MINNEAPOLIS -- Minnesota Wild coach Jacques Lemaire says he'll return for an eighth season with the team.
Lemaire, who announced his decision in a news release Saturday, has a career record of 500-381-168
Minnesota Wild coach Jacques Lemaire
over 14 years, including 60-52 in the playoffs.
But with the Wild, he's gone just 11-18 in the post-season. The Wild were ousted in the first round
last month by the Colorado Avalanche, culminating what Lemaire called his toughest season as a
coach. "I'm getting older and maybe not as patient as I was when I started to coach," he said in an
interview after the Wild were eliminated.
Boo Weekley got a close up view of the Florida flora on Saturday.
That led to some speculation that the 62-year-old could step down after leading the franchise
from expansion team in 2000 to Northwest Division champion this season. But after meeting
with general manager Doug Risebrough in Florida this week, Lemaire said he was convinced he
wanted to continue.
Sorenstam looking like super Swede of old
WILLIAMSBURG, Va. -- Annika Sorenstam knows there was speculation that her best days were behind her, and that an injury-plagued 2007 was the beginning of the end.
That all just makes working her way back to the top more satisfying.
"I never wondered, but I know other people would wonder, 'Is she ever going to get back?' " Sorenstam said Saturday after her 2-under 69 showed that she's getting there quickly. "I know what I'm capable of."
Rarely spectacular but remarkable for her consistency, Sorenstam shot her third consecutive nearly mistake-free round, and gave No. 1 Lorena Ochoa and Jeong Jang up-close evidence that she's getting ever closer to finding the maddeningly steady game that made her the top female player in the world for so long, and it's coming sooner rather than later.
"It's been over a year and I'm finally starting to feel good again," said Sorenstam, who opened with rounds of 64 and 68 and was 14 under overall.
Hitting fairways and greens consistently and scrambling when necessary with radar-like wedge play, Sorenstam stretched her bogey-free string to 53 holes before hooking a drive into the water on No. 18. Even then, she drove again, hit a 6-iron from 162 yards to 8 feet and made the putt, the bogey leaving her with a three-shot lead over Jang.
"I saved everything today," Sorenstam said. "Even the last hole."
Ochoa finished with a 74 that dropped her into a tie for 10th.
-- The Associated Press
Gallant Goydos immune to Sawgrass pressure
PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. -- Paul Goydos doesn't have a Q-rating, an endorsement deal or a top-30 finish in the last 16 months. What he does have for the first time in his career is a 54-hole lead -- in The Players Championship, no less.
Seemingly immune to the mounting pressure and a course getting tougher by the day, Goydos seized the lead Saturday with a 10-foot birdie on the island-green 17th and a great escape on the closing hole for a 2-under 70 and a one-shot lead over Kenny Perry.
As well as he played, his self-deprecating humour was even better.
Asked if he had ever had a 54-hole lead on the PGA Tour, Goydos shook his head.
"But I've only been on tour for 16 years," he said.
His 7-under 209 is the highest score to lead at TPC Sawgrass since 1999.
Perry saved par with a nifty wedge on the 18th hole for a 72 that put him at 210 and in the final group Sunday. Sergio Garcia hit the ball as well as anyone for the second straight day, and got nothing in return.
Garcia was tied for the lead standing on the 17th tee, but he three-putted from just outside 10 feet, then hit into the rough on the 18th and closed with another bogey for a 73, leaving him three shots behind.
Through three rounds, Goydos has taken 78 putts, 18 fewer than Garcia.
"I'm a little bit disappointed because I feel like the last two days, I shot the highest score I could shoot," Garcia said. "And I still have a chance. With everything that has happened, I'm still there."
The numbers are shrinking, with only 13 players remaining under par, just three of those with a major to their credit.
Phil Mickelson, trying to become the first repeat champion in the 35-year history of this tournament, was making a move up the leaderboard until he knocked his tee shot into the water on the 14th and took double bogey. He still wound up with a 71 and was in the group at 2-under 214, five shots behind.
Pistons take stranglehold in series with Magic
ORLANDO, Fla. -- There is a reason the Detroit Pistons have been to five consecutive Eastern Conference finals. They proved it on Saturday, even without their all-star point guard to hold things together in front of a hostile crowd.
Richard Hamilton scored 32 points and Hedo Turkoglu missed a layup with time running out as the Pistons beat the Orlando Magic 90-89 to take a 3-1 lead in their Eastern Conference semifinal. The Pistons became the first team to win on the road in the second round this post-season, and can clinch their sixth consecutive conference finals appearance when the series returns to Detroit on Tuesday.
All of it happened with Chauncey Billups watching on the bench after straining a hamstring in Game 3.
Tayshaun Prince scored 17 for Detroit, including an 11-foot runner for the go-ahead basket with 8.9 seconds left. Antonio McDyess added eight points and 14 boards. The Pistons controlled the tempo in the second half after falling behind by 15 in the third quarter, deflated the Magic transition game and pounded Dwight Howard in the paint.
-- The Associated Press
Dixon earns Indy pole; Patrick bumped back
INDIANAPOLIS -- Strategy was almost as important as speed Saturday as Scott Dixon won the pole for the Indianapolis 500 with a big gamble by his Target Chip Ganassi Racing team.
Dixon and teammate Dan Wheldon, who took the second spot, both took advantage of Indy's unique qualifying format, which allows each entry up to three tries on each of the four days of time trials.
Dixon, who has three pole positions in five tries in the IRL IndyCar Series this season, got the biggest benefit of the team strategy, canceling out a four-lap average of 225.178 mph earlier in the day and making it pay off with four laps at 226.366 that held up for Ganassi's third Indy pole.
The New Zealander's pole run came with just over two hours left in the session and only moments after Ryan Briscoe, the first driver to qualify Saturday, made his own gamble in an effort to give team owner Roger Penske a record 15th Indy pole. The team withdrew his earlier speed of 224.833 and Briscoe, who wound up third, put his Team Penske entry on top briefly with a run of 226.080.
Danica Patrick, just two weeks past making history as the first woman to win an IndyCar race, set the early pace, knocking Briscoe off the top spot with a four-lap run averaging 225.197 mph on the famed 2.5-mile Indianapolis Motor Speedway oval.
But Wheldon spoiled her storybook moment Saturday when he came out about 20 minutes later and pushed Patrick to the middle of the tentative front row.
Patrick, who was doing an interview in the media centre during Wheldon's run, just shook her head and smiled ruefully when Wheldon's speed was announced. She got back onto the track later for some practice, but never made another qualifying run and wound up fifth.
-- The Associated Press
James can't find mojo, but Cavs get it done
CLEVELAND -- The shots didn't drop
again for LeBron James, and it hardly
mattered. The rest of the Cleveland
Cavaliers made most of theirs.
James scored 21 points on another
off-shooting night, but Delonte West
scored 21, Joe Smith had 17 and the
Cavaliers raced to a large, early lead
in Game 3 in a 108-84 victory Saturday
night over the road-challenged Boston
Celtics to pull within 2-1 in their playoff
series.
West, who spent three seasons wearing
Celtic green and white, carried the
scoring load for the Cavaliers, who are
attempting to become the 14th team in
NBA history to come back from an 0-2
deficit and win a best-of-seven series.
They've had practise at it.
Last year, the Cavaliers lost the first
two games of the Eastern Conference
finals to Detroit before beating the
Pistons four in a row to advance to the
finals for the first time. After dropping
Games 1 and 2 in Boston, Cleveland
needed James (8-of-42 in the losses) to
shoot his way out of a slump.
James was only 5-of-16 from the
floor, but his teammates stepped up,
going 32-of-54 (59 per cent).
-- The Associated Press
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