Two Suspects Arrested in Popov Stabbing

Two suspects from Azerbaijan have been arrested in connection with the stabbing of Olympic swimming gold medalist Alexander Popov in Moscow, but the knife-wielder is still at large, police said Wednesday.

Popov, 25, whose 50- and 100-meter freestyle victories in Atlanta gave him recognition as the world’s fastest swimmer, was stabbed when a group he was with got into a fight with watermelon vendors in Moscow on Saturday.

He is hospitalized in stable condition.

Police spokesman Vladimir Zubkov said two Azeris, aged 24 and 28, have been detained in the incident. The stabber has been identified but not apprehended, he said, according to the Interfax news agency.

Police said Popov was on his way home from a birthday party with friends when they had an argument with street vendors in western Moscow. Investigators said the fight apparently was initiated by Popov’s friends.

Hockey

The Detroit Red Wings traded right wing Dino Ciccarelli to the Tampa Bay Lightning for a conditional draft choice.

Ciccarelli, 36, has one year remaining on a contract with Detroit that will pay him $1.25 million this season and has said he doesn’t want to leave Detroit. He has averaged more than a point a game in 1,079 regular-season games over 16 seasons. He had 22 goals in 64 games last season and led the Red Wings with six power-play goals in 17 playoff games.

Center Saku Koivu’s line combined for 10 points as Finland routed Germany, 8-3, to clinch at least a second-round berth in the World Cup of Hockey in Helsinki. . . . Goaltender J.C. Bergeron, who has spent the last four seasons with Tampa Bay, has agreed to terms of a one-year contract with the Kings.

Basketball

The Dallas Mavericks named Mark Aguirre director of player development and a scout for the team he left under bitter circumstances in 1989. New coach Jim Cleamons hired Charlie Parker, who coached USC last season, as an assistant.

John Paxson, a star of two championship series for the Chicago Bulls, resigned as an assistant coach with the team to pursue opportunities outside basketball.

Basketball Hall of Fame member Carol Blazejowski was named director of basketball development for the new Women’s NBA.

Miscellany

Frankie Randall, who beat Argentina’s Juan Coggi to win the World Boxing Assn. junior-welterweight title Aug. 16 in Buenos Aires, has tested positive for a powerful cocktail of drugs, including cocaine and theophylline, the Argentine Boxing Federation said.

Forty-eight school bus drivers from Tucson who drove Olympic shuttle buses in Athens, Ga., are holding bad checks, apparently stemming from a contract dispute between an Atlanta businessman and the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games. Two of the drivers have been evicted from their homes for failing to make their mortgage payments and a third is in jeopardy of losing his house, driver Bill Bellah said.

Two days after informing the Ottawa Rough Riders it could no longer pay its bills, the Canadian Football League had to pay about $120,000 to cover the B.C. Lions’ payroll this week.

Olympic silver medalist Marty Nothstein of Allentown, Pa., won the second world title of his career in the Kierin cycling race of the World Track Championships at Manchester, England.

Missy Schwen, who won a silver medal in women’s pair rowing at the Atlanta Olympics, donated a kidney to her brother in an operation in Chicago on Wednesday.

Veteran racer John Andretti agreed to a three-year deal to drive for Cale Yarborough’s RCA Ford Thunderbirds in Winston Cup competition.