Heyward Re-Signs, Stays With Falcons

The Atlanta Falcons signed running back Craig Heyward, having the best year of his career, to a two-year contract Friday.

Financial terms were not disclosed.

Heyward has 1,041 combined yards this season, the highest total of his seven-year career. He also has career highs with 746 rushing yards, eight touchdowns and 30 receptions for 295 yards.

A former No. 1 draft pick from Pittsburgh, Heyward signed a one-year deal with the Falcons before this season after spending last year in Chicago and five years in New Orleans.

His rushing average of 4.5 yards per carry is third in the NFL and his eight touchdowns are the most by a Falcon running back since Gerald Riggs in 1986.

The Falcons (6-9) play host to Arizona today.

Hockey

An attempt to schedule talks on Monday between NHL and union representatives fizzled when Bob Goodenow, executive director of the players’ association, said he had no reason to meet if the league remains intent on imposing a payroll tax or exacting more concessions from players on salary arbitration.

A league source said negotiators expected to meet Monday but canceled the session after Goodenow told union attorney Bob Riley the union had nothing to discuss if the tax was still alive. They did not set another date. The lockout is in its 85th day and has wiped out more than 40% of the NHL season.

A union source said Riley talked briefly with Jeff Pash, the NHL’s general counsel, and added that no talks will take place before Tuesday.

The last full-scale negotiations were held Dec. 6, although delegations from each side have met three times since then.

Marcel Aubut, president and part owner of the Quebec Nordiques, is quitting three corporate board positions to see his NHL team through the labor crisis, he said.

Aubut resigned from the board of Hydro-Quebec and the Quebec 2002 Winter Olympic bid committee. He also announced he would step down as chairman of the board of a technology park once a new management team is in place.

The three positions took about 25 hours a week of Aubut’s time, a Nordique spokesman said.

Aubut, a leading voice for small-market clubs on the executive committee of the NHL’s board of governors, said he wants to “concentrate all my energies on the Nordiques.”

Aubut said his club cannot survive without a new 17,500-seat arena with corporate boxes.

Top priorities are negotiations with the federal, provincial and municipal governments to build a new arena in Quebec and on reaching a settlement with locked out NHL players.

The Nordiques contend they will lose between $10 million and $14 million if no season takes place.

Miscellany

A chartered Express One plane carrying some members of the Oklahoma football team to Tucson for the Dec. 29 Copper Bowl had to make an unscheduled landing in Amarillo, Tex., after developing engine trouble. No one was injured, and the team, coaches and other athletic department staff were transferred to another plane and continued the trip. Oklahoma will play Brigham Young in the Copper Bowl.

The men’s World Cup giant slalom scheduled for Meribel, France, next Thursday was called off because of lack of snow. No immediate decision was made on a new site or date, a spokeswoman for the International Ski Federation said. The women’s slalom is still on for next Friday, on a shorter course than the men’s giant slalom.

The new conference that includes Memphis, Cincinnati, Houston and Louisville doesn’t have a name, but does have a television deal for football starting in 1996. The contract signed in Memphis, Tenn., with Liberty Sports Inc. guarantees the league’s football-playing schools $20 million in a five-year deal. Each of the football schools will receive nearly $167,000 a year starting in 1996, with more money based on the number of live TV appearances. The deal calls for 12 to 14 games a year. Liberty, associated with Prime Sports Network, will offer the games to cable systems throughout the nation.