■BASKETBALL
Durant leads Sophomores
Kevin Durant set the scoring record for the National Basketball Association’s All-Star Rookie Challenge Friday, pouring in 46 points to lead the Sophomores to victory over their first-year foes. Durant scored 30 of his points in the second half as the second-year players held off the Rookies 122-116. Durant, of the Oklahoma City Thunder, shot 17-of-25 from the field, including four-of-eight from three-point range as the Sophomores won the contest for the seventh straight time. Durant, who has averaged 25.5 points this season, owns the fourth-highest average for someone who did not make the main All-Star contest.
■BASKETBALL
Toronto, Miami start trading
Toronto and Miami launched the National Basketball Association trade season on Friday with an agreement to send Raptors forward Jermaine O’Neal to the Heat in exchange for forward Shawn Marion, the Raptors confirmed. The deal sends O’Neal and Jamario Moon to Miami in exchange for Marion and point guard Marcus Banks. The Heat will also receive a conditional first-round pick from Toronto next year unless the Raptors are in the draft lottery. In that case, the first-round selection could come between 2011 and 2015.
■BASEBALL
Santana to sit out Classic
New York Mets ace Johan Santana will not pitch for Venezuela in the World Baseball Classic next month. The two-time Major League Baseball pitcher of the year will miss the tournament, the Venezuelan Baseball Federation announced on Friday. Federation president Edwin Zerpa said organizers of the tournament, World Baseball Classic Inc, were not willing to pay the high insurance premium required for the Mets to clear Santana after he underwent arthroscopic surgery on his left knee. “It puts him in a high-risk category,” Zerpa said. Venezuela’s first game is on March 7 against Italy in Toronto. Venezuela was eliminated in the second round of the inaugural Classic in 2006.
■WEIGHTLIFTING
Taichung to host tourney
Taichung City has won a bid to host next year’s World University Weightlifting Championship, officials said yesterday. The bid was approved a day earlier by the International University Sports Federation during an executive committee meeting held in Harbin, China, prior to the Winter Universiade, said officials from National Taiwan Sport University, which was representing the Taichung bid. The event, which is expected to draw some 500 athletes from more than 50 countries, will mark the first time an international weightlifting championship has been held in Taiwan, they said. In preparation for the competition, the university will form an organizing committee in conjunction with the Chinese Taipei University Sports Federation and the Chinese Taipei Weightlifting Association, the officials said, adding that the committee will report its progress to the federation during the organization’s next executive committee meeting scheduled for July in Serbia.
■SNOWBOARDING
Jacobellis beats Nobs
Lindsey Jacobellis of the US and Markus Schairer of Austria won World Cup snowboardcross events at Cypress Mountain, Canada, on Friday. Mike Robertson of Canada was second behind Schairer, with Seth Westcott of the US taking third on the same course that will be used for the Winter Olympics a year from now. Olivia Nobs of Switzerland was second in the women’s race and Helene Olafsen of Norway was third.
South Korean giants T1, led by “Faker,” won their fifth League of Legends (LoL) world championship crown in London on Saturday, beating China’s Bilibili Gaming (BLG) in a thrilling final. The teams were locked at 2-2 at a packed O2 arena, but T1 clinched game five to make it back-to-back titles after nearly four hours of tense action. China’s BLG started strongly, taking the first game before T1 struck back to level. The Chinese team pulled ahead again at 2-1 only for their opponents to hit back again and go on to take the decider. Faker, who won the Most
The Major League Baseball World Series trophy is headed to Los Angeles, but the party is extending all the way to Japan. People milled around local train stations yesterday morning in Tokyo as newspaper extras were ready to roll off the presses, proclaiming Japanese stars Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto as world champions along with their Dodgers teammates after a stirring Game 5 victory over the New York Yankees. The 30-year-old is a national hero in Japan whose face adorns billboards and TV adverts all over the country. Ohtani this year became the first player in history to hit 50 home runs and
Amber Glenn overcame a fall and her own doubts to win a maiden Grand Prix figure skating title on Saturday at the Grand Prix de France. The American skater had the lead from Friday’s short program. That and the support of the crowd got her through a tough free skate in which she fell on a triple flip and put a hand onto the ice to steady herself on two other jumps. “I didn’t feel that great out there today, but I really tried, and the audience really got me through that last half when I was doubting myself,” Glenn
WORLD SERIES: ‘The individuals that were involved in that last night was a very small segment of the east Los Angeles community,’ the Los Angeles county sheriff said Rowdy crowds took to the streets of Los Angeles after the LA Dodgers won the Major League Baseball (MLB) World Series, setting a city bus on fire, breaking into stores and lighting fireworks. A dozen arrests were reported by police on Thursday, but officials said that most fans celebrated peacefully. Video showed revelers throwing objects at police in downtown LA as sirens blared and officers told them to leave the area on Wednesday night after the Dodgers defeated the New York Yankees in Game 5 of the MLB World Series at Giants Stadium in New York. Another video showed someone standing atop
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