This Team Should Have a Lot of Pop

Brittany Spears has signed to play basketball at Colorado, but she won’t be the only freshman making sweet music next season for the Buffaloes, who have also signed Whitney Houston.

Spears -- that’s Brittany, not Britney -- is a 6-foot-1 forward from Pasadena High who has helped the Bulldogs reach the Southern Section Division I-A quarterfinals.

Houston is a 5-8 guard at Memphis (Tenn.) Hillcrest High.

Trivia time: What do entertainers Hilary and Haylie Duff, “American Idol” winner Fantasia Barrino and retired Times motorsports journalist Shav Glick have in common?

Slots of fun: The Marlins are still talking about leaving South Florida, but Major League Baseball doesn’t want the club speaking with Las Vegas officials about a possible relocation because of the gambling stigma.

Wrote Greg Cote of the Miami Herald: “Vegas reps might have erred in proposing the team’s new mascot would be Pete Rose.”

Wouldn’t the obvious choice for a Vegas-based team be the Dodgers? Just re-create Ebbets Field in the parking lot of the New York-New York hotel and rename them the Brooklyn Dodgers-Brooklyn Dodgers.

Lining up: The Philadelphia 76ers, in cooperation with local police, are offering fans free tickets to an upcoming game if they turn in a handgun, the Philadelphia Daily News reported.

Wrote Dwight Perry of the Seattle Times: “Forty-one guns, we assume, gets you on the season-ticket list.”

The Doggfather: Bill Simmons of ESPN.com on Snoop Dogg at the NBA All-Star game: “Did you ever notice that we’re working on about 14 years of Snoop, and his Cool Meter hasn’t dipped even one iota? How is that possible? It’s like someone scoring 30 points a game for 14 straight seasons.

“And have you noticed that he’s looked exactly the same over that entire time? He’s like the Tony La Russa of rap.”

Up the downhill: Wondering about the obvious reference to “downhill skiing,” Jack Finarelli of sportscurmudgeon.com wrote: “As boring as I find the skiing competition, imagine how mind-numbingly dull it would be if it were ‘uphill skiing.’ ”

Looking back: On this date in 1985, Jim Kelly passed for a USFL-record 574 yards as he rallied the Houston Gamblers to a 34-33 victory over Steve Young and the Los Angeles Express at the Coliseum.

Pass-happy place: The NFL record for passing yards in a game was also set in the Coliseum, where, on Sept. 28, 1951, Norm Van Brocklin of the Rams threw for 554 yards in a 54-14 victory over the New York Yanks.

Trivia answer: The Auto Club 500, which takes place Sunday at the California Speedway in Fontana. Hilary and Haylie will serve as honorary starter and race official, respectively, Barrino will sing the national anthem and Glick is the grand marshal.

And finally: Jim Armstrong of the Denver Post on the hiring of ex-NFL bust Ryan Leaf as quarterbacks coach at West Texas A&M;: “West Texas A&M;? Isn’t that where Kathy Ireland coaches?”