Finland Rips U.S. in Semifinal

Luc Robitaille of the Kings scored three goals and had an assist and Steve Thomas of the New York Islanders assisted on all three Robitaille goals to lead Canada in a 6-0 victory over Sweden in the semifinals of the World Ice Hockey Championships at Milan, Italy, Saturday.

The victory avenged Canada’s sudden-death loss to Sweden in the Olympic final nine weeks ago and set up a championship game against Finland, which beat the United States, 8-0.

Team USA will play Sweden for third place, which would be the Americans’ best world championship finish since 1962, when they were third.

The Finns scored six goals in the first period--three on power plays--against Mighty Duck goalie Guy Hebert, who was replaced at the start of the second period by Ron Wilson, Duck coach and head of the U.S. team. The first was scored by former New York Islander Mikko Makela at 4:58 on a power play, the next by former Buffalo Sabre Hannu Virta 46 seconds later and the U.S. team’s play sagged from there.

Jurisprudence

A federal judge has been asked by attorneys for the Pacific 10 Conference to dismiss a lawsuit by Washington football players seeking to overturn conference sanctions against the Husky football program.

The class-action suit contends the violations cited by the Pac-10 in imposing the sanctions last August “were utterly trivial and warranted no penalties or sanctions of any kind.” Those violations included improper loans, free meals to recruits and improper employment by boosters.

The conference’s lawyers told U.S. District Judge Barbara Rothstein that the players do not have standing to bring an antitrust suit.

Auto Racing

Derrike Cope earned his first victory since 1990 when leader Hermie Sadler ran out of gas with six laps to go in the New England Chevy Dealers 250, a NASCAR Grand National race at the New Hampshire International Speedway in Loudon.

An official at Imola, Italy, where Ayrton Senna fatally crashed a week ago, said the Brazilian driver had inspected the stretch of the track where the accident occurred and declared it safe.

Federico Bendinelli, managing director of the company that runs the Imola track, said Senna inspected the Tamburello turn on March 9 and pointed out to Bendinelli and track director Giorgio Poggi a section of the asphalt where he later crashed. He made suggestions and “the next day, that is March 10, he told us it was OK,” Bendinelli recounted.

Soccer

Bayern Munich won its first German Bundesliga title in four years, beating Schalke, 2-0, in Berlin on the final day of the season on goals by national team captain Lothar Matthaus and Brazilian defender Jorginho.

Cycling

Canadian Steve Bauer, a late race entrant, bolted away from two riders on a cobblestone hill with about one mile left and cruised to an eight-second victory in the third stage of the Tour DuPont, a 92-mile Fredericksburg-to-Richmond road race in Virginia. Bauer’s time was 3 hours 58 minutes 44 seconds.

Malcolm Elliott of Britain retained his race leader’s jersey after finishing 16th in the main pack.

College Baseball

Auburn’s John Powell struck out Louisiana State’s Warren Morris in the first inning at Auburn, Ala., to become the all-time NCAA strikeout leader. He has 551 in 437 innings, eclipsing the mark of Hawaii’s Derek Tatsuno, set from 1977-79.

Miscellany

Rookie guard Sam Cassell of the Houston Rockets was suspended for one game and fined $2,500 for throwing a punch at Jerome Kersey in Game 4 of a playoff series against the Portland Trail Blazers. Cassell will sit out Houston’s game against Phoenix today.

Russia’s Dmitry Sautin scored a perfect 10 on his final dive to edge three-time defending champion Lan Wei of China in the three-meter competition of the Alamo International diving championships at Ft. Lauderdale, Fla. In the women’s platform event, China’s 15-year-old Chi Bin edged best friend and Olympic gold medalist Fu Mingxia for the gold.

The Minnesota legislature passed a bill to authorize a public buyout of the Target Center arena in Minneapolis, a move that it intended to keep the NBA Timberwolves in Minnesota.

Steve Fehr of Cincinnati became the first active American Bowling Congress Hall of Fame member to win the ABC championship when he defeated top qualifier Steve Anderson of Colorado Springs, 224-206, in the $235,000 ABC Bud Light Masters in Mobile, Ala.