Ruling Stands, Forbidding Tyson to Fight Seldon Instead of Lewis

The New Jersey Supreme Court denied an appeal Monday by fighter Mike Tyson to overturn a judge’s order and allow him to fight World Boxing Assn. champion Bruce Seldon in July.

The court voted unanimously to deny the World Boxing Council champion’s appeal, keeping in place a temporary restraining order that prohibits Tyson from fighting anyone other than British heavyweight Lennox Lewis until a lawsuit is settled.

Tyson and promoter Don King sought to overturn an appellate court’s ruling that forbade their appealing Superior Court Judge Amos Saunders’ decision regarding Tyson and Lewis. The appellate court also refused to lift Saunders’ restraining order, pending the appeal.

Lewis claims in his lawsuit that he was wrongly passed over to fight for the WBC title when Tyson was allowed to challenge Frank Bruno, a match Tyson won in March in Las Vegas.

Horse Racing

Unbridled’s Song galloped two miles over New Jersey’s Monmouth Park track without his bar shoes and, according to trainer Jim Ryerson, “was as comfortable as we could want.”

Unbridled’s Song wore the bar shoes to protect a cracked hoof at the Kentucky Derby, where he finished fifth after going off as the favorite. The good workout without them could mean he will race in the Preakness on Saturday.

Trainer Wayne Lukas, meanwhile, looking for a seventh consecutive victory in a Triple Crown race and a third consecutive Preakness, said he will run Victory Speech. The addition of the 10th-place Kentucky Derby finisher gives Lukas three of the probable 11 runners in the second leg of the Triple Crown series. He is also planning to start Prince Of Thieves and Editor’s Note.

Jurisprudence

A Dallas judge quashed a subpoena in which Michael Irvin’s attorneys sought to swear in a television newsman as a potential witness and include him in a gag order in the impending drug possession trial of the Dallas Cowboys’ receiver.

Attorney Kevin Clancy had served the subpoena on KXAS-TV “public defender” reporter Marty Griffin, whose five-part investigative series was shown last week.

The secretly recorded videotape of a former confidant turned informant showed Irvin following what were portrayed as two purported cocaine buys in a neighborhood near the Cowboys’ practice facility.

Irvin was indicted on felony cocaine and misdemeanor marijuana charges after a raid by police March 4. His trial begins June 24.

Two men charged with former Detroit Tiger pitcher Denny McLain were arraigned in Detroit in the alleged looting of a pension fund. Roger Smigiel, 44, of Rochester Hills and financial consultant Jeffrey A. Egan, 35, of Bloomfield Hills pleaded not guilty to federal charges. McLain, 52, is scheduled for arraignment today.

The three, who once owned the Peet Packing Co., are accused of transferring more than $12 million of the company’s pension-plan money to Michigan National Bank, then converting $3 million for personal and company use.

College Baseball

The Southeastern Conference was awarded three of the eight regional sites announced in the NCAA’s Division I baseball tournament. Florida will be host of the East Regional, Alabama the South I and Louisiana State the South II.

Also picked to hold regionals were Stanford in the West, Clemson in the Atlantic, Texas in the Central I, Texas Tech in the Central II, and Wichita State in the Midwest.

The eight six-team regionals will conduct double-elimination competition May 23-26, with the winners advancing to the College World Series in Omaha. The regional fields will be announced May 20.

Miscellany

Wes Flanigan, an All-Southeastern Conference basketball guard for Auburn, has been found to have bone cancer in his arm but school officials said in a news release that chances are “excellent” for a full recovery.

University of Redlands freshman Dina Dajani won the NCAA Division III women’s singles national championship by defeating Jamie Levine of Skidmore College (N.Y.), 6-4, 6-2, at Kalamazoo College in Michigan.