Sports Briefs: Austin, women's golf coach at UNC, plans to step down

CHAPEL HILL -- Sally Austin, the women's golf coach at North Carolina, said yesterday that she will step down at the end of the season to pursue other interests and to spend more time with her family. She has served as North Carolina's coach for the past 16 years.

With Austin as coach, the Tar Heels have finished in the top 25 at the NCAA Tournament six times. They have won six tournament titles and seven players have won 14 individual championships while during Austin's tenure. She has coached five All-Americas.

Austin, from Raeford, became the head coach of the Tar Heels after the 1992-93 season, when Dot Gunnells retired.

She graduated from North Carolina in 1977 as a four-year letter winner on the women¹s golf team.

Austin, winner of the 1979 North Carolina Women's Amateur Championship, also won tournaments on the Women's Professional Golf Tour and the Futures Tour.

She received her LPGA Tour card in 1987.

More golf

■ The world's top-ranked female golfer will try to give her hometown fans a reason to celebrate when the first Lorena Ochoa Invitational begins today at the Guadalajara Country Club.

Ochoa tees off a few minutes past noon today alongside Sophia Sheridan and Paula Creamer, who follows her in the Player of the Year rankings and on the money list. Ochoa has 314 points and $2.7 million in winnings, while Creamer has 170 points and $1.8 million.

Basketball

■ Boys teams from Mount Tabor and Winston-Salem Prep will play big early-season games Saturday in the Winston-Salem Basketball Classic at Joel Coliseum.

Winston-Salem Prep, which has three starters back from a team that won last season's NCHSAA 1-A title, will play Wilson Cheris Prep at 6 p.m., and Mount Tabor, which features Wake Forest signee C.J. Harris and two other returning starters, will play Goldsboro Wayne Country Day at 8 p.m.

Wayne Country Day features Reco McCarter, a 6-7 junior guard who is being recruited by ACC programs. Cheris Prep features Keith DeWitt, a 6-10 center who has committed to Missouri.

Anyone interested in ticket information can call Joel Coliseum at 336-725-5635.

■ Coach Vanessa Taylor of Johnson C. Smith yesterday announced the hiring of Ronnie Enoch as acting assistant women's coach. Enoch replaces Stephen Joyner, Jr. who left for a similar position at Florida A&M. Enoch will also serve as the assistant bowling coach.

Enoch served as the second assistant coach at J.C. Smith for the past four years. Before J.C. Smith, Enoch was an assistant coach at West Charlotte and Parkland High Schools.

■ Jerry Colangelo, who assembled the U.S. team that won the Olympics men's basketball gold medal, was elected yesterday as chairman of USA Basketball's Board of Directors for the 2009-12 term.

Colangelo spent the past three years as the managing director of the senior national team, implementing a program with a three-year commitment that culminated with the Americans' victory over Spain in the gold-medal game in Beijing. The American men hadn't won a major gold medal since the 2000 Olympics.

Miscellaneous

■ J. Lin Dawson, a former NFL player, was hired yesterday as athletics director for Grambling State.

He takes over an athletics department that fields 18 varsity programs and competes in the Southwestern Athletic Conference.

Sharon Perkins had been interim athletics director since Troy Mathieu resigned in July.

Dawson, who played at N.C. State, was drafted by the New England Patriots in 1981 and started in the 1986 Super Bowl against the Chicago Bears.

He also served as athletic director at N.C. Central and spent three years at Virginia Commonwealth University as an adjunct professor in the school's graduate sports-management program.

■ Roger Federer kept his hopes alive for a fifth Masters Cup title yesterday in Shanghai, China, by beating Radek Stepanek 7-6 (4), 6-4.

Stepanek was playing in the place of Andy Roddick, who withdrew from the tournament earlier yesterday with a sprained ankle.

after losing his opening match Monday. Roddick said his injury did not appear to be serious, but that it left him unable to be competitive in Shanghai.

■ Rafael Nadal might want to skip the trip to Argentina to be a cheerleader for Spain at the Davis Cup final.

Emilio Sanchez Vicario, captain of the Spanish team, said his country will stand a better chance if Nadal, the world's No. 1 player -- injured and unable to compete -- isn't courtside for the championship in Mar del Plata on Nov. 21-23. He said Nadal would pose too much of a distraction.

"I think he's too big media-wise," Sanchez Vicario said yesterday. "When he wants to be there, he wants to be there to compete. He's always center and he's a leader, so I will miss him there, but obviously we have great players. ... They have enough personality to take this team and help it forget about Rafa."

■ European champion Spain remained No. 1 in FIFA's soccer rankings yesterday, followed by Germany, Italy and the Netherlands. The United States dropped to No. 24, tops in its regional group.

England advanced to No. 10 among the world's soccer elite, moving up four places. Coach Fabio Capello's team fell from the top 10 in July after failing to qualify for the European Championship.

The Americans moved down three places to No. 24, with CONCACAF rival Mexico at No. 25.

The next rankings are scheduled to be released on Dec. 17.

■ Peter Marshall has done it again, this time breaking the short-course record in the 50-meter backstroke at a World Cup meet in Stockholm, Sweden.

Marshall won the 50 backstroke in 23.05 seconds yesterday, beating Australian Robert Hurley's mark of 23.24. Another American, Randall Bal, also went under Hurley's time for second place at 23.07.

Therese Alshammar of Sweden also set a record yesterday in the women's 50-meter butterfly in 25.31 seconds, topping the 25.32 by Australia's Felicity Galvez.