Maryland’s Smith Leaves Early for NBA

Maryland sophomore Joe Smith will announce today that he’s leaving school with two years of eligibility remaining to make himself eligible for the NBA draft.

Smith’s mother, Letha Smith, said that her son would hold a news conference in the Norfolk, Va., high school where he played before coming to Maryland. Smith, who attended the team’s awards banquet Wednesday night, would not comment on his status, but a team source and newspaper reports all said he was NBA-bound.

Smith, a 6-foot-10 center, averaged 20.8 points, 10.4 rebounds and 2.9 blocked shots while leading Maryland to a 26-8 record. He was the Associated Press player of the year and Naismith college basketball player of the year.

“He’s in a no-lose situation,” Maryland Coach Gary Williams said. “He either returns to a team with four other starters, or he goes to the NBA and makes a lot of money. It’s a good situation to be in.”

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Junior Gary Trent of Ohio U. made himself available for the NBA draft.

Trent, a 6-8 forward, is a three-time Mid-American Conference player of the year who averaged 22.8 points and 12.9 rebounds last season.

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Tara VanDerveer will leave her job as women’s basketball coach at Stanford to take over as coach of the 1996 U.S. Olympic team.

“I agonized over that,” said VanDerveer, who will miss the 1995-96 collegiate season while coaching the women’s national team and the Olympic squad.

VanDerveer, 42, who has won two national titles in leading Stanford to four Final Four appearances in the 1990s, will be required to resign from her collegiate job under a preliminary ruling by the NCAA, which also ruled that Stanford could make no written guarantees to VanDerveer that she would get her job back.

Athletic Director Ted Leland has made it clear, however, that the school expects her back and will hold the position for her.

“We’re going to try to get that ruling changed,” Leland said. “We’re big fans of the NCAA, but we think this ruling is shortsighted.”

Assistant Amy Tucker was selected as coach until VanDerveer returns after the ’96 Olympics. *

Former Notre Dame standout John Shumate, 43, resigned as basketball coach at Southern Methodist with three years left on his contract, saying the school’s strict academic standards limited the program.

“I am particularly proud of the fact that 100% of our student-athletes graduated during my tenure,” said Shumate, who in seven seasons had a 78-118 record at SMU, including a 20-8 mark in 1992-93 when he led the Mustangs to the Southwest Conference regular-season title. “It has been a challenge to meet the high expectations of the university, in light of the various limitations that have been imposed on the program.”

Recently hired Athletic Director Jim Copeland disagreed with Shumate.

“The admission standards are not a hindrance--or should not be a hindrance,” he said.

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Felipe Lopez of St. John’s was granted a waiver by the NCAA and will not be penalized for playing in two basketball games in the Dominican Republic two weeks ago.

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Former Westchester High standout James Gray, a 6-3 point guard and the all-time leading scorer at Santa Monica College, became the first recruit to commit to Coach Jerry Tarkanian at Fresno State.

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Joanne Palombo, the women’s basketball coach who led the University of Maine to its first NCAA tournament this year, is to be interviewed for the coach’s job at Long Beach State.

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Less than a month after his team won the NCAA Division III national championship, Wisconsin Platteville guard Gabe Miller died of apparent natural causes after complaining of feeling ill while playing basketball and flag football, the university announced. Autopsy results are pending.

Tennis

Andre Agassi, paying the price for joining the U.S. Davis Cup effort--a sore back--still raised his game a notch when it counted Thursday.

Down 1-4 in the second set, Agassi bounced back for a 6-3, 7-5 victory over Canadian Sebastien Lareau to advance to the quarterfinals of the $1.2-million Japan Open at Tokyo.

In today’s quarterfinals, Agassi faces Australian qualifier Scott Draper, who ousted 10th-seeded Jonathan Stark in the first round with a 6-1, 6-4 victory over American Michael Joyce.

In other matches, Canada’s Greg Rusedski double-faulted on match point in the second-set tiebreaker and then lost, 4-6, 7-6 (9-7), 6-4, to fourth-seeded Jim Courier.

Third-seeded Wayne Ferreira of South Africa beat No. 13 Jeff Tarango, 6-3, 3-6, 6-3. Three Swedes had easy trips into the quarterfinals. Fifth-seeded Thomas Enqvist beat Australian Wally Masur, 6-4, 6-0, No. 6 Jonas Bjorkman took qualifier Steve Campbell, 6-0, 6-1, and Jan Apell beat Japan’s Kataro Miyachi, 6-2, 6-3.

Steffi Graf needed less than an hour to defeat unseeded Tami Whitlinger-Jones, 6-2, 6-1, and advance to the semifinals of the Houston Women’s Tennis Championships. The only other seeded player left is No. 7 Sandra Cecchini, who advanced with a 6-1, 6-7 (7-1), 6-2 victory over Maria Sanchez Lorenzo of Spain.

Third-seeded Yevgeny Kafelnikov of Russia defeated Marcelo Rios of Chile, 6-4, 6-3, to advance to the quarterfinals of the $900,000 Conde de Godo tournament in Barcelona. Other seeded winners were No. 4 Alberto Berasategui of Spain, No. 5 Goran Ivanisevic of Croatia and No. 9 Thomas Muster of Austria.

Erin Boisclair of Agoura Hills upset her second seeded player in two days at the Easter Bowl Junior Championships in Palm Springs by defeating seventh-seeded Amanda Augustus of Palos Verdes, 6-1, 6-4, in the girls’ 18s quarterfinals. Boisclair, who is only 15, will play fourth-seeded Amanda Basica of Lomita in today’s semifinals.

Four of the top five seeded players remain in the boys’ 18 draw as top-seeded Ryan Wolters of San Jose, second-seeded Kevin Kim of Fullerton, third-seeded Michael Russell of Bloomfield, Mich., and fifth-seeded Brandon Kramer of Reno advanced to today’s semifinals.

Jurisprudence

DeAnthony Hall, an Arkansas freshman football player accused of attempted rape, pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of public sexual misconduct in Fayetteville. Hall was sentenced to one year in the Washington County jail with six months suspended and was fined $1,000 under the plea bargain.

Names in the News

Marquez Pope formally joined the San Francisco 49ers and began getting used to the idea of switching from safety to cornerback after the Rams declined to match a four-year, $4.7 million contract. The Rams got San Francisco’s second-round pick as compensation. Pope is expected to replace free agent Deion Sanders at right cornerback. . . . Tampa Bay Lightning defenseman Enrico Ciccone was suspended for two games and fined $500 by the NHL for head-butting Steve Thomas of the New York Islanders. . . . Arvidas Sabonis scored 23 points and led Real Madrid over Olympiakos of Greece, 73-61, for an unprecedented eighth European basketball championship. . . . German long jumper Susen Tiedtke-Green faces a possible four-year ban under international rules after a second drug test revealed traces of a performance-enhancing drug. . . . The Las Vegas Posse must be sold today or the CFL franchise will fold if businessmen Norton Herrick and Billy Van Devender do not complete a deal to buy the team and move it to Jackson, Miss. . . . Mal McMullen, a golf pro for more than 40 years and a former NBA player with the old Indianapolis Olympians, has died at 67.