ARSENAL CAPTURES DERBY OVER TOTTENHAM

It says a lot about Arsenal’s struggles that not even a first north London derby win in more than two years does much for its Premier League targets.

Even after coming from behind to beat Tottenham 2-1, Arsenal is in 10th place and 10 points from the top four.

Alexandre Lacazette captained Arsenal with PierreEmerick Aubameyang out of the starting lineup following a breach of pre-match protocols.

Emile Smith Rowe was unfortunate not to open the scoring for Arsenal when his shot came back off the crossbar with goalkeeper Hugo Lloris beaten. And Tottenham substitute

Erik Lamela, on for the injured

Son Heung-min, took full advantage with an audacious “rabona” shot from Lucas Moura’s layoff 12 minutes before the break.

Arsenal leveled with a minute of the first half remaining when Martin Odegaard’s shot clipped defender Toby Alderweireld and eluded Lloris.

Lacazette put the hosts ahead from the spot in the second half after being felled by

Davinson Sanchez’s untidy challenge before Lamela was dismissed for a second bookable offense for recklessly swinging his arm at Arsenal defender Kieran Tierney.

The more significant results on Sunday in the Champions

League chase were victories for Manchester United and Leicester, which both pulled further clear.

United, which is 14 points behind leader Manchester City in second, beat fifth-place West Ham 1-0. Leicester remains a point behind United after routing Sheffield United 5-0. Chelsea is now five points further back in fourth after only managing a draw on Saturday.

Local colleges

The San Diego State softball team (12-5) rallied from an eight-run deficit for a walk-off 9-8 victory over Saint Mary’s (812) in nine innings at SDSU Softball Stadium.

• The USD bullpen came through in the Toreros’ 5-4, 10inning baseball victory to complete a home sweep over UC Riverside. USD (11-3) has now won eight games in a row.

• The San Diego State baseball team had what longtime Aztecs call a “rally on the Mesa,” scoring six runs in the seventh inning Sunday for an 8-6 win over UNLV at Tony Gwynn Stadium. The rally enabled SDSU (9-4, 4-2 Mountain West) to take the series against the Rebels (6-3, 6-3).

• The UC San Diego baseball team (3-8) achieved a stunning split of its four-game series with Santa Clara by scoring seven runs over the final three innings in a 10-9 victory at

Triton Ballpark.

Locally

The San Diego Gulls (9-9) lost their fourth straight AHL game, 3-2 to first-place Henderson (11-2) at Irvine.

• The San Diego Sockers saw three leads evaporate, eventually falling in suddendeath overtime to the Tacoma Stars 5-4 at Ontario in MASL play.

Tennis

Top-seeded Daniil Medvedev was pushed to three sets by doubles specialist PierreHugues Herbert in the Open 13 final at Marseille, France, winning 6-4, 6-7 (4), 6-4 for his 10th career title on the eve of his move up to second in the rankings.

• Kei Nishikori came back from a set down to beat Reilly Opelka in the first round of the Dubai Championships, while

Jo-Wilfried Tsonga retired from his match. Nishikori won 3-6, 6-3, 6-4 to set up a secondround match with David Goffin. Tsonga was 3-3 in the first set with Tunisian wild card

Malek Jaziri when the French player retired.

• Four-time Grand Slam champion Kim Clijsters withdrew from upcoming tournaments in Miami and Charleston, a setback in her comeback following right knee surgery and a bout with COVID-19.

Also

Austrian skier Marco Schwarz locked up the men’s World Cup slalom title, finishing seventh in a race in Slovenia won by Clement Noel. The result gave Schwarz an insurmountable lead of 122 points over his only remaining challenger in the discipline standings, Ramon Zenhausern, with only next week’s slalom at the finals in Switzerland coming up.

• Dallas Seavey was leading the Iditarod, positioning himself to tie one other musher for the most wins ever in the world’s most famous sled dog race.

Seavey, a four-time winner, was the first musher in this year’s Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race to reach the last checkpoint, in the community of Skwentna. He checked in just before 1 p.m. Sunday.

• After losing last year’s Tour de France on the last decisive stage, Primoz Roglic failed in his bid to win the Paris-Nice race after crashing early in the final stage. The overnight leader seemed certain to triumph at the week-long race after winning three stages. But the Slovenian fell after 22 kilometers (15.5 miles) of the eighth stage and lost valuable time as German rider

successfully

Washington Nationals pitcher Stephen Strasburg left his second spring training start in the third inning Sunday because of a problem with his left calf that he called “nothing major.”

The 2019 World Series MVP, whose 2020 season was cut to just five innings because he needed carpal tunnel surgery on his right wrist, said his calf “grabbed” as he stood on that leg at the end of his pitching motion.

“Just kind of more of a precautionary thing and just kind of take it day-to-day and see how it feels (today),” said Strasburg, who allowed one hit, struck out four and walked one in 21⁄3 scoreless innings of Washington’s 5-0 loss to the Houston Astros.

“Luckily, I feel like I’m a fast healer,” he said, “so I don’t think it would be something that could be a prolonged absence.”

Manager Dave Martinez and trainer Paul Lessard went out to the mound to check on the right-hander before he left the game.

“There was really not much of a discussion,” Martinez said. “Just wanted to pinpoint exactly what he was feeling. Other than that, he was coming out of the game. We’re in spring training. There’s no sense in pushing it.”

Strasburg said he was looked at by a team doctor and had an ultrasound exam.

He threw 45 pitches and said that before the calf became problematic, his fastball and changeup felt better than they did in his initial Grapefruit League outing five days earlier.

“I didn’t really feel it at all except for that last pitch, where I kind of felt it simultaneously as I was finishing the pitch,” Strasburg said.

“I’ve had my calves cramping up on me in the past and I’ve pitched through that,“he said. “This was definitely something a little different, but not something I couldn’t have pitched through if it was a bigger game, I guess.” Opening day is April 1. “My concern is just keeping him on a five-day schedule right now,” Martinez said.

“If he wakes up tomorrow sore or something, he might be held back,” the manager said. “We’ll see what happens (today).”

Boone ‘awesome’

Yankees manager Aaron Boone is into his second full week on the bench after having a pacemaker inserted and says he’s feeling “awesome.”

Boone had the procedure done at St. Joseph’s Hospital in Tampa, Fla., on March 3 and was back on the job after missing just three games.

“Just a lot different, honestly,” Boone said before Sunday’s road game against the Blue Jays. “Energy. Even cardio-vascular workout capabilities. Done some (Peloton) rides I haven’t done in a few months that I didn’t even realize, oh, this is what it’s supposed to be like.”

Boone’s pacemaker is to keep his heart rate from dropping below 50-60 beats per minute or from rising too high.

“Still have some arm restrictions,” Boone said. “So I can’t like lift weights like I normally do but that will be hopefully a few more weeks. But as far as just getting around, energy in the mornings and all day, so much better.”Boone had open heart surgery on March 26, 2009, while he was a player with the Houston Astros, a procedure to correct a swelling of the aorta. The condition had been first discovered when he was in college.

Interesting at-bat

This easily could be the most amazin’ at-bat of the entire season. Yep, in a spring training game. With his Mets teammates cheering, dancing and going crazy in the dugout, Luis Guillorme stood at the plate for more than 10 minutes against rocket-armed St. Louis reliever Jordan Hicks, eventually drawing a 22pitch walk Sunday.

“It’s pretty cool,” Guillorme said.

Guillorme took a called strike on the first pitch, then swung and missed at the second. Quickly down 0-2, the backup infielder wound up hitting 16 foul balls — nine in a row with a full count.

Pete Alonso, Michael Conforto and the rest of the Mets got more and more animated with every curve, change-up and fastball, including a half-dozen at 100 mph. Finally, Guillorme took a slider down and in for ball four and trotted to first base as the shouts and hollers erupted.

“It was definitely a good battle,” Hicks said.