Jury Convicts Oregon State Duo of Assault

Two former Oregon State football players, including Robert Prescott, a starting wide receiver on last season’s Fiesta Bowl-champion team, were convicted of felony assault Thursday for beating a fellow student at an off-campus party last summer.

Receiver Alton “Junior” Adams, who has transferred to Montana State, was also convicted while a third receiver, James Newson, was acquitted. Newson, the only player among the three who still is on the team, cried after the verdict was announced in Benton County Circuit Court at Corvallis, Ore.

No date was set for sentencing. Prescott and Adams could be sent to prison for up to five years for the assault of Victor Becerra, 22.

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Top women tennis players will be subpoenaed to testify in the Miami trial of a man charged with stalking Martina Hingis at the Ericsson Open last year.

Defense attorney Frank A. Abrams told Judge Kevin Emas he will subpoena “all the leading players” to testify at Dubravko Rajcevic’s trial scheduled to begin April 2, the day after the tournament ends in Key Biscayne, Fla.

Emas said at a January hearing that Hingis should testify in person against Rajcevic, who is being held on $2-million bail on three misdemeanor stalking charges.

Tennis

Monica Seles moved closer to her second WTA Tour title in as many weeks by beating Cara Black of Zimbabwe, 6-0, 6-3, in a second-round match of the rain-plagued State Farm Women’s Tennis Classic at Scottsdale, Ariz. Second-ranked Lindsay Davenport defeated Gala Leon Garcia, 7-5, 6-2, in a match delayed twice by rain. . . . Seventh-seeded Juan Carlos Ferrero of Spain upset second-seeded Magnus Norman of Sweden, 6-2, 4-6, 6-4, in the quarterfinals of the Dubai Open in the United Arab Emirates. Russia’s Marat Safin, the top seed, beat Andrei Medvedev of Ukraine, 6-1, 6-2, in 53 minutes. . . . Second-seeded Lleyton Hewitt of Australia defeated Andrei Stoliarov of Russia, 6-2, 6-7 (8), 6-3, after a power outage delayed the Sybase Open for more than two hours at San Jose. . . . Top-seeded Gustavo Kuerten reached the quarterfinals of the Mexican Open with a 6-4, 6-0 victory over fellow Brazilian Andre Simoni at Acapulco.

Olympics

In a meeting with officials representing Olympic teams from 75 countries, Mitt Romney, the president of the Salt Lake Organizing Committee, said the 2002 Winter Games are all but ready to go.

Romney said 1,300 employees, consultants and contractors already are working full time on preparations. He also said the $1.3-billion Salt Lake Games will be “a significant reduction from prior Winter Games,” but technically proficient.

Osaka’s sports venues are top-notch, but efficient transportation links are crucial to the city’s proposal to host much of the 2008 Summer Olympics on nearby islands, a International Olympic Committee team judging the bid said in Japan.

The evaluation commission from the IOC finished a four-day tour of Japan’s second-largest city, its latest stop among the five cities competing to host the games. Other cities looking to host the 2008 Games are Toronto, Paris and Istanbul.

Also, organizers for the Athens Olympics said they have approved a budget of $129.7 million to stage the Paralympics that will follow the 2004 Summer Games.

Colleges

The Temple University board of trustees will meet today to discuss the football program’s affiliation with Big East Conference. The meeting comes a day after Big East Commissioner Mike Tranghese said Temple wasn’t in compliance with league criteria for membership, putting the program’s future in doubt. . . . Indiana selected San Diego Charger vice president Michael McNeely as its new athletic director. . . . USC freshman Klete Keller won the 500-yard freestyle to help the Trojans to second place behind Stanford after the first day of the Pacific 10 Men’s Swimming and Diving Championships at Belmont Plaza.

Names in the News

Tiger Woods might be No. 1 in golf, but he is a runner-up when it comes to money in sports. Formula One driving champion Michael Schumacher heads Forbes magazine’s list of the highest-paid athletes for the year 2000 with $59 million in earnings. That was $6 million more than Woods.

Dale Earnhardt’s widow will have to wait another week before trying to stop a newspaper from obtaining copies of her husband’s autopsy photos.

A hearing in Daytona Beach, Fla., among attorneys for Teresa Earnhardt, the Orlando Sentinel and Volusia County on releasing autopsy photos of the NASCAR driver was postponed because of a scheduling conflict.

In another matter, a safety harness similar to the one found broken in the crash that killed Earnhardt also failed in a crash at Seekonk Speedway in Boston last summer, according to a lawsuit filed by driver David Hutchins against the manufacturer, Simpson Performance Products.

Two-time Indianapolis 500 winners Al Unser Jr. and Arie Luyendyk, who is coming out of retirement, are expected to enter the May 27 race.

UCLA junior Stephanie Rigamat is among players selected by U.S. soccer coach April Heinrichs to compete in this month’s Algarve Cup in Portugal.

Wolfram Goetz, the director of the Hamburg Marathon, won’t allow banned German runner Dieter Baumann to compete in the race, even if the former Olympic champion obtains a court order. Baumann has twice tested positive for the steroid nandrolone.

Marie M. Ishida has been named executive director of the California Interscholastic Federation, succeeding Jack Hayes. Ishida, a past president of the CIF, is the first woman to become chief executive of the organization that was established in 1914 and is the governing body for high school sports in the state. Ishida, assistant superintendent of human resources for the Santa Cruz city schools, begins her new job April 1.

Passings

Ray Dorr, who had stops at USC, Washington and Texas A&M; in his 33 years as an assistant football coach, died of complications from Lou Gehrig’s disease at his home in College Station, Texas. He was 59.