FOOTBALL
Chargers turn to Staley
The Los Angeles Chargers have hired Los Angeles Rams defensive coordinator Brian Staley as the team's head coach. The Chargers made the decision Sunday after having a second interview with Staley. The interview was held a day after the Rams were eliminated from the playoffs with a 32-18 loss to the Green Bay Packers. The 38-year old Staley was in demand with interviews also scheduled with the Houston Texans and Philadelphia Eagles. Staley has been an NFL assistant for only four years. He joined the Rams this past season after being a linebackers coach with the Chicago Bears and Denver Broncos. He is the third assistant under Rams Coach Sean McVay to get an NFL head coaching job, joining Green Bay's Matt LaFleur and Cincinnati's Zac Taylor.
Marshall hires Bama assistant
Marshall has given Alabama's Charles Huff his first head coaching job. Marshall announced Huff's hiring Sunday. Huff spent the past two seasons as the Crimson Tide's associate head coach and running backs coach and is widely known as a top recruiter. The 37-year-old Huff is Marshall's first Black head football coach. He is a 2005 graduate of Hampton, where he played center, guard, fullback and tight end. Huff replaces Conference USA coach of the year Doc Holliday, whose contract was not renewed. Marshall started the season 7-0 and moved up to No. 15 in The Associated Press poll before losing its final three games. Holliday went 85-54 in 11 seasons, winning the league title in 2014. Among Huff's other stints as an assistant included Mississippi State and Penn State. He also spent a season with the Buffalo Bills in the NFL.
BASEBALL
Red Sox reach deal with lefty
A person familiar with the deal says the Boston Red Sox have reached an agreement with left-hander Martin Perez on one-year contract. The deal was confirmed to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity because it could not be announced until Perez completed a physical. The contract would reportedly pay Perez $4.5 million this season, with a $6 million option or $500,000 buyout for 2022. Perez went 3-5 with a 4.50 ERA in the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, when he was the only starter in the Red Sox rotation to make all 12 of his scheduled starts. In a nine-year career, he is 56-61 with a 4.71 ERA.
WINTER SPORTS
Germans sweep bobsled golds
Germany swept the gold medals to conclude the World Cup bobsled stop in St. Moritz, Switzerland, on Sunday, with Stephanie Schneider driving to a win in the women's race and Francesco Friedrich getting his team across the line first in the four-man event. Schneider and Leonie Fiebig held off the U.S. sled of Elana Meyers Taylor and Sylvia Hoffman by 0.08 seconds. It was Meyers Taylor's first World Cup medal since Feb. 23, 2019 -- she missed last season for the birth of her son -- and the fifth consecutive time she has medaled in St. Moritz. In the four-man race, Friedrich extended his World Cup record with a 48th career victory. He prevailed by about three-tenths of a second over the Austrian sled driven by Benjamin Meier.
Norwegian earns slalom victory
Sebastian Foss-Solevaag earned his first World Cup win Sunday, boosting the morale of the Norwegian ski team after it was hit by a series of season-ending injuries. Foss-Solevaag won a slalom in dominating style, clocking the fastest time in both runs to beat Marco Schwarz by 0.76 seconds, a week after the Austrian had captured his first career win. Foss-Solevaag's maiden win came a day after his teammate Aleksander Aamodt Kilde, the defending overall champion, became the third Norwegian in eight days to be ruled out by a severe knee injury. After Lucas Braathen and Atle Lie McGrath picked up season-ending injuries at a giant slalom in Switzerland last week, Kilde tore ligaments in his right knee in a crash during super-G training in Austria on Saturday.
Bassino goes back-to-back
Marta Bassino won her second World Cup giant slalom in two days Sunday at Kranjska Gora, Slovenia, after first-run leader Mikaela Shiffrin dropped to sixth. The Italian skier has won four of the five races in the discipline this season, with Shiffrin winning the only other event, in Courchevel in December. The result saw Bassino closing in on a 13-year-old record: No Italian skier won more than four giant slaloms in a single season since Denise Karbon won a record five events in the 2007-08 campaign. Bassino trailed Shiffrin by three-tenths of a second after the American's near-perfect opening run, but the Italian posted the fastest time in the final. The last racer on course, Shiffrin was still in the lead at the first split time. However, the Olympic GS champion was late on a turn after the first steep part, lost speed and never regained her rhythm. Shiffrin finished 1.27 back in sixth, equaling her result in Saturday's race.
Geisenberger tops in luge
Natalie Geisenberger of Germany claimed the 50th World Cup women's luge win of her career on Sunday, her first since returning to the circuit following a one-year break for the birth of her first child. Geisenberger was the fastest in both runs at Oberhof, Germany, and finished about a quarter-second ahead of Austria's Madeleine Egle. Anna Berreiter of Germany was third. Geisenberger -- who had finished second in each of the season's first eight races -- extended her World Cup points lead over fellow German slider Julia Taubitz to 74 points with three races left. Geisenberger could clinch her eighth overall season title as soon as next weekend's stop in Innsbruck, Austria.
