Off the wire

BASKETBALL Women ponder date change

The NCAA women’s basketball committee is backing a move to play the Final Four two days earlier, starting next season. The Final Four would go to a Friday-Sunday format instead of the Sunday-Tuesday configuration in place since 2003. The committee also decided that the top 16 seeds should host the first two rounds. The move would hopefully bolster attendance in the first two rounds, which has become stagnant over the past few years. Last season, the NCAA averaged 5,466 for all rounds - 17th since the tournament began in 1982. The committee also recommended moving the start date of the first round up a day, which would put them directly head-to-head with the men’s tournament. The regionals, which are at host schools for this season’s tournament, will move to a neutral site and also move up the dates one day. Stanford, Notre Dame, Louisville and Nebraska all are hosting regionals in this year’s NCAA tournament. It’s a move that angered a lot of coaches as all four of those schools have had incredible successat home, with Stanford boasting a 92-2 mark at Maples Pavilion since the start of the 2007-2008 season. Notre Dame is 85-11 at home during that span. Louisville and Nebraska each have won 81 percent of their home games over the past six years. “It’s great to have them back at neutral sites next year,” Stanford coach Tara VanDerveer said. “It will help our game grow.” The committee also asked Division II and Division III for input on the idea of a combined championship that would take place on the same weekend as the 2016 Women’s Final Four in Indianapolis. Men’s basketball did it in Atlanta last season.

Purdue center A.J. Hammons was suspended Monday for three games for violating team rules. Hammons will miss two exhibition games and Purdue’s regular-season opener Nov. 8 against Northern Kentucky. Coach Matt Painter declined to elaborate on what rules were broken, other than the suspension for the 7-foot, 251-pound Hammons was related to “conduct” and not academics, legal trouble or NCAA rule violations. Hammons averaged 10.6 points and 6.0 rebounds as a fsreshman, and then showed up in better shape this season.

Wes Bialosuknia, 68, who averaged 28 points a game for Connecticut in the 1966-1967 season to set a school record, died Monday. Bialosuknia starred for the Huskies between 1964 and 1967. He averaged 23.6 points for his three seasons. He scored 30 points or more in 17 games, also a school record. Bialosuknia was drafted by the NBA’s St. Louis Hawks in 1967, but chose to play in the ABA’s Oakland Oaks, where he averaged just under 9 points in 70 games.

GOLF Ko, 16, gets waiver

The LPGA Tour waived its age requirement Monday for Lydia Ko, clearing the way for the 16-year-old from New Zealand to join the tour in 2014. Ko won’t be like most LPGA Tour rookies. She already is a twotime champion, having won the Women’s Canadian Open at 15 last year to become the youngest winner in LPGA Tour history, and thensuccessfully defended her title this summer in Canada. Born in South Korea and raised in New Zealand, she already is No. 5 in women’s world ranking. Ko contended in the Evian Championship in France, and a short time letter asked the LPGA Tour to waive its requirement that players be 18 or older to join.

HORSE RACING Game on Dude 8-5 in Classic

Entries were taken for this weekend’s $25 million Breeders’ Cup to be held at Santa Anita Racetrack in Arcadia, Calif., and Game On Dude was made the early 8-5 favorite in a field of 12 for the $5 million Breeders’ Cup Classic, the most prestigious race of the weekend. Hall of Fame trainer D. Wayne Lukas has Will Take Charge, a two-time winner at Oaklawn Park, in the Classic. The Travers winner drew the No. 10 post and was listed at 12-1 odds. Belmont Stakes winner Palace Malice is 10-1 and drew the No. 8 post. Reigning Horse of the Year Wise Dan drew post position eight in a field of 10 and was made the even-money favorite for the $2 million Mile, where the 6-year-old gelding will try to improve to 6-0 on the turf this year.

BASEBALL

Game 4 rates behind NFL

Boston’s 4-2 victory over St. Louis in Game 4 of the World Series drew a slightly higher rating than San Francisco’s title clincher last year but was topped by Green Bay’s 44-31 victory over Minnesota in a regular-season NFL game. Nielsen Media Research said Monday the game on Fox received a 9.4 rating and 15 share and was seen by an average of 16 million viewers. The rating was up 6 percent from the 8.9 for San Francisco’s 4-3, 10-inning victory at Detroit last year. The NFL game drew a 9.8/15 and 16.9 million viewers on NBC. The rating is the percentage of U.S. television households tuned to a program. The share is the percentage watching a broadcast among those homes with TVs on at the time.GOLF Woods to Golf Channel: Ball in your court

Tiger Woods issued a veiled challenge to Golf Channel over a column written by analyst Brandel Chamblee that questioned Woods’ integrity.

Woods spoke publicly for the first time since Chamblee, a longtime critic of the world’s No. 1 player, wrote a column forSI Golf Plus in which he gave Woods an “F” for his season for being “a little cavalier” with the rules.

Chamblee is best known for his work with Golf Channel, though he also is a contributor to SI Golf Plus. He took to Twitter last week to apologize to Woods for “this incited discourse,” though not for the content of his column.

“All I am going to say is that I know I am going forward,” Woods said before his exhibition match with Rory McIlroy at Mission Hills. “But then, I don’t know what the Golf Channel is going to do or not. But then that’s up to them. The whole issue has been very disappointing as he didn’t really apologize and he sort of reignited the whole situation.

“So the ball really is in the court of the Golf Channel and what they are prepared to do.”

Golf Channel has not commented on the flap. Chamblee has said he was not asked to apologize by anyone.

Chamblee saved Woods for last in his report card of 14 players in a column posted Oct. 18 on Golf.com. He told of getting caught cheating on a math test in the fourth grade, and how the teacher crossed a line through his “100” and gave him an “F.”

Chamblee followed that anecdote by writing, “I remember when we only talked about Tiger’s golf. I miss those days. Hewon five times and contended in majors and won the Vardon Trophy and … how shall we say this … was a little cavalier with the rules.” He then gave Woods a “100” with a line through it, followed by the “F.”

In one of his tweets last week, Chamblee said he intended to point out Woods’ rules infractions, “but comparing that to cheating in grade school went too far.”