HIGH SCHOOLS

Garet Beal of Jonesport-Beals given honor as Maine basketball Gatorade player of year

Garet Beal, who led Jonesport-Beals High to the Class D state championship this past season, was honored Thursday as the Maine Gatorade boys’ basketball player of the year.

Beal became the first Gatorade winner from Jonesport-Beals.

Beal, a 6-foot-5 junior who maintains an A-minus average in the classroom, averaged 22.3 points and 8.7 rebounds for the Royals, who capped a 19-2 season by defeating Forest Hills of Jackman in the state championship game.

GOLF

LPGA: Top-ranked Yani Tseng shot a 5-under 67 for a share of the first-round lead with Ji Young Oh in the Kia Classic at Carlsbad, Calif.

Tseng finished with a birdie on the par-4 ninth after dropping a stroke on the par-3 eighth.

EUROPEAN TOUR: Damien McGrane of Ireland opened with a 7-under 65 to lead the Hassan II Trophy by two strokes at Agadir, Morocco.

TENNIS

SONY ERICSSON OPEN: Serena Williams, a five-time champion in the event playing in her backyard tournament for the first time since 2009, beat wild card Zhang Shuai 6-2, 6-3 at Key Biscayne, Fla.

The victory marked Williams’ return to tournament tennis after a two-month absence. It was her first match at Key Biscayne since she lost to Victoria Azarenka in the final three years ago.

SPEEDSKATING

WORLD TITLE: Denny Morrison of Canada won the 1,500-meter speedskating world title at Heerenveen, Netherlands despite appearing to be hampered by Shani Davis of the United States.

Morrison had to hold back to prevent crashing into Davis as the skaters came out of the second bend but managed to retain enough speed to finish first in 1 minute, 46.44 seconds.

SOCCER

OLYMPIC QUALIFYING: Joe Corona scored three goals as the United States beat Cuba 6-0 in the Americans’ opening game of the CONCACAF Olympic qualifying tournament at Nashville, Tenn.

Juan Agudelo and Freddy Adu also had a goal apiece, and the U.S. Under-23 team also got an own goal from Cuba to lead 4-0 at halftime.

The Americans will play Canada on Saturday in the second of three games in the Group A round-robin tournament. Canada tied El Salvador 0-0 in the other group opener.

— From staff and news reports