Marion Jones Picks Olympic Track Bid Instead of Basketball

Marion Jones of North Carolina, who helped lead the women’s Tar Heel basketball team to the 1994 NCAA championship, will sit out this season to concentrate on making the U.S. Olympic track and field team.

“Getting a chance to compete in the Olympic Games, especially those Games being contested in the United States, is a chance of a lifetime,” said Jones, who also said she wants to rehabilitate a broken foot. “I want to give my best shot to making the U.S. track and field team, and I don’t want to ever regret not giving it my best.”

Jones went to North Carolina two years ago from Thousand Oaks. She competed in women’s basketball and outdoor track in her freshman and sophomore seasons.

As a sophomore, she won three individual event titles at the Atlantic Coast Conference outdoor track meet. She holds the ACC record in the long jump of 22 feet 1 3/4 inches, which earned her second place at the 1994 NCAA meet.

College Basketball

A weakened heart, not a wasp sting as originally thought, probably killed a South Carolina Spartanburg basketball player who collapsed during a pickup game last month, according to a doctor who did the autopsy and reported that Charles Maurice D’Antignac Tyus, 20, suffered from a longtime, low-level viral heart infection that replaced much of his heart muscle with scar tissue.

Robert Reed, who last week left the University of Arkansas, started classes at Hinds Community College at Utica, Miss., where he plans to play basketball. As a freshman last year, Reed played football and basketball at Arkansas. He started the Razorbacks football season opener Sept. 2 at quarterback, but left the team two days later.

Reed played two series in the season opener against SMU before being replaced by senior Barry Lunney, the starter the previous 28 games. He left the team, saying he planned to stay at Arkansas and play basketball.

Instead, he left Fayetteville and started classes Monday at the Mississippi junior college.

Hockey

Forward Teemu Selanne, a free agent, has agreed to a new contract with the Winnipeg Jets and must only decide on the length of the deal. Selanne says he has to consider the uncertainty over who will own the Jets next year, and where the team will play. This probably is the Jets’ last season in Winnipeg.

Colorado Avalanche forwards Wendel Clark and Chris Simon were suspended after failing to show up for the first day of training camp. Both players have a year remaining on their contracts, but reportedly are seeking significant pay raises.

Goaltender Daren Puppa signed a multiyear contract with the Tampa Bay Lightning. Puppa, 30, the Lightning’s most valuable player the last two seasons, agreed to the new contract to avoid an arbitration hearing in June.

Bryan Berard, an 18-year-old defenseman selected first overall in the NHL draft by the Ottawa Senators, will return to the Ontario Hockey League’s Detroit Junior Whalers, agent Tom Laidlaw said.

“This decision was not made on the basis of dollars and cents,” Laidlaw said. “It reflects our belief that Bryan’s career development was best served by him remaining with Detroit.”

Florida Panther defenseman Keith Brown, a 16-year NHL veteran, retired because of a chronic problem with his left knee.

Left wing Louie DeBrusk, 24, agreed to a two-year contract and re-signed with the Edmonton Oilers. DeBrusk is Edmonton’s only remaining player from the trade that sent Mark Messier to the New York Rangers in 1991.

Golf

Hale Irwin shot a three-under-par 69 in leading a three-man Senior PGA Tour team to a four-stroke victory over the PGA Tour in the Three-Tour Challenge at Dublin, Ohio. Ray Floyd shot a 70 for the seniors and Jack Nicklaus, who designed the Muirfield Village Golf Club course, had a 72 for a five-under 211 total.

Peter Jacobsen led the PGA Tour team with a 70, Lee Janzen had a 72 and John Daly a 73. Dottie Mochrie and Kelly Robbins had 73s and Laura Davies shot a 74 to give the LPGA tour a four-over 220 total.

The PGA Tour team played from the championship tees, with the other teams hitting from forward tees.

Jurisprudence

An art student picked a bar fight last year with Pittsburgh Penguin strength coach John Welday and former defenseman Peter Taglianetti, a judge ruled in Pittsburgh. Welday, a former Penn State lineman, and Taglianetti were found not guilty of simple assault charges stemming from the fight that left the student with a broken nose and a split lip.

After hearing a day of testimony, the judge decided 34-year-old art student David Ninness was spoiling for a fight on April 29, 1994, just after the Washington Capitals had eliminated the Penguins from the Stanley Cup playoffs.

Tennis

Jeff Tarango upset second-seeded Michael Stich, 7-6 (7-5), 6-3, in the first round of the $1.38-million Romanian Open in Bucharest. . . . Australian Kristin Godridge struggled to a 6-4, 6-7 (3-7), 6-4 victory over second-seeded Kyoko Nagatsuka of Japan in the first round of the TVA Cup women’s tournament in Nagoya, Japan.

Water Polo

Chris Humbert scored with 6.7 seconds left to give the United States a 6-5 victory over Croatia in the first round of the Water Polo World Cup at Atlanta.

Earlier, Italy lost its first game in a major competition in three years, falling to Greece, 7-6.