Price Is Right for Miami, Riley

After nearly three months of dreaming about life with Riley, the Miami Heat can live it. But they have to pay dearly for it.

Pat Riley was introduced as the Heat’s president and coach Saturday, combining the Carnival Cruise Lines of owner Micky Arison and the announcement, as a smiling, tanned Riley trotted onto the main stage of the company’s newest ship, Imagination.

“This is one of the great cities in the league and a great place to start this new, dramatic change in my life,” Riley said. “I hope and wish that it does end here in Miami for a very long time.”

Wishes that it would end in Los Angeles with the Lakers and New York with the Knicks didn’t pan out, and if this doesn’t, Riley at least will be able to afford a break before his next move.

His contract with the Heat was estimated to be valued at $15 million over five years and includes an undisclosed ownership stake in the team--believed to be 20%--and $350 per diem for expenses.

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Guard Isaiah Rider of the Minnesota Timberwolves left jail in Plymouth, Minn., after serving four days for violating probation on a 1994 fifth-degree assault conviction.

Football

Commissioner Paul Tagliabue said the NFL stadium committee will meet Wednesday to discuss a way to finance construction of a new stadium in Los Angeles and hinted at an arrangement similar to the one used to renovate stadiums in San Diego, Buffalo and New Orleans, where visiting teams get a smaller cut of game revenues to free up more money for improvements.

Tagliabue also talked about a team for Los Angeles.

“I think if I had to pick a number, I would probably say the target date is 1998, which is the first year of our next TV contract,” he said. “That gives us a reasonable amount of time to get a new stadium built. That’s a top priority in that area.”

Architects and engineers working on the Georgia Dome in Atlanta have come up with a temporary plan to keep water from gathering in ponds on the roof, which collapsed in places under the weight of recent heavy rains.

The dome will be watertight for the Atlanta Falcons’ opener today because of vinyl patches covering four areas where Teflon-coated panels collapsed two weeks ago.

Joel Segal a New York sports agent who sent $1,350 to former Florida State player Corey Sawyer, has pleaded no contest to illegal recruiting charges and was sentenced to one year of probation and ordered to pay $3,500 in fines and court costs.

His relationship with Sawyer, who now plays for the Cincinnati Bengals, was uncovered after a Foot Locker shopping spree in November 1993 when would-be agents treated 11 Florida State players to $6,000 worth of clothing, shoes and other merchandise.

Sawyer was charged in April with perjury for allegedly lying about his relationship with Segal.

A 16-year-old high school football player died Saturday in Dallas, four days after a lightning bolt struck him in the helmet during practice. Douglas Clay Jones died at Baylor University Medical Center.

Golf

Scott Hoch made six birdies--two on 20-foot putts--in shooting a six-under-par 65 for a 54-hole total of nine-under 204 and a one-stroke lead over Marco Dawson and Lee Rinker heading into the final round of the Greater Milwaukee Open. Billy Mayfair, the 1993 Milwaukee champion, is tied with Robert Gamez and Joe Acosta, another shot back.

Don Bies shot a five-under 67 for a share of the second-round lead with South Africa’s Simon Hobday in the PGA Senior Tour’s Franklin Quest Championship at Park City, Utah. Bies, who won the last of his six senior tour titles in 1992, matched Hobday with an eight-under 136 total. Hobday, the 1994 U.S. Senior Open winner, shot a 70.

Hall of Famer Betsy King and rookies Emilee Klein and Pat Hurst shot five-under 67s to share the first-round lead in the LPGA Rail Classic at Springfield, Ill.

Auto Racing

Jacques Villeneuve moved a step closer to the Indy car championship, turning a record 110.547-m.p.h. lap over the tight 10-turn, 1.703-mile temporary course to wrap up the pole position for today’s Vancouver Molson Indy in Canada. Villeneuve can wrap up the title by finishing sixth or better in the race.

Mark Martin took the lead on Lap 98 and retained it the rest of the way in the 147-lap Gatorade 200 NASCAR Busch Grand National stock car race at 1.366-mile Darlington Raceway in South Carolina. It was the third year in a row that Martin has won the race, and he earned $26,160 for finishing 0.79 seconds ahead of Johnny Benson and averaging 115.183 m.p.h.

Rusty Wallace led second-round qualifying for today’s Southern 500 NASCAR Winston Cup race at Darlington Raceway, turning a lap of 165.900 m.p.h. to earn the 21st starting position.

Kenny Bernstein, John Force and Warren Johnson led qualifying for today’s finals in the National Hot Rod Assn. U.S. Nationals in Clermont, Ind. Bernstein led the Top Fuel competition at 4.813 seconds and 303.03 m.p.h., Force topped the Funny Car division at 5.027 and 303.64 in a Pontiac Firebird and Johnson led the Pro Stock qualifiers at 7.040 and 196.67 in an Oldsmobile Cutlass.

Miscellany

Japan defeated South Korea, 2-0, to win the men’s soccer final for its 22nd gold medal in the World University Games in Fukuoka, Japan. The United States picked up its 21st gold when Georgetown guard Allen Iverson scored 26 points to lead a 141-81 rout of the Japanese in the men’s basketball final.

The Americans still were ahead, 63-61, in total medals, missing one in the decathlon by one point when Aric Long fell from the lead to fourth by being about one-tenth of a second too slow in the final event, the 1,500 meters.

The top-seeded team of Karch Kiraly and Scott Ayakatubby defeated second-seeded Mike Dodd and Mike Whitmarsh, 15-11, to win the Nestea Players Championship beach volleyball tournament in Newport, R.I.