Taylor King won’t play at USC

Taylor King, a onetime Santa Ana Mater Dei High basketball star who played at Duke and Villanova before recently announcing he would transfer to USC, will not play for the Trojans after all, a USC spokesman said Tuesday.

King would have had to sit out one year before becoming eligible had he come to USC, and the details were not immediately clear why the former McDonald’s All-American, who became notable for committing to UCLA as a 15-year-old, will not become a Trojan.

— Baxter Holmes

Houston Rockets All-Star center Yao Ming is confident that he’ll be ready for the start of the regular season after a team doctor declared his surgically repaired foot fully healed.

Yao missed last season after undergoing complex surgery on his left foot in July 2009. Team doctor Tom Clanton has cleared Yao to resume basketball activities.

HOCKEY

Joffrey Lupul has blood infection

Ducks winger Joffrey Lupul, plagued by a blood infection and unable to train, won’t be ready for the start of the 2010-11 season. He’s scheduled to be reevaluated on Sept. 20, after he finishes an eight-week course of antibiotics.

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Defenseman Aaron Ward, who finished last season with the Ducks, has retired after knee surgery. His 13-year career included three Stanley Cup titles, two with Detroit and one with Carolina.

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Tampa Bay Lightning center Vincent Lecavalier had minor arthroscopic surgery on his left knee and is expected to recover in time for the start of training camp on Sept. 17.

ETC.

Skater Kim splits with coach

Olympic figure skating champion Kim Yuna has split from her coach, Brian Orser, in a move that has taken many by surprise — Orser included.

Three weeks after Kim’s mother, Park Mi-hee, informed Orser he was no longer the coach, he said he still doesn’t know the reasons behind the decision. He doesn’t even know whether the decision was Kim’s.

A statement from Kim’s management company, AT Sports, didn’t explain why the South Korean star left Orser, saying only that relations between the skater and coach had been “uncomfortable” since May.

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Caroline Wozniacki of Denmark was seeded No. 1 at a Grand Slam tournament for the first time, getting the top spot at the U.S. Open because Serena Williams pulled out with a foot injury.

Wozniacki is the first woman since 2003 to be seeded No. 1 at the U.S. Open without having already won a major championship.

Defending champion Kim Clijsters was seeded No. 2., while Venus Williams was seeded third.