Davenport Ousts Huber from New York Tournament

Lindsay Davenport Wednesday ousted Anke Huber from the $3.5-million Virginia Slims Championships at Madison Square Garden in New York, 6-2, 6-2, 6-3.

There was no disguising tactics: hit hard, harder and hardest. The only diversion was an occasional moon ball to allow the players to get back into position for another barrage of heavy ground strokes.

While seventh-seeded Davenport is the higher ranked of the two, and thus was seeded in this elite 16-player field, Huber has been one of the hottest players on the WTA Tour lately.

The German had entered this tournament coming off a victory at the Virginia Slims of Philadelphia and also captured a title in Filderstadt, Germany, last month.

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Boris Becker produced one of the best matches of his already impressive year and frustrated Pete Sampras with a 7-5, 7-5 victory at the IBM/ATP Tour World Championship in Frankfurt, Germany.

In other matches, Michael Chang defeated Alberto Berasategui, 6-1, 6-0, and Stefan Edberg beat Goran Ivanisevic, 6-3, 6-4.

Baseball

Cy Young winner Greg Maddux earned his fifth straight Gold Glove and MVP Jeff Bagwell won for the first time when National League awards for fielding prowess were announced.

The San Francisco Giants led the majors with three Gold Glove winners--outfielders Barry Bonds and Darren Lewis and third baseman Matt Williams.

Also selected were Houston second baseman Craig Biggio, Cincinnati shortstop Barry Larkin, Montreal outfielder Marquis Grissom and St. Louis catcher Tom Pagnozzi.

The American League Gold Glove team consisted of first baseman Don Mattingly of New York, second baseman Roberto Alomar of Toronto, shortstop Omar Vizquel of Cleveland, third baseman Wade Boggs of New York, outfielders Devon White of Toronto, Kenny Lofton of Cleveland and Ken Griffey Jr. of Seattle, catcher Ivan Rodriguez of Texas and pitcher Mark Langston of California.

The Angels have decided to pursue free agent reliever Lee Smith, baseball’s all-time saves leader who pitched for the Baltimore Orioles last season.

A $15.6-million minor league baseball stadium complex has been approved by the Oxnard and Ventura city councils and is awaiting a vote by Camarillo, the third city involved in the project. The proposed stadium is to be built on a 35-acre parcel in Ventura. Financing has yet to be considered.

Hockey

NHL general managers, after meeting in Toronto, reaffirmed their intention of overhauling the league’s salary structure even if that means canceling the season. Asked at a news conference if any of them is optimistic about the season starting, not one of the 26 responded.

“He (union chief Bob Goodenow) hasn’t given any of us any indication that he wants to say anything other than no,” Edmonton GM Glen Sather said. “If you want to make compromise and get a deal, there are ways you can do it. I don’t think he wants to do it. . . . I believe he’s trying to push this thing right to the point where we can continue with the present deal. He thinks that we’re all going to fall down. We can’t. We’re already down.”

Commissioner Gary Bettman will meet with Goodenow today in Boston to reject the limited entry-level salary concessions last offered by the union. Bettman said he has not set a deadline for canceling the season but said 50 games would be the minimum for a meaningful season. In that case, an agreement would have to exist by mid-December. Fourteen games have been erased from each club’s schedule and more cancellations are imminent. A decision will be made early next month whether to cancel the All-Star Game, scheduled Jan. 21 at San Jose. If the game does take place, lineups might be chosen by players instead of by fan balloting.

Miscellany

Baylor basketball Coach Darrel Johnson was fired after the university administration concluded the basketball program violated school and NCAA rules during his two-year tenure. Assistant Harry Miller will take over temporarily. Johnson denied any wrongdoing.

Romania and the United States held first and second place, respectively, at the Gymnastics World Team Championships in Dortmund, Germany, after the women’s compulsories.

Americans Larissa Fontaine and Kerri Strug both fell off the uneven bars and Shannon Miller, the two-time world champion, struggled with her dismount, costing the United States first place.

Erica Gomez, one of the nation’s top girls high school point guards, has signed a letter of intent to attend UCLA. Gomez, a 5-foot-9 senior from Holmdel, N.J., averaged 16.8 points and five assists per game last season. She led St. John Vianney High to three state championships.

The Nevada Ethics Commission has ruled that Robert C. Maxson, president of Cal State Long Beach, wrongly concealed an arrangement to pay basketball coach Rollie Massimino $375,000 a year over and above his public salary of $511,000 when he was president of the University of Nevada at Las Vegas. Maxson, who became the CSULB president five months ago after 10 years at UNLV, called the finding “the silliest thing I’ve ever heard” and denied that he had concealed parts of Massimino’s contract from state authorities.

Placentia El Dorado High was removed from the Southern Section football playoffs after it was learned the team used an ineligible player all season. Anaheim Loara replaces El Dorado in the Division V first-round playoff game against Anaheim Canyon, and the game has been moved from Friday to Saturday night at 7:30.