Sakic Named MVP and a Gentleman

Joe Sakic is everybody’s MVP.

The captain of the Stanley Cup champion Colorado Avalanche won the Hart Trophy at the NHL’s annual awards dinner. Earlier in the day, he took the Lester B. Pearson Award as the NHL’s most valuable player as voted on by the players. The Hart is chosen by the Professional Hockey Writers’ Assn.

Sakic, 31, also won the the Lady Byng Trophy as most gentlemanly player. He is eligible to become an unrestricted free agent July 1.

Other winners were Buffalo’s Dominik Hasek as outstanding goaltender, Detroit’s Nicklas Lidstrom as top defenseman and San Jose goaltender Evgeny Nabokov as rookie of the year.

Brett Hull, whose first season with the Dallas Stars ended with a disputed Stanley Cup-winning goal, will be an unrestricted free agent July 1 after the Stars decided not to exercise a $7-million option for 2001-02.

He still could return to the Stars for a fourth season.

For now, the Stars will pursue other options to find an accomplished goal-scorer younger than Hull. The 16-year NHL veteran turns 37 in August.

Mike Gartner, who ranks fifth on the all-time NHL list with 708 goals, and Jari Kurri, who was Wayne Gretzky’s Edmonton Oiler linemate and later played for the Kings and Mighty Ducks, were among four players elected to the Hockey Hall of Fame.

Also elected were Russian great Vyacheslav Fetisov and Dale Hawerchuk, who is 13th on the all-time scoring list with 1,409 points.

Pittsburgh Penguin General Manager Craig Patrick, architect of the Penguins’ two Stanley Cup teams, was chosen from among the hockey executives.

John LeClair signed a five-year contract with the Philadelphia Flyers worth close to $9 million a year. LeClair averaged 47 goals in the five seasons before last season when he sat out 66 games because of a back injury.

Tennis

Second-seeded Patrick Rafter of Australia defeated Andrei Pavel of Romania, 6-3, 6-3, at Halle, Germany, to reach the quarterfinals of the Gerry Weber Open, a major warmup for Wimbledon. Fabrice Santoro of France upset third-seeded countryman Sebastien Grosjean, 7-5, 7-5. . . . Top-seeded Marat Safin of Russia was defeated by Dutchman Peter Wessels, 4-6, 6-4, 7-6 (8), in the Stella Artois grass-court tournament at London. . . . Top-seeded Nathalie Tauziat of France benefited from strong service returns for a 6-3, 6-3 victory over Alexandra Stevenson and reached the quarterfinals of the DFS Classic at Birmingham, England. . . . Big-serving Australian Mark Philippoussis, 1996 champion Richard Krajicek and former French Open champion Mary Pierce have withdrawn from Wimbledon because of injuries. . . . Corina Morariu, who won the Wimbledon doubles title with Lindsay Davenport in 1999, was released from the Miami hospital where she was being treated for a rare form of leukemia.

Soccer

Ten members of the U.S. women’s soccer team that won the 1999 World Cup, including Mia Hamm and Brandi Chastain, were selected to play against Canada in a two-game series June 30 at Toronto and July 3 at Blaine, Minn. Among the players chosen by Coach April Heinrichs were 13 members of the 2000 Olympic squad. . . . Dutch defender Frank de Boer was suspended for one year by the Union of European Football Assns. for testing positive for nandrolone, a banned steroid. . . . Eight members of Chile’s under-20 soccer team spent a night at a police station in Santiago after being detained at a massage parlor hours before they were to leave for the FIFA World Youth Championship. The players will be questioned when they return from the tournament, which starts Sunday in Argentina. Chile opens Sunday against Ukraine, then plays the United States on Wednesday.

Miscellany

Denver Nugget assistant John Lucas has been offered the head coaching job with the Cleveland Cavaliers, an NBA management source told the Associated Press. Lucas is also reported to be a finalist for the Portland Trail Blazers’ coaching vacancy. . . . The Charlotte Hornets traded their second-round draft pick to the Chicago Bulls for the rights to center Roberto Duenas. The Bulls, who got the 45th pick from the Hornets, drafted the 7-foot-3 Duenas in 1997.

Claude Bebear, a prominent businessman leading Paris’ bid to host the 2008 Olympic Games, has been placed under formal investigation for alleged money laundering, officials said.

Despite his legal woes, Bebear planned to remain head of the committee. Bebear 65, is the former chief of France’s largest insurance group, Axa SA.

Sports agent William “Tank” Black was sentenced in Detroit to nearly seven years in prison on a money-laundering charge.

U.S. District Chief Judge Lawrence Zatkoff ruled that Black’s six-year, 10-month sentence would be followed by three years of supervised probation. Black, 44, of Columbia, S.C., also was fined $15,000.

Black still faces Florida charges that he bilked millions of dollars from about a dozen professional football players.

British 400-meter runner Mark Richardson, who was banned for two years after a positive test for nandrolone, was reinstated by track and field’s world governing body. Richardson was cleared to return to competition by the ruling council of the International Amateur Athletic Federation.

The Washington Redskins agreed to a one-year, $1.1 million deal with offensive lineman Ben Coleman. . . . Hula Bowl Maui and Pro Bowl officials announced a partnership that will put the two all-star games on the same weekend in Honolulu next year.

UCLA’s Jeanette Bolden was named the Pacific 10 Conference women’s track coach of the year for the fifth consecutive year. Freshman hurdler Sheena Johnson of the Bruins was named Pac-10 newcomer of the year and Arizona sprinter Brianna Glenn (La Mirada High) was the women’s athlete of the year.

Kirk Jones, 36, an assistant football and track coach at Long Beach Poly High, died Saturday after suffering a heart attack at his Diamond Bar home.