UCLA’s Sua Makes History With Fourth Discus Title

UCLA’s Seilala Sua made history Thursday at the NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships at Durham, N.C.

Sua won the women’s discus at 200 feet 9 inches, becoming the first woman to win the same field event four times. Wisconsin’s Suzy Favor is the only other woman to win the same event four times, the 1,500 meters from 1987-1990, with her final victory also coming at Duke’s Wallace Wade stadium.

Sua, who will defend her shotput title today, also tied Favor for the most overall outdoor NCAA titles by a woman. Favor also won the 800 in 1990.

Sua has six NCAA titles, including this year’s indoor shotput championship. Favor has nine career championships.

In other finals, Brad Hauser led a 1-2-4 Stanford finish in the men’s 10,000, outkicking teammate Jason Balkman to win in 30 minutes, 38.57 seconds, the slowest winning time since 1956; Christi Smith became the first NCAA champion from Akron, taking the heptathlon with 5,797 points; Texas’ Erin Aldrich won the women’s high jump at 6-2 3/4; and Louisiana State’s Russ Buller took the men’s pole vault at 18-4 1/2.

Joachim Olsen of Idaho won the men’s shotput at 66-5 3/4; Houston’s Jenny Adams took the women’s long jump at 21-5 1/2; and Southern Methodist’s Libor Charfreitag won the men’s hammer throw at 253-4, a distance that qualified him for the Olympics for Slovakia.

Jurisprudence

Police officers testified in Atlanta that Baltimore Raven linebacker Ray Lewis gave them a statement full of lies and contradictions when they interviewed him hours after a brawl that left two men dead.

The statement shows Lewis denied knowing many of the people who rode in his rented limousine and gave inconsistent accounts of whether anyone in his party was cut during the fight.

Lewis and two friends, Reginald Oakley and Joseph Sweeting, are on trial for murder in the deaths of Jacinth Baker and Richard Lollar, who were stabbed in the Jan. 31 fight after a Super Bowl party.

Before the trial began, Lewis’ lawyers tried to keep his statement out of evidence. But Superior Court Judge Alice D. Bonner ordered that it be admitted because she said it was “freely and voluntarily given.”

WNBA

Tina Thompson had 19 points and nine rebounds, and Sheryl Swoopes scored 20 points in the Houston Comets’ 77-47 rout of the Seattle Storm at Seattle. . . . Natalie Williams scored 18 points and had 14 rebounds to lead the Utah Starzz to an 83-74 victory over the Minnesota Lynx at Salt Lake City. . . . Kara Wolters, outplayed for much of the game, scored six of her eight points in the final six minutes at Miami as the Indiana Fever overcame a 17-point second-half deficity and beat the Miami Sol, 57-54, in both expansion teams’ opening game. . . . Nykesha Sales scored 24 points and the Orlando Miracle held off a late charge by the Charlotte Sting to win their home opener, 82-79.

Pro Football

The Green Bay Packers will release tight end Mark Chmura on Monday, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported on its Web site.

Citing an anonymous source “closely connected to the matter,” the newspaper said the Packers plan to cut ties with Chmura, who was accused of sexually assaulting a 17-year-old girl at a post-prom party on April 9.

Earlier this week, Chmura, 31, and Robert Gessert, 43, were ordered to stand trial in Waukesha County on third-degree sexual assault charges.

Running back Ki-Jana Carter, the No. 1 overall pick in the 1995 draft, was released by the Cincinnati Bengals.

The former Penn State running back sat out the 1995 season when he tore an anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee in the preseason. He played only one game in 1998 after breaking his wrist in the season opener.

Brian Mitchell, the NFL’s career leader in combined kickoff and punt return yardage, was cut by the Washington Redskins. Mitchell, 32, had three years left on a contract that would have counted $1.7 million against the salary cap this season.

College Basketball

CBS Corp. is in talks to sell marketing rights for the NCAA men’s basketball tournament through 2013 for about $1 billion, said sources familiar with the discussions.

The Viacom Inc.-owned network is in separate negotiations with Bull Run Corp.’s Host Communications and ISL Worldwide’s U.S. unit for the rights to sell radio broadcasts, corporate sponsorships, and permission to use the NCAA trademark in Final Four promotions.

The NCAA granted an additional year of eligibility to Drexel’s Joe Linderman, who was sidelined most of last season because of lower back pain. Linderman averaged 17.2 points and 7.6 rebounds as a junior in 1998-99.

Miscellany

Charles Howell of Oklahoma State shot a six-under-par 66 at Opelika, Ala., to share the individual lead in the NCAA golf championship and give the Cowboys a one-stroke lead over Texas at the midway point of the 72 hole tournament. Howell, at 11-under 133, is tied with David Gossett of Texas.

One million Olympic tickets could still be for sale at the start of the Sydney Games in September, a senior official said. Bob Leece, the Olympic Coordination Authority deputy director-general, said analysts had told him tickets for a wide range of sports would be available when the games get underway Sept. 15. A spokesman for the Sydney organizing committee, however, said it was difficult to know how many tickets would be available when the Games started.

Italy defeated Turkey, 3-1, and the Czech Republic beat Croatia, 4-2, to advance to the final in the European Under-21 soccer championships at Bratislava, Slovakia. . . . Fatih Terim, who led Istanbul’s Galatasaray to a UEFA Cup title last month, signed a one-year contract to coach Fiorentina in Italy’s Serie A.