FanFare 3/15/03

Briefly

Baseball

Kenny Lofton and Reggie Sanders, teammates with the NL champion San Francisco Giants last season, were reunited in Pittsburgh when Lofton reached terms Friday on a $1,025,000, one-year contract. The Pirates had tried to sign the 35-year-old Lofton since spring training started, finally making the deal after sweetening their initial offer of $500,000 in base salary and $500,000 in performance bonuses.

Tug McGraw was diagnosed with brain cancer and doctors were trying to determine if they could operate, a source close to the former star pitcher told The Associated Press.

Colleges

Muna Lee of Louisiana State broke Merlene Ottey's collegiate record by finishing the women's 200-meter preliminaries in 22.49 seconds at the NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships. Lee ran the fastest time in the world this year. The old record of 22.79 was set by Ottey for Nebraska in 1982.

Football

Junior Seau, the heart of the Chargers' defense for more than a decade, appears to be on his way out of San Diego. The 12-time Pro Bowl linebacker, a stalwart since his rookie year in 1990, has been given permission to seek a trade. If that doesn't materialize, he probably will be released, coach Marty Schottenheimer said.

Golf

Meg Mallon shot the second-lowest score in LPGA Tour history, completing a 10-under-par 60 in the second round of the Welch's-Fry's Classic. Mallon left an 18-foot, downhill birdie attempt about 3 1/2 feet short on the last hole, squandering a chance to match the LPGA record of 59 recorded by Annika Sorenstam in Phoenix two years ago.

Notah Begay III shot a 5-under 67 in the second round to take a share of the Honda Classic lead with David Peoples at 14-under 130 when play was suspended because of darkness.

Early starter Gil Morgan avoided the afternoon wind that kept scores high and shot a 7-under-par 65 to take the first-round lead in the SBC Classic.

David Howell shot a second-round 72 Friday and was tied for the lead with Jean-Francois Remesy at the Qatar Masters.

Motorsports

Bobby Hamilton swept past defending champion Ted Musgrave with 16 laps remaining and held on to win the NASCAR truck event at Darlington Raceway.

Tennis

Andy Roddick ripped one serve at 147 mph, but couldn't overcome his erratic groundstrokes and Rainer Schuettler beat him 6-3, 6-2 in the Pacific Life Open quarterfinals. Roddick's ace in the eighth game of the opening set was just 2 mph slower than the fastest ever clocked -- by Greg Rusedski in 1998 at Indian Wells. Top-ranked Lleyton Hewitt and Vincent Spadea also won quarterfinal matches.

On the air

College men's basketballConference USA championship, 10:30 a.m., WQWQ

America East Conference championship, 10:30 a.m., ESPN

Mideastern Athletic Conference championship, 11 a.m., ESPN2

Atlantic Coast Conference championship, 12:30 p.m., 2:30 p.m., 5 p.m., ESPN

Big Ten Conference semifinals, 12:45 p.m., 3 p.m., WQWQ

Big 12 Conference semifinals, 1 p.m., 3:30 p.m., ESPN2, KFVS

Pac-10 Conference championship, 5 p.m., KFVS

Mid-American Conference championship, 6 p.m., ESPN2

Big East Conference championship, 7 p.m., ESPN

Western Athletic Conference championship, 8 p.m., ESPN2

Mountain West Conference championship, 9 p.m., ESPN

Big West Conference championship, 11 p.m., ESPN

College women's basketballMid-American Conference championship, noon, FOX-Midwest

Mountain West Conference, championship, 11:30 a.m., ESPN2

Golf

The Honda Classic, 2 p.m., WPSD

Welch's/Fry's Championship, 3:30 p.m., GOLF

SBC Classic, 5 p.m., CNBC

High school boys basketballClass 5 state championship, 8 p.m., FOX-Midwest

High school girls basketballNotre Dame vs. Duchesne, 2 p.m., KAPE-1550

Delta vs. Couch, 2:30 p.m., KBHI-107.1

Class 5 state championship, 6:30 p.m., FOX-Midwest

Kelly vs. John Burroughs, 8 p.m., KWKZ-106.1

Jackson vs. Lee's Summit, 9:30 p.m., KREZ-104.7

MLB

Cardinals vs. Expos, 11:50 a.m., KGIR-1220

Chicago White Sox vs. Milwaukee, 2 p.m., WGN

MotorsportsAmerican Le Mans Series, 9 a.m., SPEED

Darlingtonraceway.com 200, noon, FX

NHLGame TBA, 2 p.m., WSIL

CHARTER CABLE KEY:CNBC (ch. 53), ESPN (42), ESPN2 (43), Lifetime (49)Fox-Midwest (45), Fox-Central (352), Fox-Pacific (353), Fox-Sunshine (351), Fox-World (350), FX(50), Golf Channel (46), KBSI (9), KFVS (7), MSNBC (55), Outdoors (38), Outdoor Life Network (74), Oxygen (75), Speed Channel (44), TNT (48), WDKA (17), WPSD (6), WQWQ (33), WSIL (3). Listings and times are provided by the networks and individual stations and are subject to change.

Area events

College softballSoutheast at Winthrop Tournament: vs. Akron, noon; vs. Pittsburgh, 4 p.m.

High school girls' basketballDelta vs. Couch, Class 1 quarterfinal at West Plains Civic Center, 2:45 p.m.

Kelly vs. John Burroughs, Class 3 quarterfinal at Farmington Civic Center, 8:15 p.m.

Notre Dame vs. Duchesne, Class 4 championship at Columbia, 2 p.m.

Jackson vs. Lee's Summit, Class 5 third place at Columbia, 9:30 p.m.

High school girls' swimming

Central, Notre Dame at Marquette Relays