Johnston Returns as Penguin Coach

Eddie Johnston, who changed hockey history by drafting Mario Lemieux, ended a 10-year coaching layoff by returning Tuesday to the two-time Stanley Cup champion Pittsburgh Penguins.

“I want to win another Stanley Cup and this is the place,” Johnston said. “The challenge is tremendous, but I wanted to be the coach.”

Johnston, 57, a longtime NHL player, coach and general manager, inherits from Scotty Bowman a team many consider the best in hockey.

Johnston’s contract is for more than one year, but a salary was not disclosed. Bowman made $350,000 last season.

Bowman left Pittsburgh last week after two seasons--one Stanley Cup and one NHL regular-season championship--to coach the Detroit Red Wings.

Basketball

Despite the absence of Toni Kukoc, who has tonsillitis, Croatia lived up to its role as favorite by beating Bulgaria in the opening round of the European basketball tournament in Berlin, 104-83.

The University of New Orleans said that none of the charges made after a 16-month internal investigation of the school’s basketball program involve current coaches or athletes.

The investigation found more than a dozen improprieties, among them arranging for an athlete’s sister to get a job, fixing speeding tickets, and paying an athlete $400 a month.

Football

The NFL may waive its ban on dual ownership to give James Orthwein more time to sell the New England Patriots if he decides to buy an expansion franchise in St. Louis.

Bidders for expansion franchises must commit $42 million by Nov. 1, but an NFL official told the Boston Herald that Orthwein might be allowed to delay payment until he can sell the Patriots and still get an expansion team.

Expansion teams will not begin playing until 1995.

Neal McMeans, a three-year starter for Tennessee in the 1960s, died at Ft. Sanders Park West Medical Center in Knoxville, Tenn. Cause of death wasn’t immediately released. He was 46.

Miscellany

Two Bosnian swimmers refused to compete at the Mediterranean Games in Narbonne, France, after being barred from swimming under their new country’s name.

Kevin Mahaney, skipper of the PACT 95 America’s Cup defense syndicate, was released from a New Hampshire hospital after the removal of a cancerous tumor.