HOCKEY
University of Maine junior goalie Jeremy Swayman was named one of 10 finalists for the 2020 Hobey Baker Memorial Award, which honors the top Division I college hockey player.
Swayman, who was also unanimously selected to Hockey East First Team All-Stars on Wednesday, had an 18-11-5 record with three shutouts and led the NCAA with 1,099 saves, which was also a school record.
Swayman, who signed an entry-level contract with the Boston Bruins on Tuesday, was second in the nation with a .939 save percentage and 14th with a 2.07 goals-against average.
The nine other finalists are: Morgan Barron, junior, forward, Cornell; Jason Cotton, senior, forward, Sacred Heart; Jack Dugan, sophomore, forward, Providence; David Farrance, junior, defenseman, Boston University; Jordan Kawaguchi, junior, forward, North Dakota; John Leonard, junior, forward, Massachusetts; Dryden McKay, sophomore, goalie, Minnesota State; Marc Michaelis, senior, forward, Minnesota State; Scott Perunovich, junior, defenseman, Minnesota Duluth.
The winner will be announced on April 10.
Fans voting is now open at: https://www.hobeybaker.com/vote.
NHL: The Boston Bruins signed unrestricted free-agent defenseman Nick Wolff out of Minnesota-Duluth, where he was a co-captain.
Wolff was a development camp invitee for the Bruins the last two summers.
• The Buffalo Sabres agreed to a two-year, entry-level contract with undrafted forward Brandon Biro.
Biro, 22, helped lead Penn State to a Big Ten-best 12-8-4 record while serving as the captain for his senior season. The Nittany Lions advanced to the conference semifinals before the season was canceled because of the coronavirus.
Biro, who is listed at 5-foot-11 and 175 pounds, had 10 goals and 25 points in 25 games last season. Overall, he had 41 goals and ranks fourth on the school list with 116 points in 138 career games.
Biro is familiar to Buffalo after taking part in the Sabres’ development camp in 2018. He was also part of a Penn State program that was re-established in 2013-14 through a $100 million donation made by alum and Sabres owner Terry Pegula.
BOXING
NE GOLDEN GLOVES: Three Portland Boxing Club boxers won championships in the New England Golden Gloves Championships at Lowell Memorial Auditorium in Lowell, Massachusetts, on March 5.
Reining open class lightweight (132 pounds) New England champion Liz Leddy of Portland won her 10th New England Golden Gloves championship with a split decision over Marni O’Shea of Danbury, Connecticut.
Wade Faria, a novice class middleweight (165) from South Portland, won a unanimous decision over Manuel Teo of Marlboro, Massachusetts, and Kate Zehr, an open class featherweight (125) of South Portland, won a unanimous decision over Noelle Boran of East Walpole, Massachusetts.
Jordan Lindsay, a novice class super heavyweight (201+) from Windham, lost to Quintin Sumpter of Pittsfield, Massachusetts, but later defeated Jerry Polanco of Brooklyn, Connecticut, by unanimous decision in a special nontournament bout.
Portland Boxing Club athletes have earned 217 championship wins in the organization’s 28 years.
The three champions will advance to the National Golden Gloves Championships, which have been rescheduled to start Aug. 10 in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
COLLEGES
MEN’S BASKETBALL: Kansas Coach Bill Self has spent much of the past week mulling ways to commemorate one of the more remarkable seasons in the school’s proud basketball history, one that began with off-the-court distractions too numerous to count and ended in the unprecedented cancellation of the NCAA Tournament.
The Jayhawks can start by celebrating their finish atop the final Top 25 from The Associated Press.
The regular-season Big 12 champions, who were 28-3 when the season abruptly ended after the first day of the conference tournament last week, received 63 of 65 first-place votes from a national media panel in balloting. That easily outdistanced No. 2 Gonzaga and No. 3 Dayton, each of which received a first-place vote.
It’s the fourth time since the inception of the men’s poll for the 1946-47 season that Kansas finished on top, though typically there would still be March Madness to play. The AP does not declare a national champion in the sport because of the tournament.
The final rankings were based on play through March 11, when the outbreak of the coronavirus brought the sport to a halt.
Florida State (26-5) was fourth in the final poll, easily the best finish ever for the Seminoles, while Baylor (26-4) rounded out the top five after spending a longer stretch at No. 1 than any other team during a topsy-turvy season.
No. 11 Duke finished outside the top 10 for only the second time since 2007, while Maryland, Oregon, Louisville and Seton Hall came next.
The rest of the Top 25 included reigning national champion Virginia at No. 16, followed by Wisconsin, BYU, Ohio State and Auburn. The final five in the poll were Illinois, Houston, Butler, West Virginia and Iowa.
WOMEN’S BASKETBALL: UNLV has hired former Stanford assistant and player Lindy La Rocque as its next women’s basketball coach.
The school announced La Rocque will replace Kathy Oliver, who resigned on March 6 after the Rebels failed to make the NCAA Tournament for the 12th straight season.
La Rocque is a Las Vegas native who played at Durango High School before going on to make four straight Final Four appearances with Stanford, including a trip to the national title game in 2010.
She started her coaching career as a graduate assistant at Oklahoma and spent two seasons as an assistant at Belmont before joining Tara VanDerveer’s staff at Stanford in 2017. The Cardinal made the NCAA Tournament all three years La Rocque was there as an assistant, stretching her streak of consecutive NCAA Tournament appearances to 11 straight years.
BASKETBALL
NBA: Los Angeles Clippers guard Terance Mann had surgery Tuesday to repair a ligament in his right hand.
Mann was injured during a game on March 8 while on assignment with the team’s G League affiliate in Ontario, California. No timetable for his return has been set.
SOCCER
MLS: Atlanta United star Josef Martinez underwent surgery on his right knee more than two weeks after he tore the ACL during the league-opening match at Nashville.
Martinez posted an update on his Instagram page after the operation at UPMC hospital in Pittburgh. The striker was smiling and giving a thumbs-up as he posed in his bed alongside one of his doctors, Volker Musahl.
Martinez was injured Feb. 29 in a 2-1 victory over Nashville to open the Major League Soccer season. He is expected to be out for much of the year, though the season is now on hold because of the coronavirus outbreak.
BASEBALL
MAJORS: Left-hander Joey Wentz, a prospect in the Detroit Tigers’ organization, had surgery to reconstruct the ulnar collateral ligament in his pitching elbow.
The Tigers said Wentz is expected to return in 14 to 16 months.
Copy the Story LinkSend questions/comments to the editors.
Success. Please wait for the page to reload. If the page does not reload within 5 seconds, please refresh the page.
Enter your email and password to access comments.
Hi, to comment on stories you must . This profile is in addition to your subscription and website login.
Already have a commenting profile? .
Invalid username/password.
Please check your email to confirm and complete your registration.
Only subscribers are eligible to post comments. Please subscribe or login first for digital access. Here’s why.
Use the form below to reset your password. When you've submitted your account email, we will send an email with a reset code.