Saturday.
June 16, 2007
Pirates, Gamecocks
announce football dates
East Carolina and South Carolina
will renew a football series that dates back to 1977 with a five-game
agreement beginning in 2011 and ending in 2016, according to a joint
announcement made by the two schools on Friday.
Three of the five games will
take place in North Carolina as the Pirates and Gamecocks will meet in
Charlotte in 2011 and 2014 before taking the series back to
Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium in Greenville during the 2015 season. South
Carolina will host ECU at Williams-Brice Stadium in Columbia in 2012 and
2016.
USC leads the overall series
10-5, but the Pirates have won three of the last four meeting and five
of the last seven. The programs last met on Sept. 18, 1999, at
Williams-Brice Stadium, where East Carolina posted a 21-3 victory over a
Gamecock squad coached by Lou Holtz, the father of current ECU coach
Skip Holtz.
Owls
open CWS by rallying past Cardinals
The Rice Owls, who found
themselves down 10-4 after the top of the fifth, rallied to score 11
times over over the next four and a half frames to beat Louisville 15-10
in front of 18,807 in the opening game of the 2007 College World Series.
The win was the Owls' sixth
straight of the NCAA tournament and pushed them into the winner's
bracket game on Sunday.
Trailing 10-9 heading to the
bottom of the eighth, the Owls scored six times off Cards closer Trystan
Magnuson to complete their comeback.
Nifong steps down as Durham district attorney
Durham district attorney Mike
Nifong told an N.C. State Bar disciplinary panel Friday that he will
resign because of his actions in the Duke lacrosse case, according to
the Durham Herald.
Former Blue Devils lacrosse
player Reade Seligmann tearfully testified that the false rape
allegations lodged against him and two teammates by a Durham stripper
and vigorously pursued by Nifong devastated his family and created
financial difficulties.
