SJU tops Purdue in First Four women’s game
Jayla Everett made a layup from the right baseline with 0.3 seconds left to life St. John’s to a 66-64 win over Purdue in a First Four game of the NCAA women’s basketball tournament Thursday in Columbus, Ohio.
Everett, who had a team-high 20 points, scored the Red Storm’s final two baskets after the Boilermakers rallied from a 15-point second-half deficit to tie it twice in the final 3:10 seconds.
St. John’s (22-8), a No. 11 seed, advances to play No. 6 seed North Carolina on Saturday at 4 p.m. in a first-round matchup.
Unique Drake added 16 points for the Red Storm, who won their first NCAA tournament game since 2014, a 71-68 win over USC.
St. John’s took a 60-45 lead on a Drake 3-pointer with 1:06 left in the third quarter and then went quite, managing just a Rayven Peeples jumper during Purdue’s 17-2 run, ending with Lasha Petree’s layup to tie the game a 62-62.
That’s when Everett stepped up with a jumper with 1:27 left. Petree answered with a layup with 31 seconds remaining before Everett drove the lane while the clock was winding down and finished the winning shot.
NFL SEEKS ARBITRATION
NFL lawyers are urging a New York judge to change her mind and agree to let racial discrimination claims against the league and its teams go to arbitration rather than trial.
In written arguments late Wednesday, the lawyers said Judge Valerie E. Caproni in Manhattan should reverse her recent decision finding that some claims by NFL coach Brian Flores can go to trial.
Flores, the new defensive coordinator for the Minnesota Vikings, sued the league and three teams last year, saying the NFL was “rife with racism,” particularly in its hiring and promotion of Black coaches.
Caproni ruled on March 1 that discrimination claims by two other Black coaches, Steve Wilks and Ray Horton, must go to arbitration. She let claims Flores made against the Miami Dolphins go to arbitration. Flores made some of his most sensational claims against the team that fired him early last year after he led the Dolphins to a 24-25 record over three years.
Earlier this week, lawyers for the coaches asked her to reverse portions of that ruling allowing arbitration, saying that proceedings in which NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell would likely serve as the arbiter would set a dangerous precedent for businesses nationwide that will be motivated to emulate the NFL’s unfair arbitration practices.
In papers signed by attorney Loretta E. Lynch — a former U.S. attorney general — the NFL, the Denver Broncos, the Houston Texans and the New York Giants asked that the judge change her mind and force all of the claims made by Flores into arbitration.
“We do so only because we believe that the Court inadvertently overlooked important controlling authorities on two separate issues that were not previously briefed by the parties, leading to two clear errors of law that, if corrected, might reasonably be expected to alter the Court’s conclusion,” the NFL and its teams asserted.
In her decision two weeks ago, Caproni said the claims made by Flores had shined “an unflattering spotlight on the employment practices of National Football League” teams.
“Although the clear majority of professional football players are Black, only a tiny percentage of coaches are Black,” she wrote.
SETTLEMENT IN WRESTLER’S DEATH
A Kentucky university has agreed to a settlement of more than $14 million over the death of a student wrestler hours after practice, the school announced.
The settlement over the death of junior Grant Brace, 20, of Louisville, Tennessee, includes an agreement for the University of the Cumberlands to participate in a heat-illness training program and to help raise awareness of heat-related injuries, the university said Wednesday in a statement.
Brace’s death on August 31, 2020 from heat stroke after he begged for water and was refused “was tragic and entirely avoidable,” news outlets reported, citing the lawsuit.
Brace was diagnosed with narcolepsy and ADHD and was prescribed Adderall which requires maintaining hydration, according to the lawsuit.
He died during the wrestling team’s first training day of the season. After practice, the team had to sprint multiple times up and down a steep hill and Brace completed several before sitting down from exhaustion. The then-coach threatened to kick Brace off the wrestling team, so he ran up the hill again and was later heard saying “I’m done. I can’t do this anymore,” the lawsuit said.
He begged for water and his condition continued to deteriorate, but the coaches didn’t provide water or contact the trainer or emergency medical personnel, according to the lawsuit. Brace left and tried to drink from an outdoor water fountain that was not working. He also tried to get into a building but could not, and he collapsed. About 45 minutes later, the coaches found him dead with his hands clenched in the grass and dirt, according to the suit.
The university said in a statement that it believed it could defend the claims asserted in the lawsuit, but the legal process would have been long and costly.