The Miami News from Miami, Florida • 11

w. 4 I can; says Yancey; for less he won't settle iv. Mf By BILL SEARBY Miami Newt Special Writer AUGUSTA, Ga. Bert Yancey wants to win the Masters golf championship so badly he risked suspension to get the jump on the rest of the players. He is sorry about ducking out of last week's Greensboro Open, but a green jacket is a green jacket.

The intensity with which Yancey attacks the Augusta National Golf course and even his mental replay In the stroke by stroke recounting the round for Interviewers is unmistakable. He is not here to play for second place. He says', "I can win here" in plain English, and he says it in his actions. Yancey went boldly at the course yesterday a little too boldly on two holes and came away with a two-under par 70. He is tied for first place with Gene Littler at 139, five under par heading into today's third round.

"I just love the place," Yancey said. "I don't know why a person can play his best at one golf course rather than at some other one, but I seem to do well here. I know I can put four good rounds together here some day and win." The burning urge to get here a few days early and put himself in the right frame of mind prompted him to become a Greensboro dropout. "I had shot 78 in the round," he said, "and I felt okay. I wasn't hurt or sick or anything.

I just wanted to come on down to Augusta and work on my putting, I wanted out of that tournament. (The original Thursday start was pur off a day by rain). Somehow I just felt it was important to get here. I went to the sponsor and told him just that. I didn't lie.

I know is some penalty "for pulling out of a tournament without just cause. But I left anyway. "It was a bad tiling to do, and I would never do it again. I had committed myself to play and I should have stayed and tried my hardest to make the cut. I have no excuse and I certainly can't condone my action.

It is just this sort of obsession to be here and to get started. I don't know about the penalty. I have to see Mr. Dey later." Joe Dey, commissioner of the PGA's tournament player division, fixed- the penalty at a fine of $150. "Bert thought he had the sponsor's permission to withdraw" Dey said, "but he did not.

It was simply a misunderstanding. We are satisfied that his intentions were good and we are just applying a routine fine of $150." Suspension was a possibility, to the discretion of the commissioner, depending on the gravity of the circumstances. Yancey, chewing gum rapidly, Mistered the tough 11th, 12th and 13th holes for birdies. Fourteen was a routine enough par, but he gambled on the stretched out 15th. "I put a good drive out there and then I went for the green," Yancey said.

"There was a little breeze against me and it probably wasn't worth the risk. Anyway. I knocked the ball across the water, but I missed the green. I chipped up but missed the five-footer for the birdie anyway. "At 16 1 got greedy.

I have been playing that hole (190 yards par three) so well (eight birdie two's in his last nine tournaments tries). I got a little too confident and tried to cut a four iron right into the flag. I missed the green so far I had to chip back from some pine needles and I felt fortunate to get away with a bogey four. Yancey has yet to win his first major championship, an oversight he would like Continued on Page 2B, Col. 4 Associated Presa Wlrephote 3Iaking ihe sand fly, blasters co-leatler Bert Yancey blasts from trap The Miami News SPORTS ON TV Third round of the Masters, 5 p.m., Ch.

4. Complete schedule in scoreboard Page 2B. INSIDE STORY Ransom's Harris Masterson t-: soft serves way into District 8 tennis finals. Page 3B. 31iami, Fla.

Saturday Afternoon, April 11 1970 Section aiVfX V- J4 lAV 1o i i fa 'i: Report says ABA agrees to a merger Tha Associated Press WASHINGTON The American Basketball Association has agreed to pay $11 million indemnity to the National Basketball Association in the forthcoming merger of the leagues, the Washington Post said last night. In a report from Pittsburgh, Post writer Mark Asher said the NBA had been hoping to get $1 million each from the ABA's 11 teams since merger talks began last August. The money will be paid out over 10 years. The ABA had hoped to sign Pete Maravich of Louisiana State and thereby bring down the price, the story said. But Maravich has signed with the NBA's Atlanta Hawks.

It was also agreed that the ABA would get any television money it comes up with from CBS, but would share receipts if ABC had exclusive rights. The NBA has an exclusive three-year-pact with ABC. The ABA also will give up its 15 per cent of the gate for visiting teams, the story said. 4 ,4 fpv I Miami News Photo by SAL CRISANTI Harold Fox left, and Eddie Thomas with U-M cheerleaders at airport The Fox trots to traveling music AL LEVINE I iWt I V- where there is enthusiasm for basketball and where there is a. good future for basketball, not necessarily a strong basketball tradition." He said Miami is high on his list.

Maybe the kid sees things in Coral Gables that some of us have overlooked. "Harold Fox personally says that where he goes he will play on the national champion," said Bob Guy, Miami's assistant coach and Fox's confidante. "If he goes here he's saying that he thinks we'll go all the way." Miami has its letter-of-intent ready for Harold's signature but right now Fox isn't signing any one-way tickets to anyplace. It's too much fun playing tourist. Say, Harold, have you checked out the hippie scene in Coconut Grove? his thing, and get a degree in public relations.

"I'm looking for a place that has a good academic program," he said, sounding like a public relations major. "And a good social life, The embarrassment is mutual The Associated Presa SOUTH LYON, Mich. South Lyon High School's baseball team opened its season Thursday and lost to Northville, 24-0. Yesterday, South Lyon played Whkmore Lake and won, 24-1. The game was called after four and one-half innings as a gesture of mercy.

"I know how they felt," said South Lyon coach Richard Moon. "I felt the same way the day before." After checking out of 7 the sights in Jacksonville, Tallahassee, Lawrence, and El Paso, Texas, Harold Fox arrived in Miami yesterday with a travel brochure of Los Angeles under his arm. "I'd like to see Disneyland when I get to California," Fox said, "and I want to go to that place where the hippies hang out, the Sunset Strip." Harold's odyssey will eventually take him to a place where he will play major college basketball. He could trip around the United States until next winter, he's that popular. This weekend the University of Miami is his valet, next week it's UCLA.

A 6-2 guard who has scored 1510 points the last two. years at Brevard Junior College and who has played on the winning side 175 times in 192 games since junior is especially popular because as a junior college transfer Fox, has served his apprenticeship and; can step in as a starter most everywhere he chooses. This is a new kind of game for Harold Fox, pick-and- play, and he's enjoying the hell out of it. When he was a hero at Northwestern High School In Hyattsville, the world seemingly was a basketball Harold could manipulate whichever way he wanted. And then he almost lost it all.

A week after Fox had helped Northwestern take its second straight state title, as a senior, a door slammed on the tip of the middle finger of his right hand. "I remember somebody picked up the tip of the finger and carried it to the doctor in alcohol," Fox said. "They wrapped my finger in guaze and cotton and the thing that killed me was five doctors came by to see the finger and each one unwrapped it. Hurt like heck. Finally, this one doctor asked me if I wanted to have the finger amputated at the joint or try a skin graft.

I guess he didn't know I played basketball. I said I'd try the skin graft" So a surgeon made an incision in his palm, sewed the fin- ger together and inserted the finger into the palm, covering the wrist with a cast which would remain with Fox for nearly two months. A month later. Fox tried to play again. The tip of the middle finger was bent to the right but when he began drib-.

bing and shooting Harold found his career was not in jeop- ardy. Come and get me, he said, looking for the, recruiters. The recruiters had been stymied by a minor technicality. Harold's grades. "In high school," Fox said, "1 never really thought about grades.

I just thought about basketball. I just did enough to get by. When I felt like it, I stayed home." Legend has it that Fox was so big at Northwestern High that the only time anyone got concerned was when Harold didn't make a basketball or football practice. The student body got a sign from a neighborhood thoroughfare Fox Street and put it in the corridor where Harold has his home room, naming the hallway in his honor. "The real Fox Street," he confessed, "was named after some other Fox." U'" Harold was such a natural athlete in high school that he was persuaded to go out for the football team in his senior year and wound up as the starting quarterback.

But practices were a drag and he quit coming around. The football coach, the story goes, couldn't see cutting such a natural talent so he switched Harold to defensive back, a position the coach felt Fox could play without much practice. It may have been kicks for Harold back then. He has grown up to realize that it was wrong. He sees how he has hurt himself.

"in junior college," he said, "I learned that if you want to achieve a goal you've got to have the grades." Harold's immediate goal is finding the right place to do The Denver Rockets, so disorganized at the start of the season some critics advised them to play their games by mail, clinched the ABA Western division crown last night with a 145-141 victory overy the Miami Florid-ians. The Rockets were in last place Dec. 11 when Joe Belmont took over the team from John McLendon. But behind fiery rookie Spencer Haywood and veteran Larry Jones, the Rockets caught fire, and compiled a 40-14 record, with a 30 and 2 mark at home. Now the Rockets hold a 4'2 game lead over the Washington Capitols, and just two games left on the schedule both on the home court.

Haywood rammed through 44 points and Jones added 29 in the championship victory before 7,148 fans the 20th sellout of the season. Actually, the Rockets had clinched the division title at halftime, when it was announced Washington had been knocked off by Pittsburgh, 132-124. "But it was more important that we won than it was that Washington lost," Belmont said. The peppery coach said he tried to stop the announcement of the Washington score at half-time. "I was too late," he said.

just wanted our guys to feel like they had won it and not backed into it." But Belmont said when he took over the team in December he believed the club had championship talent. "I honestly expected to win it. I thought then we had the best players in the league so why not!" The Rockets meet the New Orleans Bucs tomorrow afternoon, and close the regular season against the Los Angeles Stars Wednesday. The Floridians, winding Continued on Page 3 PETE MARAVICH Hot Angels play devil vith rivals Tha Associated Presa The California Angels are playing the devil with opposing pitchers. Led by Roger Repoz, Alex Johnson, Joe Azcue and Bill Voss, the Angels pounded out 14 hits in beating the Kansas City Royals 11-7 last night to boost their record to 3-0 and their hit total to 40.

Repoz got the Angels started with a two-run homer, his first in the second inning. Johnson, Azcue and Voss also drove in two runs each. Boston topped Washington 4-1 at night and Baltimore nipped Detroit 3-2 in 10 innings and the Chicago White Sox edged Milwaukee 5-4 in other daytime American League action. After Repoz belted his homer, the Angels added one run each in the third and fourth and then erupted for five in the fifth to build up a 9-1 lead for winner Clyde Wright. Kansas City fought back with three runs off Wright in the sixth and three unearned tallies off Rudy May in the seventh.

Ed Kirkpatrick Continued on Page 4B, Col yv. vv fir a a v. -X i m- zi ffMSiliillilP 1 Miami News Photo By NATHAN BENN All in a row over hurdle they go There wasn't much to choose between the seven competitors in the 120-yard high hurdles in the junior varsity division of the GMAC track meet yesterday. They crossed this hurdle almost as a team. Southwest edged Jackson for the junior, varsity championship.

Story on Page 3B..