In the news
UNC’s Jackson, Georgia Tech’s Pastner win ACC awards: North Carolina’s Justin Jackson is the Atlantic Coast Conference player of the year and Georgia Tech coach Josh Pastner is its coach of the year.
The ACC announced its all-league team and individual award winners Sunday following a vote of 53 media members and coaches.
Jackson finished with 24 votes to 15 for Wake Forest’s John Collins. Joining them on the all-ACC first team were Notre Dame’s Bonzie Colson, Louisville’s Donovan Mitchell and Duke’s Luke Kennard — the only unanimous selection.
North Carolina State guard Dennis Smith Jr. was chosen as freshman of the year.
Pastner’s Georgia Tech team, the preseason pick to finish 14th in the league, went 17-14 and earned the No. 11 seed in this week’s ACC Tournament.
The Associated Press all-ACC team will be released Monday.
Transgender boy with girls wrestling title: ‘I don’t cheat’: A transgender boy who won a girls wrestling state title in Texas says he would compete against boys if allowed and is taking lower doses of testosterone to try to be fair to his opponents.
Mack Beggs said in an interview that aired Sunday on ESPN that he competes against girls only because the state’s governing body for public high school sports requires him to wrestle under the gender listed on his birth certificate.
Asked if he was taking the amount of testosterone he wanted while transitioning to male, Beggs said he was “holding back because of wrestling.”
“I want to do it fairly,” he said. “I don’t want to cheat. That’s not something I do. I don’t cheat.”
The 17-year-old Beggs won the 110-pound girls title as a junior at Euless Trinity High School in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. He could face a legal challenge during his senior wrestling season.
University Interscholastic League rules allow Beggs to compete while taking testosterone, but school superintendents and athletic directors voted overwhelmingly last year on the gender requirement.
Missouri fires hoops coach Anderson ahead of SEC tourney: Missouri has fired basketball coach Kim Anderson after less than three seasons with his alma mater.
Tigers athletic director Jim Sterk said in a statement Sunday that he asked Anderson to step down after next week’s SEC Tournament. Missouri is the No. 14 seed and plays Auburn on Wednesday night.
Anderson took over a program in disarray after leading Central Missouri to the Division II national championship but was never able to get things going in the right direction. He compiled a 26-67 record with the Tigers, who were 7-23 and 2-16 in the SEC this season.
Anderson was a conference player of the year for Missouri before spending two stints as Norm Stewart’s assistant coach.
North Carolina switches to Jordan Brand football uniforms: North Carolina is switching its football uniforms to former player Michael Jordan’s Nike line.
The school made the announcement at halftime of the Tar Heels’ basketball game against rival Duke on Saturday night — and marked the occasion by bringing out Jordan himself to a pair of raucous ovations at midcourt.
North Carolina will become the second football program to wear Jordan’s Jumpman logo, joining Michigan. The basketball programs have long worn uniforms from Jordan Brand — a business division of Nike.
Football coach Larry Fedora was spotted before the basketball game wearing a polo shirt with the Jumpman logo, and a photo on social media showed him with Jordan — and both wore Jordan Brand shirts.
Russian lawmaker aims to make football hooliganism a sport: A Russian lawmaker has proposed an unorthodox solution to the country’s football hooliganism woes ahead of next year’s World Cup — legalize it and turn it into a spectator sport.
Organized groups of Russian fans, many with martial arts training, fought English fans on the streets of Marseille during last year’s European Championship.
That inspired Igor Lebedev, who sits in the Russian parliament, to draw up rules for what he calls “draka,” the Russian word for “fight” — 20 fighters on each side, unarmed, in an arena.
In a statement on the website of the nationalist LDPR party, Lebedev says organized brawls “could turn fans’ aggression in a peaceful direction.” He also claimed it would serve as an “example” for English fans, who he characterized as undisciplined louts and poor fighters.