BASKETBALL
Rose returns
Derrick Rose returned to the New York Knicks on Tuesday and confirmed that he went home to Chicago on Monday night for a family issue. Rose was seen at the team's training facility in Greenburgh, N.Y. He was fined and is expected to be in uniform tonight against the 76ers, the team said in a statement. Rose told reporters after practice that he needed to be home with his mother. He said the absence had nothing to do with basketball, denied any rift with head Coach Jeff Hornacek and apologized to teammates and the organization. Rose said he spoke to GM Steve Mills on Monday night and met with team President Phil Jackson and Mills when he got to practice on Tuesday. Rose said he didn't want to pick up the phone when the Knicks called and said he needed his "space." Once he explained his situation, he said, the team understood why he left. Hornacek said Rose will play tonight in Philadelphia if he is in the right mental state.
TENNIS
Bautista-Agut out
Defending champion Robert Bautista-Agut of Spain has withdrawn from the ASB Tennis Classic at Auckland, New Zealand, without playing a match, citing a stomach virus. The top-seeded Bautista-Agut had a bye in the first round and was due to play 2015 champion Jiri Vesely in his second round match on Wednesday. But the 28-year-old Spaniard, ranked 13 and the winner of the recent Chennai Open, informed organizers he was unable to play. His place in the second round will go to a lucky loser from the qualifying draw. Third-seeded David Ferrer, a four-time champion, is scheduled to face Robin Haase in the first match of the second round today, while second-seeded John Isner will face Malek Jaziri. Fourth-seeded Jack Sock will play fellow American Ryan Harrison.
Sharapova back in April
Maria Sharapova will return from her 15-month doping ban at a tournament in Germany in April. Car manufacturer Porsche, which sponsors both Sharapova and the event in Stuttgart, said Tuesday that Sharapova has been given a wild-card entry into the tournament. It will be her first official competition since she tested positive for meldonium at last year's Australian Open. Sharapova will be eligible to return on April 26, the third day of main-draw play, which could leave her facing a busy schedule of matches in order to win a fourth Stuttgart title. The Russian will have to rely on wild-card invites to tournaments, including Grand Slams, for a while because her ban means she has fallen out of the world rankings, which only count tournament performances over the preceding 12 months. Sharapova was originally banned for two years but that was reduced on appeal in October. She said she had used meldonium for years for medical reasons and was not aware it had been banned for 2016.
HORSE RACING
Ellis banned from Cup
Trainer Ron Ellis has been banned from entering any horses in the Breeders' Cup world championships this fall after being sanctioned by the event for a positive drug test involving his horse that finished second in last year's BC Sprint. Breeders' Cup officials said Tuesday that the ban also applies to the horse Masochistic, who tested positive for a trace amount of an anabolic steroid after last year's event at Santa Anita. The horse was disqualified from the Sprint and his purse earnings were redistributed. This year's two-day world championships will be Nov. 3-4 at Del Mar north of San Diego. Ellis most recently had a horse at Oaklawn Park in Hot Springs in 2014, according to the Horse Racing Nation website. Majestic City, guided by Joel Rosario, ran second in the Grade 3 Razorback on March 15.
HOCKEY
All-Stars announced
Rookies Auston Matthews and Patrik Laine are among the players selected for the NHL All-Star Game at Staples Center in Los Angeles. The NHL announced the full rosters and coaches Tuesday for the All-Star weekend, which will be held Jan. 27-29 in Los Angeles. The game format will again be a 3-on-3 tournament featuring a team from each of the NHL's four divisions. The Pacific Division won last year. Pittsburgh's Sidney Crosby, Edmonton's Connor McDavid, Nashville's P.K. Subban and Montreal's Carey Price already were chosen by fans to be captains of their respective teams. The rosters also include Alex Ovechkin, Evgeni Malkin, John Tavares and Chicago teammates Patrick Kane, Jonathan Toews and Duncan Keith. The Los Angeles Kings will be represented by forward Jeff Carter and defenseman Drew Doughty in their home rink.
OLYMPICS
Leaders: Ban Russians
A global group of anti-doping leaders is calling for Russian teams to be excluded from international competitions while establishing a process to allow individuals from the country to compete if they can prove they have taken part in effective anti-doping programs elsewhere. Leaders from 19 national anti-doping organizations, including those in the United States, Britain and Sweden, held a summit this week and released their recommendations Tuesday. They also call for removal of major international competitions from Russia, a process that already has begun in the wake of Part 2 of the McLaren doping report, which was released last month. The McLaren report detailed state involvement in a widespread doping conspiracy that touched almost every corner of international sports. The details included a cover-up involving 12 medalists from the 2014 Sochi Olympics. Since the report, track's governing body, the IAAF, has set out guidelines under which Russians can compete as independent athletes if they can prove they've been subject to anti-doping regimens outside their own country. The National Anti-Doping Organizations leaders recommend the same sort of process for all sports.
GYMNASTICS
New lawsuit against doctor
A Michigan doctor accused of sexually abusing gymnasts has been hit with a new lawsuit by 18 women and girls who say they were molested by him, mostly at his clinic at Michigan State University. The lawsuit against Dr. Larry Nassar was filed Tuesday in federal court in western Michigan. It also names Michigan State and USA Gymnastics. Nassar was affiliated with the group. Rachael Denhollander of Kentucky says she was sexually assaulted by Nassar in 2000 when she was 15. The Associated Press usually doesn't name people who allege sexual abuse, but Denhollander is talking publicly about the lawsuit. Nassar now faces at least five lawsuits. Through lawyers, he's denied the allegations. He's also charged with possessing child pornography and sexually assaulting a girl at his Lansing-area home. Nassar is in jail without bond.
SOCCER
World Cup to expand to 48 teams in 2026
ZURICH — The World Cup will grow to 48 teams within a decade under a plan approved unanimously Tuesday by FIFA’s governing council, an enormous expansion of soccer’s showpiece tournament that was hailed by supporters as a victory for inclusion but derided by critics as the latest money grab by an organization still emerging from a series of financial scandals.
The larger field, which will be put in effect for the 2026 event, was ratified Tuesday in a vote by the governing council of FIFA, the sport’s governing body. The move was the largest expansion, in percentage terms, for the World Cup since it went to 24 teams from 16 in 1982, and the first since it moved to the current 32 nations in 1998.
The decision to expand was both political and financial. FIFA’s new president, Gianni Infantino, had pressed for the change when he ran for the presidency last year, as a way to invigorate the event and to include more countries. Expansion is sure to be popular in the vote-rich confederations of Africa and Asia that serve as any FIFA president’s power base. And few dispute that a 48-team World Cup would be a bigger, richer tournament, producing, by FIFA’s estimates, an additional $1 billion in television, sponsorship and ticketing revenue in the first cycle alone.
But critics of the plan argue it will be a diminished tournament, with nearly a quarter of FIFA’s 211 member associations earning a place every four years, and one that, at 80 games over nearly five weeks, will exhaust the players and lead to middling performances in the later stages.
The World Cup has used a 32-team format since the 1998 tournament in France and will keep that format for the coming competitions in Russia in 2018 and in Qatar in 2022. But beginning in 2026 — in a tournament for which the bidding to host has not yet begun — 48 teams will be placed into 16 three-team groups for the first stage, with the top two teams from each group advancing to a 32-team knockout round.
Sports on 01/11/2017