Messenger-Inquirer from Owensboro, Kentucky • 12

4D Sports MESSENGER-INQUIRER, Tuesday. August 12. 2003 COLLEGE FOOTBALL: OHIO STATE Clarett meets with school's AD Suspended Ohio State running I back Maurice Clarett, second from right, and attorney Scott Schiff, right, together with Clarett's mother, Michelle Clarett, left, and NFL Hall of Famer Jim -Brown, leave Ohio State University on Monday in -Columbus, after meeting with Ohio State athletic director Andy Geiger. Associated Press I -l By Jonathan Drew Associated Press COLUMBUS. Ohio Maurice Clarett met with Ohio State athletic director Andy Geiger and NCAA officials on Monday, and the running back said he believed he would return to practice this week.

Clarett is being held out of practice with the defending national champions because of investigations by the NCAA and the university. "I believe 111 be able to start practicing back again this week." Clarett said in an interview with ESPN. "Things seem like they went very well. I'm cooperating with the university, and the NCAA is cooperating with me and I think everyone is happy with things." Geiger said the three-hour meeting did not involve the university's academic investigation of Clarett but declined to provide further details. The meeting was not a sign that the university was any closer to deciding Clarett's status, Geiger said.

A 10-member university committee is investigating a teaching assistant's claim that Clarett walked out of a midterm exam last fall and later passed the course by taking an oral exam. He is under investigation by the NCAA for use of a 2001 Chevrolet Monte Carlo that was broken into while on overnight loan from a car dealership. In a police report, Clarett said he had lost more than $6,000 in clothing, cash and stereo equipment in the theft. He later acknowledged that he had exaggerated his losses to police. Clarett set a record for Ohio State freshmen last year by rushing for 1,237 yards.

He scored the winning touchdown in the second overtime of the Fiesta Bowl to give the Buckeyes a 31-24 win over Miami and their first national tide in 34 years. Geiger said none of the members of the university investigative committee were at the meeting, which was attended by Hall of Fame running back Jim Brown and Clarett's attorney, Scott Schift Brown, who met Clarett at an awards dinner, said he was there to support Clarett and his mother. AUTO RACING: INDY RACING LEAGUE COLLEGE FOOTBALL: MARYLAND A.J. Foyt IV facing high expectations Terps hit by NCAA for rules violation 1 1 I "a a 1-1 i -i Young racer has Kentucky roots By Mike Torralba Associated Press SPARTA Had he not moved from Kentucky to Texas when he was 6, A.J. Foyt IV might not be competing in the Belterra Casino 300 at Kentucky Speedway this weekend.

The 19-year-old grandson of four-time Indy 500 winner A.J. Foyt Jr. doesn't give a second thought to what might have been. Sure, he spent his earliest years milling about the stables at Churchill Downs alongside his horse-trainer father and watching the afternoon races with his mom and dad. He saddled up for the first time when he was 5.

He even hung around jockeys such as Pat Day and rode a quarter horse named Blackie, a gift from Grandpa. Ask him today, though, and he'll tell you he's a Texan. And hell draw a blank when asked what he'd be doing if he weren't driving for his grandfather's IndyCar team. "When I came to Texas, that's when I first started racing," he said in a telephone interview. "I don't know if I'd really started racing if I'd lived in Kentucky." He was 9 and living in Hockley, outside Houston, when a family friend bought him a junior dragster.

Racing became his passion from then on. Despite the expectations that come with the family name, Foyt IV isn't worried he hasn't finished better than 15th in eleven races. "I think I'm just going from race to race and just trying to concentrate on one race at a time," he said. The two main obstacles, he says, are adjusting to the delicate handling of the No. 14 DallaraToyota and communicating with his grandfather and the rest of the pit crew.

"This car is just way more sensitive," Foyt IV said. "They got a really fine point where they need to be, and if you don't get there, it's going to be tough on you." But as he gets a better feel for the car, the give-and-take Associated Press By Stephen Manning Associated Press BALTIMORE Maryland was placed on one year of probation by the NCAA on Monday because an assistant football coach committed a "major" violation by giving money to a high school recruit The NCAA's infractions committee determined that coach Rod Sharpless gave heralded prospect Victor Abiamiri cash in amounts ranging from $5 to $200 five different times in order to gain an edge in the recruiting competition. Sharpless "formed a pattern of deliberate violations with a prospect of elite stature that spanned virtually the entire period the assistant coach was permitted to recruit the prospect under NCAA rules," according to a statement released by the NCAA. The committee found another coach gave a player a T-shirt and hat worth $20, a move the NCAA deemed a "secondary" infraction. But Maryland escaped serious punishment for the violations, largely because of actions the school took after the allegations arose.

It forced Sharpless to resign and stopped recruiting both players involved, steps the NCAA called "commendable." Most punishments for major infractions involve at least two years of probation and often include a ban from postseason play or cuts in funding, said Thomas Yeager, chairman of the infractions committee. "A one-year probation is about as short as it gets," he said. Under the probation terms, Maryland will have to develop an educational program on NCAA rules and make periodic reports to the body that governs intercollegiate athletics. After it comes off the probation, which began Monday, any future infractions will be subject to NCAA repeat offender rules. "I think the NCAA recognizes that we have institutional control here," head coach Ralph Fried-gen said.

There was no effort to deceive the NCAA." A.J. Foyt IV, left, listens to his grandfather, racing legend A.J. Foyt after taking the pole during qualifying for the Infiniti Series race last year at Kentucky Speedway in Sparta. Foyt will be competing in the Belterra Casino 300 at Kentucky Speedway this weekend. becomes smoother, he and his grandfather say.

"I said, "You make some of your own Foyt Jr. said. "I make him tell me what the car's doing and things like that and explain when I make a change, the car might do this now. "I make him go out with the change it's a small change but now then you tell me what it did. And he's really learned on that quite a bit." Foyt IV earned four poles and won as many races in the inaugural season of the IRL's developmental Infiniti Pro Series.

He clinched the championship at Texas Motor Speedway. But the big league hasn't been easy on him, though he never thought it would be. He's had to meet the expectations of fellow drivers, the fans and the media, all in the face of some of the toughest competition around. And that's not to mention the expectations of his grandfather, who leans on him hard while fending off outside critics. "You never ease up on none of 'em," Foyt Jr.

said. "Nobody ever eased up on me. I'm gonna treat him just like I would treat anybody else." One of the low points for Foyt IV this season was at Col behind winner Helio Castron-eves. Afterward, some of the other drivers and team owners grumbled that Foyt got in their way when he was down several laps. The elder Foyt said a faulty radio hampered communications and led to his grandson's problems.

The youngster will learn, the grandfather says. "I think the first year, I finished something like 29th in points," Foyt Jr. said. "Anytime you're a rookie, you're going to struggle. He's really been holding his own pretty good considering everything, and he's run a lot faster in some than when I ran." orado's Pikes Peak International Raceway in June.

He was forced out in the 41st lap. "I just really couldn't get the car handling right where I felt comfortable in the car and just didn't do well in the race," he said. "I was just trying to give (the crew) the best feedback I could, and we just never really got the car to where it needed to be." The race that made his grandfather an icon in the sport wasn't kind to the younger Foyt either. He crashed twice in practice for the Indy 500. On race day also his 19th birthday he drove to 18th place, 11 laps COMMENTARY: BOXING Death of a boxer: Who should be allowed to fight? Sports most respected figure, an administrator who genuinely cares for fighters and isn't afraid to stop those he thinks might get hurt It doesn't always work.

Last year, Pedro Alcazar died during a title fight on the Las Vegas Strip. But Rone was banned from fighting in Nevada three years ago. He lived in Las Vegas, sparred at local gyms but had to go on the road to Rone's last fight took place less than 50 miles from the Nevada border, against a guy he had just fought and a guy he knew he wouldn't beat Rone had been fighting for 14 years, but the last time he won a fight was when he beat Kevin Rosier in a four-round decision at a Michigan casino in 1999. Rone never really had any promise as a fighter. He started in 1989 as a 173-pounder and lost his first four bouts.

He was knocked out in three of them, two of those in the first round. When Rone died, he was 86 pounds heavier, a By Tim Dahlberg Associated Press Brad Rone took his last fight so he could have enough money to attend his mother's funeral. He ended up being buried next to her, in matching cream-colored coffins. Rone died last month in an outdoor ring in a small Utah town, where fans yelled at him to get up after he collapsed late in the first round. A punch didn't kill him, but you could say boxing did.

The portly 34-year-old heavyweight held assorted jobs but made his real living being what is known in the sport as an opponent, someone who could be counted on for a few rounds against a local favorite or an up-and-coming fighter. He wasn't supposed to win, and he rarely did. Rone had lost 26 straight when he got into the ring that night against Billy Zumbrun, a Utah fighter of little note who beat Rone a few months earlier. He was there for an $800 payday, money he wanted to use to get to Cincinnati for the funeral of his mother, who died of a heart attack a day earlier. Instead, Rone's life came to an get a fight "I can't put guys with those kind of records in fights, and I don't" Ratner said.

Rone traveled with gusto, going as far as Germany and Denmark to get fights. This year alone he end at the Cellar Raceway Park, where a temporary boxing ring had been erected for a night of four fights in Cedar City. In between fights, motocross riders kept the sparse crowd entertained on the raceway's dirt track. Rone never seemed to get hit by a telling punch before collapsing. rYeliminary results revealed he may have died of a heart problem that he might have just as easily suffered running the bases in a pickup softball game.

Rone's death, though, begs the obvious questions, even if getting hit in the head didn't kill him: What was a guy who was 0-27-1 in his last 28 fights doing in the ring? And what can be done to keep other Brad Rones who crisscross the country in search of fights from risking their lives for a few hundred dollars? "He was just a sparring partner type of guy," said Marc Ratner, executive director of the Nevada Athletic Commission. "I didn't even know he was still fighting." That goes to the heart of one of the biggest problems in a sport with a lot of big problems. Ratner is perhaps the sport's punch that seemed to do no damage. The bell rang and before Rone could reach his corner, he crumpled to the canvas. The ring doctor couldn't find a pulse.

He tried mouth-to-mouth resuscitation while another doctor pounded on his chest It was no use. Rone was already dead. Rone's July 18 death came at a time when U.S. Sen. John McCain is pushing legislation to form a federal boxing commission to oversee the sport A few days after he died, the General Accounting Office issued a report saying the lack of consistency among state commissions does not assure boxers of being protected.

A national commission could have protected Rone by taking a look at his record and not allowing him to fight He might have died anyway, but not in the ring. Ironically, Rone accomplished something by dying that he couldn't do while boxing. Because he died, the fight was ruled a no contest His losing streak ended at 26 fights. Zumbrun would later tell people Rone lacked his usual strength. The two were opponents, but they were also friends.

V. JENNINGS big teddy bear kind of guy who was so distracted by his mother's death that he forgot to bring his boxing socks when he drove up from Las Vegas for the fight Zumbrun would later tell people Rone lacked his usual strength. The two were opponents, but they were also friends. In the last seconds of the first round, Zumbrun hit Rone with a 691-7312 fought in Idaho, Utah, Oklahoma and twice in California. Boxing regulators in those states knew his record, yet allowed him to fight In California, they made him take a physical and neurological exam, and he was tested for HIV and hepatitis before being licensed.

In Utah, he passed a pre-fight physical..