The Boston Globe from Boston, Massachusetts • 44

D2 Sports Boston Sunday Globe OCTOBER 15, 2006 nun mi iiiiii ii 1 1 milium i inn iiiiniii 11 minimi '1 Kahne sweeps Lowe's Burton retains lead in points NEXT THURSDAY, 7 P.M. Calgary at Boston NESN, WBZ (1030) is Taylor Twellman goes shoulder it ALSO ON THE AIR AUTO RACING TIME TV RADIO ARCA: Prairie Meadows 250 2:30 p.m. Speed I PRO BASEBALL NLCS: New York at St. Louis 8 p.m. Ch.25 890 EXTREME SPORTS Dew Action Sports Tour: PlayStation Pro 2 p.m.

Ch.7 COLLEGE FOOTBALL Boise St. at New Mexico St. 8 p.m. ESPN I PRO FOOTBALL New York Giants at Atlanta 1p.m. Ch.25 Houston at Dallas 1p.m.

Ch.4 Miami at New York Jets 4:15 p.m. Ch.4 Oakland at Denver 8:15 p.m. Ch.7 850 GOLF PGA: Frys.com Open (final rd.) 3 p.m. Ch.5 LPGA: Samsung World Championship (final rd.) 4 p.m. Ch.7 Champions: Administaff Classic (final rd.) 6 p.m.

TGC COLLEGE HOCKEY Michigan St. at Western Michigan 3 p.m. ESPNU PRO HOCKEY AHL: Portland at Manchester 4:05 p.m. 1440 I AHL: Worcester at Lowell 4:05 p.m. 580 PRO SOCCER MLS: Chicago at D.C.

United 5 p.m. ESPN2 llllltEIIIIIIIUIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIHIIIMIHIIinilllMIIIIIIIIIIIIIMIIIIIIMIIIIIIMIIIIIIIIIIItM a m. sports Leg FOOTBALL evolution win i to shoulder with the Crew's Marc 9 HiiiiiHimiiiiiiiiiniiiiMMiiiiiiiiiiiMiiiiii Revolution 1, Crew 0 at Gillette Stadium Cofumbus New England- I 1 Scoring: NE, Khano Smith 1 (Steve Ralston. Clint Dempsey) 88th minute. Shots: Columbus 9, New England 14.

Corner kicks: Columbus New England 6. Offsides: Columbus 4, New England 2. Fouls: Columbus 15, New England 20. Yellow cards: C. loseph Ngwenya 50th, Rusty Pierce 82d; NE, left Larentowicz 40th, Dempsey 68th.

Avery lohn 76th. Saves: Andy Gruenebaum NE, Mart Reis 2. Referee: Michael Kennedy. Attendance: 19,166 (21.000). Lineups NEW ENGLAND Matt Reis: lay Heaps, Michael Parkhurst, Avery John; Steve Ralston, Jeff Larentowicz, Andy Dorman (Jose Cancela 81st), Clint Dempsey.

Joe Franchino (Khano Smith 69th): Jose Manuel Abundis (Daniel Hernandez 69th), Taylor Twellman. COLUMBUS Andy Gruenebaum: Marc Burch, Ezra Hendrickson, Chad Marshall, Rusty Pierce: Joseph Ngwenya (Jacob Thomas 64th), Duncan Oughton, Brandon Moss, Ricardo Virtuoso (Chris Leitch 89th): Eddie Gaven, Jason Ga-rey. Cancela, Daniel Hernandez, and Smith were all involved in threatening maneuvers. Taylor Twellman's shot was tipped over the bar off a Hernandez pass in the 86th minute. A minute later, Cancela was fouled by Marc Burch, then quickly took the free kick to Steve Ralston, who took a touch advancing into the penalty area, then found Clint Dempsey, who one-timed the ball into the goal area for Smith to score his first goal of the season into an empty net.

"They all contributed," Nicol said of the substitutes. "Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. I was more concerned with what was happening behind the ball on the scoring sequence, because if we didn't score, they had been coming at us on the break." The Revolution dominated in the early going. Dempsey had three good chances: a breakaway stopped by Chad Marshall (sixth minute); a close-in blast saved by Andy Gruenebaum off a throw-in (13th); and a 20-yarder wide GAME OCT. 22,1 P.M.

New England at Buffalo Ch.4,WBCN(104.1) secure playoffs By Jenna Fryer ASSOCIATED PRESS CONCORD, N.C. Kasey Kahne did everything right, yet it did little to help his championship hopes. Kahne put on a dominating performance last night to complete a season sweep at Lowe's Motor Speedway, passing track favorite Jimmie Johnson with 26 laps go and pulling away for the victory in the Bank of America 500. But the win his series-leading sixth of the season hardly moved him in the Chase for the Championship standings. He's eighth, 160 points but with five races to go before the Nextel Cup is awarded.

"We're making ground now. We had trouble at the start, but we're down to 160, we've cut it just about in half," Kahne said. "We're doing everything we can, but I think we definitely have the team to do it." Although several Chase contenders had horrible nights including Denny Hamlin, Mark Martin, and Jeff Gordon Jeff Burton is proving to be an excellent points racer and retained his spot atop the stand-ings in spite of a pit road miscue. He finished third and leads Matt Kenseth by 45 points. Kahne led 134 laps tq grab the win, his second this season on the 1.5-mile track.

Johnson, winner of five of the past eight races at Lowe's, finished second again. He moved up 1 point to seventh in the Chase standings. The top half of the standings are still pretty tight, and only 106 points separate Burton and Dale Earnhardt who finished fourth last night and is fifth in the standings. Earnhardt then marveled at what Burton the driver who couldn't find his way to Victory Lane for almost five years before this season has been able to accomplish. "I couldn't catch up to the Ice Man, Jeff Burton," Earnhardt said.

"He's not indestructible, but he's doing a great job." Mayhem broke out 91 laps from the finish during a round of green-flag pit stops. First, Kevin Harvick was caught speeding on pit road. Then Burton, his teammate, stalled exiting his pit stall. As his crew was trying to jump-start Burton by pushing him down pit road, Harvick headed that way to serve his speeding penalty. Meanwhile, out on the track, Martin was attempting to pass J.J.

Yeley on the inside when the rookie cut down toward pit road. The contact sent Martin's car skyrocketing across the track it was off the ground when it hit the wall and came to a stop in a crumpled heap that crippled his chance at taking over the championship standings. Martin had flirted with the points lead, shifting back and forth from first to second in the standings before the accident ended his streak of 37 straight races running at the end. He finished 30th, and is fourth in the standings, 102 out. "The championship is not really something that's meant to be for me ever," he said.

'It's not gonna beat me down. I'm having a good time." When the race restarted with 83 to go, Burton was a lap down, Harvick was two down, and the championship chase was a whole lot tighter. iimiiiiiiiiiHiiiiitiiiiiimiiimiiiMiiii Chasing the Cup Jeff Burton widened his lead with last night's third-place finish In the Bank of America 500. The standings with five races remaining. Pts.

Fin. IW They drop Crew to clinch second By Frank Dell'Apa GLOBE STAFF FOXBOROUGH If there were any doubts the Revolution had perfected the late-season rally, they have been extinguished in recent weeks. The Revolution won their final match of the MLS regular season for the fifth straight season, taking a 1-0 win over the Columbus Crew last night, clinching second place in the Eastern Conference, and extending their unbeaten streak to seven games (5-0-2). Substitute Khano Smith scored in the 87th minute off a sequence started by another substitute, Jose Cancela, as the Revolution (12-8-12, 48 points) concluded the season with their second-highest point total. The Revolution qualified for the playoffs for the fifth consecutive season (after advancing to the postseason just twice in their first six years of existence) and will visit the Chicago Fire at 1 p.m.

next Sunday in the playoff opener. The second game will be at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 28 at Gillette Stadium. The Revolution overtook Chicago for second place with a 2-1 over D.C.

United last week, and a tie last night would have left them vulnerable to the Fire overtaking them with a victory today. "We felt the longer the second half went on, we had to try and do something to win the game," said Revolution coach Steve Nicol. "We didn't want to be sitting around and waiting to see what was going to happen today." Nicol went to the bench late in the second half, and replacements Raiders suspend Porter for four games The Oakland Raiders suspended disgruntled wide receiver Jerry Porter four games without pay yesterday for conduct detrimental to the team. Porter, Oakland's leading receiver a year ago, was inactive for the first four games of the season after clashing with coach Art Shell and making public a trade demand at the start of training j. camp.

"It's crazy," Porter said earlier in the week. "I pretty much stay Squiet and do what I'm asked. What am I supposed to do?" The Carolina Panthers signed guard D'Anthony Batiste and placed line- Jacker Dan Morgan on injured reserve. Morgan announced last week liell miss the rest of the season because of lingering effects of what is at least the sixth concussion of his career, suffered in a ing loss to Atlanta, Batiste, who is 6 feet 4 inches, 318 pounds, had Ibeen on Dallas's practice squad after getting released by the Cowboys in the preseason A 23-year-old man charged with stalking and sending threatening e-mails to Michigan coach Lloyd Carr has been 'ordered to undergo a psychiatric evaluation. Tobi Akinmusuru of Ann CArbor, will be held in the Washtenaw County jail until a com- petency hearing set for Dec.

5 Kendric Smith scored 10 touch- downs, on runs ranging from 1 to 54 yards, and it still wasn't enough for Hughes High School. Smith broke the state record for touch- downs in a game in Lepanto, the last coming in overtime, but Hughes lost, 73-72, Friday night to East Poinsett County. He also scored on runs of 13, 20, 28, 35, 40, 45, 52, and 53 yards while break- tag the Arkansas record of eight touchdowns set by Alvin Bell of Little Rock in 1919 and matched by Chris James of Osceola in 2003. East Poinsett County quarterback Brett Hardin had 835 all-purpose yards. TENNIS -Blake beats Soderling, heads to final Defending champion James Blake edged Robin Soderling, i to reach the Stockholm Open final.

Blake, the second seed, will play Jarkko Nieminen in today's final. Nieminen, seeded fifth, beat -wild card Joachim Johansson, 7-6 (10-8), 6-7 (5-7), 6-3 It's an all- Russian final in the men's and women's events at the Kremlin Cup in Top-seeded Nikolay Davydenko defeated Fabrice Santoro, f6-4, 6-1, and will play Marat Safin, who beat wild card Igor Kunitsyn, 6-4, 6-3, to advance to his first final in Moscow. Nadia Petrova will play Anna Chakvetadze on the women's side. The fifth-seeded Petro-. va beat Nicole Vaidisova, 6-0, 4-6, 7-6 (7-3), and Chakvetadze upset fourth-seeded Elena Dementieva, 7-5, 3-6, 6-0 Defending Ivan Ljubicic will play Fernando Gonzalez in the final of the BA- CA Trophy in Vienna.

Ljubicic cruised past Dominik Hrbaty, 6-1, 6-4, and Gonzalez upset third-seeded Andy Roddick, 6-4, 3-6, 7-6 (7-5) Vania King defeated sixth-seeded Meghann Shaughnessy, 6-1, 6-4, at the Bangkok Open to reach her first career WTA final. King, 17, will meet Tamarine Tanasugarn in the final after Tanasugarn cruised past ninth-seeded Severine Bremond, 6-2, 6-3. HORSE RACING Pletcher has a big day at Belmont Trainer Todd Pletcher set the record for stakes victories in a year and Scat Daddy earned a spot in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile with a win in the $400,000 Champagne Stakes at Belmont Park. Pletcher got -his 93d stakes victory, erasing the mark of 92 set by his former D. Wayne Lukas, in 1987.

Scat Daddy moved into contention with a four-wide move on the turn and dug in to beat Nobiz Like Showbiz by three-quarters of a length in the 135th running of the mile-long Champagne for 2-year-olds. Sutra rallied to win the $400,000 Fri-J "zette, the companion stakes for 2-year-old fillies. She got away eighth a in the 10-horse field, and Mike Luzzi opted to keep her on the rail. When an opening materialized in the lane, Sutra shot through for her second win in three starts. Showing Up showed up seven rivals with a 3Mi-tength win in the $290,000 Jamaica Breeders' Cup Handicap for year-olds on the turf.

The colt, trained by Barclay Tagg and ridden -py Cornelio Velasquez, ran the 1V6 miles on good turf in 1 minute 17.81 seconds Vacare took the lead in the stretch and won the Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup by a half-length at Keeneland in Lexington, to remain unbeaten in four career starts. Also at 'Keeneland, Favorite Gorella accelerated down the stretch with Julien Leparoux aboard to win the $400,000 First lady by a nose over Karen's Caper. Gorella, bred in France, heads to the Breeders' Cup having Avon four of five starts this year, including her last three Pride won -the Champion Stakes at Newmarket, England, beating Rob Roy by 3 lengths, with favorite Hurricane Run finishing third. i v. 1 ri'5 ".1 MICHAEL DWYERASSOCIATED PRESS Burch in the Revolution's win.

(17th). The Crew began retaliating through left wing Ricardo Virtuoso. In the 22d minute, a Rusty Pierce cross for a Jason Garey header was saved by Matt Reis. The Revolution regained momentum late in the half. Jose Manuel Abundis broke through, his shot saved in the 38th minute.

Abundis had two opportunities early in the second half, popping a shot over the crossbar on the rebound of a Dempsey shot in the 49th minute, and skidding a shot through the goal area on a breakaway in the 54 th minute. But the Crew nearly scored first, Duncan Oughton redirecting a free kick over Reis and off the bar in the 55th minute. "We toughed it out and won," Nicol said. "We got rewarded for being a wee bit more adventurous. "I wouldn't want to be playing against our players in the playoffs.

They showed in this last stretch they are committed to each other. They made challenges and supported each other, and, if we can ally that to nice soccer, we will be tough to beat." The Revolution returned to a 3-5-2 formation after switching to a four-man back line in a 2-1 win at D.C. United last week. The three-man defense appeared vulnerable to the advances of Virtuoso. The Revolution, though, stifled Virtuoso by sending several defenders at him, and began pressuring the Crew goal in the late going.

The windy conditions and difficult playing surface contributed to a choppy game. "All that matters is we are getting results," Twellman said. "We were playing good soccer early and not getting results. Now we have to get a result in Chicago." playoffs return to action until August. "I have been healthy for a long time," Smith said.

"I have just been waiting my opportunity. We wanted to finish second in the Eastern Conference and it is nice that we are pulling wins out late. We did that last year and it's nice to start doing that again." Happy return Revolution defender Avery John returned to Revolution training Friday after setting up the first goal of the game as Trinidad Tobago took a 2-1 win over Panama in an exhibition in Port of Spain Wednesday. Kenwyne Jones scored off a John clearance and Stern John added another goal for the Soca Warriors Revolution midfielder Miguel Gonzalez scored for the second straight game as the US Under-20 national team took a 5-1 win over Haiti in Sunrise, Wednesday The Revolution's season-concluding records the last five years: 5-1-1 (2002); 6-0-1 ('03); 3-4-0 ('04); 3-2-2 ('05); 5-0-2 ('06). Frank Dell'Apa can be reached at Joseph running toward By Frank Dell'Apa GLOBE STAFF FOXBOROUGH Shalrie Joseph is ready to return for the Revolution's playoff run.

Joseph, who injured finger ten- dons in his right hand in a nightclub incident Sept. 14, has been training on his own and plans to rejoin full practice with the team this week. "I've been cleared to practice next week," said Joseph, who had a cast removed from the hand before last night's 1-0 Revolution victory over Columbus. "I have been training the last two weeks, running and stuff. I have lost some fitness and I am not going to be as sharp as I was." The Revolution have a seven-match unbeaten streak (5-0-2) overall and a five-match unbeaten streak (4-0-1) without Joseph.

Previously, the team had won only once in 12 games over three seasons without Joseph in the lineup. "It shows we have great depth on this team and no matter who goes out we can replace them," Joseph said, 't has been a pleasure REVOLUTION NOTEBOOK MISCELLANY to watch. I have been really mad about missing games but I am not surprised. We have leaders and coaches on this team who pull everyone together." Joseph said his injury "could have been avoided. I was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

I have to learn to be smart and make better decisions in my life. I earn my paycheck with my body and I have to make sure I am taking care of it." Joseph was named the Revolution defender of the year. Matt Reis was named most valuable player and Taylor Twellman won the golden boot. Michael Parkhurst (humanitarian) Slid Andy Dorman (Midnight Riders man of the year) were also honored. Opportunity knocked Khano Smith's 87th-minute goal made the difference for the Revolution last night.

Smith last scored for the Revolution in a 3-1 win over the MetroStars in the second leg of a 3-2 total-goals victory in the playoffs last season at Gillette Stadium. But Smith sustained a knee injury in the final minutes of that match and did not I 2 With win, Red Bulls Amado Guevara scored his third career hat trick to lead New York Ito a 3-2 win over the Kansas City Wizards in East Rutherford, N.J., and put the Red Bulls into the Major League Soccer playoffs. The Red ''Bulls (9-11-12) got the fourth and final spot in the Eastern Confer- ence playoffs Jacob Peterson scored from in close in the 88th minute in Houston to give Colorado a 3-3 tie with the Dynamo and clinch a playoff spot for the Rapids The Providence Bruins defeat- ed the visiting Manchester Monarchs, 1-0, on Matt Lashoff first-pe- riod goal Mykolai Rudyk, 32, had to sprint to ward off a late- charging opponent, winning the United Technologies Greater Hart- ford Marathon. Rudyk, from Ukraine, held off Jonathan Ndambuki of Kenya to win in 2 hours 18 minutes 40 seconds. Ndambuki finished Itwo seconds behind Rudyk.

Anastasiya Padalinskaya, 23, of Belarus, "won the women's event 1. Jeff Burton 5,763 3 1 2. Matt Kenseth 5,718 14 2 3. Kevin Harvick 5,674 18 4 4. Mark Martin 5.661 30 3 5.

D.Earnhardt Jr. 5,657 4 6 6. Denny Hamlin 5,626 28 5 7. J. Johnson 5,617 2 8 8.

Kasey Kahne 5.603 1 9 9. KyleBusch 5.568 6 10 10. Jeff Gordon 5,547 24 7 com, 4,.