Sports FYI
BY Staff and Wire reports
Friday, December 07, 2012
12/07/12 at 2:12 AM
Football
Texas' Brown has full support of school president: Texas President Bill Powers gave coach Mack Brown his "full support" on Thursday, saying Brown will remain the Longhorns head coach after an 8-4 regular season and missing a BCS bowl for the third consecutive year.
Writing on his university blog, Powers cited an "increase in media speculation" about Brown's future.
"I'd like to state unequivocally that Coach Brown has my full support as well as the support of Men's Athletics Director DeLoss Dodds. Put succinctly, Mack Brown is and will remain the Longhorns' head football coach," Powers wrote.
"Coach Brown restored Texas' winning tradition. He embodies the Texas character, is a superb ambassador for The University of Texas, and runs a program that is both winning and clean, a program that all alumni and fans can and should be proud of. Mack cares about the young men on the team as people, as students, and as players, in that order, and he models the kind of leadership that will serve our players for the rest of their lives," Powers wrote.
Alvarez to coach Wisconsin in Rose Bowl: Wisconsin is going retro for the Rose Bowl.
Left without a coach when Bret Bielema bolted for Arkansas, the Badgers asked former coach and current athletic director Barry Alvarez to lead them when they face No. 8 Stanford on New Year's Day.
The return is for one game only, Alvarez said. He's already started the search for a new coach, and plans to begin interviewing candidates next week.
Strong rebuffs Tennessee, stays at Louisville: Charlie Strong is staying at Louisville. The football coach said he turned down an offer from Tennessee and will stay with the Cardinals.
The No. 22 Cardinals (10-2) won a share of the Big East Conference championship and a BCS berth in the Sugar Bowl, where they'll face Florida.
Hockey
NHL, players still can't end lockout: The NHL and the players' association are further apart than ever before. Union executive director Donald Fehr began the first of his two news conferences Thursday night by proclaiming he believed the sides had agreements on such issues as actual dollars, and then returned moments later to reveal the NHL rejected everything his side offered.
Hot-button topics such as the "make-whole" provision on existing contracts not only weren't settled, but are no longer being offered by the league.
Forget that owners were willing to pay up to $300 million to cover the costs, and Commissioner Gary Bettman countered by saying the entire concept is off the table - along with everything else the league offered during the previous two days of talks.
When the NHL agreed to increase its make-whole offer of deferred payments from $211 million to $300 million it was part of a proposed package that required the union to agree on three nonnegotiable points. Instead, the players' association accepted the raise in funds, but then made counterproposals on the issues the league stated had no wiggle room.
Soccer
TU's Cristian Mata nabs honor: Tulsa forward Cristian Mata was tabbed to the Top Drawer Soccer Freshmen Team of the Season, the publication announced.
Mata netted a team-best 14 goals, five of which were game-winners, and six assists for 34 points.
Mata ranks 13th nationally in total goals and 79th in total assists.
Track and field
ORU athletes win events: Oral Roberts seniors Jeffery Gibson and Jack Whitt won their respective indoor events at the 2012 Bob Timmons Challenge in Lawrence, Kan.
Gibson took the 400-meter dash with a time of 47.92 seconds. Whitt's final season started strong as he reached a height of 5.35 meters in the pole vault. ORU's Dustin Gehrke cleared 5.20 meters to place third.
