Stich, Edberg in Grand Slam Cup Semifinals

Defending champion Michael Stich came from behind to defeat Brett Steven on Thursday, 5-7, 6-4, 6-4, advancing to the semifinals of the $6-million Grand Slam Cup in Munich, Germany.

Stefan Edberg defeated Wayne Ferreira, 6-7 (7-5), 6-1, 6-0, in another quarterfinal.

Today, top-ranked Pete Sampras plays Michael Chang, and Sergi Bruguera faces Petr Korda.

*

Monica Seles, shocked that the man who stabbed her was set free, still hopes to return to tennis next month at the Australian Open. In her first interview since her attacker escaped a prison term, Seles told CNN that “when my brother first told me the sentence, I thought he was joking. I was stunned.”

Seles was stabbed in the back during a tournament last April in Hamburg, Germany, by Gunter Parche, who was given a two-year suspended sentence on Oct. 13.

“Everyone expected him to get at least 10 or 15 years,” Seles said. “It was obvious what he did to me. It was on tape. The state is appealing. There’s nothing I can do at this point.”

College Football

Auburn Coach Terry Bowden won the Bear Bryant Award as college football’s coach of the year, but he didn’t get his wish.

He wanted his father, Florida State Coach Bobby Bowden, to win.

Instead, Terry Bowden beat out his father and two other finalists, John Cooper of Ohio State and Bill Snyder of Kansas State.

“To be honest, I’d rather my father win,” Terry Bowden said. “I don’t have to win this award at age 37.”

Auburn had an 11-0 record but was not eligible for a bowl game because of NCAA probation.

Pro Basketball

After meeting for two hours with an attorney representing a franchise group from Ontario, NBA deputy commissioner Russell Granik said that the province’s sports betting lottery could endanger Toronto’s NBA expansion franchise.

When the NBA granted the franchise to a group headed by 33-year-old restaurateur John Bitove Jr. five weeks ago, the league attached a number of conditions pertaining to minimum ticket sales and luxury box sales and the elimination of NBA games from the Pro Line lottery, which allows betting on sports games, including basketball.

Names in the News

Randy Johnson, the major league strikeout leader for two consecutive seasons, agreed to a $20.25-million, four-year contract with the Seattle Mariners. . . . The Kings called up defenseman Mark Hardy and left wing Dan Currie from their minor league team in Phoenix. Sent down to Phoenix were defensemen Brent Thompson and Dominic Lavoie. . . . The Mighty Ducks recalled center Jarrod Skalde from minor league affiliate San Diego of the International League. Goaltender Mikhail Shtalenkov was sent down to San Diego.

Lyndon Paul Walker, a junior-lightweight from Washington who took the bout three days ago when Olympic champion Oscar De La Hoya pulled out, registered a split decision over Jose Vidal Concepcion in New York. . . . Pro golfer Jan Stephenson is suing the Miami Heat over a career-threatening broken ring finger suffered in a mugging outside the team’s arena in 1990. The suit, seeking unspecified damages, claims that the team was careless and negligent in failing to provide adequate security and proper lighting in nearby parking lots.

Miscellany

The Midwestern Collegiate Conference, which had lost three members and its automatic bid to the NCAA basketball tournament, added six schools from the Mid-Continent Conference--Cleveland State, Northern Illinois, Wisconsin Green Bay, Wisconsin Milwaukee, Illinois Chicago and Wright State. The additions should restore the NCAA automatic bid. . . . The European yacht Intrum Justitia won the 7,558-mile second leg of the Whitbread Round the World Race when it sailed into the harbor at Fremantle, Australia.