It Might Be Time for Harding to Trade Skates for Black Cape

She would have to start out as a villain, but for $2 million, it might be worth it.

That is how much Takashi Matsunaga, chairman of the All Japan Women’s Professional Wrestling Assn., says he is willing to pay Tonya Harding to enter the ring.

“Tonya was made to be a pro wrestler,” Matsunaga said Monday. “She’s about as tough as they come, and she’ll last a lot longer in our sport than she will in figure skating.”

But $2 million?

“If that’s what Disney’s paying Nancy Kerrigan, that’s what we’ll pay Tonya, even if I have to go into debt to do it,” he said, adding that he has sent a representative to Oregon to make Harding an offer. He said he hopes to meet Harding while she is in Japan for the World Figure Skating Championships, which will begin outside Tokyo next week.

And Harding’s role?

“Of course, she’d have to be the bad guy at first, but I think she can learn to be a heroine as well,” Matsunaga said.

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Trivia time: Who holds the women’s NCAA Division I record for most points in a basketball game?

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Nothing like L.A.: A Morning Briefing item about the Los Angeles Sports Council’s “LA Sports” logo producing more than $1 million in sales in nine months left out one significant fact, points out Barry Zepel of the Amateur Athletic Foundation.

All of the money came from Japan.

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You can look it up: UCLA, North Carolina, Indiana, Duke, Georgetown, UNLV and Kentucky have been college basketball powerhouses for years, yet none of the seven have ever had an NCAA individual scoring leader.

Who has? How about Texas Pan American, Morehead State, U.S. International and Loyola Marymount? Players from those four schools were the leading scorers the last five seasons.

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One honest man: After Jack Russell had won the Australian bantamweight title on a split decision over champion Barry Sewell, Russell said: “I don’t know what fight they were watching. I must be the luckiest fighter in the world.”

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Trivia answer: Cindy Brown of Long Beach State, with 60 points against San Jose State on Feb. 16, 1987.

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Quotebook: College of Charleston Coach John Kresse on receiving an NCAA bid after only three years in Division I: “We went from being the talk of the town to the talk of the nation.”