Zurbrugg to Northwestern

ALLIANCE — Eight days after verbally committing to Syracuse University, Alliance High School senior quarterback Brendan Zurbrugg introduced on social media Monday he heading to Northwestern of the Big Ten.

The determination got here a day after Syracuse obtained a verbal dedication from highly-touted quarterback Jakhari Williams from Warner Robbins, Georgia.

The 6-foot-3, 185-pound Zurbrugg obtained 15 scholarship gives, together with seven from Mid-American Conference faculties.

As a junior final fall, Zurbrugg handed for two,184 yards and 23 touchdowns and rushed for 804 yards and 11 extra touchdowns.

He led the Aviators to an 8-3 season and a second-place end within the Eastern Buckeye Conference behind West Branch.

Zurbrugg completed fifth within the Division I 300-meter hurdles (38.16 seconds) on the state observe meet on June 3.

He is the twelfth member of Northwestern’s class and the primary quarterback.

Johnny Bench Award winners

CINCINNATI — The Johnny Bench Awards are offered to the highest highschool baseball and softball coachers in Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana and West Virginia in addition to NCAA Division I.

The 10 winners can be honored on July 18 on the Johnny Bench Awards Luncheon at Great American Ball Park and acknowledged that night throughout pregame ceremonies earlier than the Reds vs. San Francisco Giants sport.

The 2023 Johnny Bench Award winners embrace the highest male NCAA baseball catcher:

• Kyle Teel – University of Virginia

Top feminine NCAA softball catcher:

• Kinzie Hansen – University of Oklahoma

Top highschool catchers from Ohio:

• Jordyn Wycuff – Watkins Memorial High School (softball)

• Mason Eckelman – Walsh Jesuit High School (baseball)

Top highschool catchers from Kentucky:

• Nora Mack – Lafayette High School (softball)

• Jonathan Fitz – Covington Catholic High School (baseball)

Top highschool catchers from Indiana:

• Ava Ratliff – Bedford North High School (softball)

• Grant Sawa – Center Grove High School (baseball)

Top highschool catchers from West Virginia:

• Amber Wolfe – Wahama High School (softball)

• Ty Galusky – Morgantown High School (baseball)

Mallett performed 5 seasons in NFL

DESTIN, Fla. (AP) — Former Arkansas quarterback Ryan Mallett, who additionally performed for New England, Houston and Baltimore throughout 5 seasons within the NFL, has died. He was 35.

Mallett died in an obvious drowning, in response to the Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Office. Mallett was a soccer coach at White Hall High School in his native Arkansas, and the varsity district additionally confirmed his demise in a put up on its web site on Tuesday.

Arkansas athletic director Hunter Yurachek mentioned the college “lost an incredibly special person.”

“Our thoughts and prayers are with the family, friends and teammates of Ryan Mallett,” Yurachek posted on Twitter.

Mallett performed for the University of Michigan for one season earlier than ending his faculty profession at Arkansas. He handed for 7,493 yards and 62 touchdowns in two seasons with the Razorbacks.

Mallett was chosen by New England within the third spherical of the 2011 NFL draft. He appeared in 4 video games with the Patriots in the course of the 2012 season, finishing 1 of 4 passes for 17 yards.

New England coach Bill Belichick mentioned he was “extremely saddened by Ryan’s tragic passing.”

“My thoughts and prayers are with his family and the many people whose lives he touched,” Belichick mentioned in a press release posted by the workforce on Twitter.

Mallett made six begins in 9 video games with the Texans and two begins in eight appearances with the Ravens. He accomplished 190 of his 345 makes an attempt within the NFL for 1,835 yards and 9 touchdowns with 10 interceptions.

Johnson household tragedy

MUSKOGEE, Okla. (AP) — Police in Muskogee, Oklahoma, confirmed Tuesday they’re investigating the taking pictures deaths of three kin of seven-time NASCAR champion Jimmie Johnson.

The our bodies of Jack Janway, 69; his spouse Terry Janway, 68; and their grandson Dalton Janway, 11, have been found Monday at a house in Muskogee, situated about 50 miles southeast of Tulsa, Muskogee police spokesperson Lynn Hamlin mentioned. Hamlin mentioned investigators consider Terry Janway shot and killed her husband and grandson earlier than taking pictures herself.

Police responded to the house after a lady known as 911 to report a disturbance with a gun earlier than hanging up, Hamlin mentioned.

When police arrived on the scene, they discovered one particular person close to the entrance door of the house after which heard a gunshot from additional inside, the place officers later discovered two different individuals lifeless, Hamlin mentioned. Hamlin confirmed the three are the dad and mom and nephew of Johnson’s spouse, Chandra Janway.

Johnson’s race workforce, Legacy Motor Club, introduced on Twitter it was withdrawing his No. 84 Carvana Chevrolet from this weekend’s NASCAR Cup Series occasion in Chicago. The workforce added: “The Johnson family has asked for privacy at this time and no further statements will be made.”

Tennis cash extra equalThe ladies’s tennis tour plans for its gamers to earn the identical as males at extra occasions

(AP) — It took greater than three many years after the founding of the Women’s Tennis Association for all 4 Grand Slam tournaments to agree to provide the identical prize cash to feminine and male gamers. Now the ladies’s tour is pledging to ensure its athletes additionally get an identical paychecks at another top-tier occasions within the coming years.

The St. Petersburg, Florida-based WTA introduced Tuesday that it’s revising its season calendar and guidelines about which gamers should enter sure tournaments, whereas additionally organising what it known as a “pathway to equal prize money.”

The plan is to have matching payouts for men and women throughout all rounds of singles on the joint WTA-ATP 1000 and 500 occasions — the 2 ranges proper under the 4 Slams — by 2027, and to be sure that single-week WTA-only 1000 and 500 occasions which can be being performed on the similar time, however at totally different websites, as their ATP-only 1000 and 500 equivalents are providing the identical cash as these counterparts by 2033.

“Players that say, ‘Why do we have to wait?’ are right, 100%. But it can’t happen tomorrow. We can’t change this overnight. But I’m very excited that we have a plan now — not to just sit and talk about this and hope that somebody will help us do the right thing that’s appropriate and deserving for these players,” WTA Chairman & CEO Steve Simon instructed The Associated Press. “We’re going to make it happen. Maybe we can even get there faster, if the revenues grow.”

Simon mentioned the extra cash will come from incremental boosts by the tournaments themselves and from income projected to reach from broadcast, knowledge and sponsorship rights through WTA Ventures, the tour’s industrial enterprise that launched in March. CVC Capital Partners, an funding supervisor, contributed $150 million for a 20% stake.

“Women’s professional sports don’t receive the same level of compensation for those rights as men’s professional sports do, which is why you see lower prize money paid or contracts (given) across all women’s sports versus those of men. That’s just an economic reality,” Simon mentioned, explaining that the intention is to spice up funds out there for gamers “by increasing the value of the asset and by creating new revenue streams.”

All modifications will have to be accredited by the WTA Board of Directors in August, one thing the tour expects to occur. The proposals embrace growing the variety of 1000 tournaments to 10, with occasions in Beijing (2024), Cincinnati (2025) and Canada (2025) increasing to 2 weeks with bigger fields; new guidelines to spice up participation by main gamers within the largest occasions; and making singles rankings primarily based on greatest 18 outcomes — not simply greatest 16 — plus the WTA Finals.

One instance of the kind of pay discrepancy happening at present: When Iga Swiatek gained the 2022 Italian Open, she obtained a verify for a bit greater than 330,000 euros (about $365,000), which was lower than half of the roughly 835,000 euros (greater than $900,000) that Novak Djokovic earned for successful the lads’s title in Rome that yr.

This April, Italian tennis federation president Angelo Binaghi mentioned that the nation’s principal event goals to provide the identical prize cash to men and women as of 2025. The WTA signaled its intention to reach at Tuesday’s information by responding to Binaghi’s assertion with this remark again then: “It is our hope to see this commitment achieved at more WTA events.”

Billie Jean King, who was the main voice when the fashionable WTA was based in 1973, says she was motivated to assist create a ladies’s skilled tour after incomes $600 for her 1970 championship in Italy, virtually $3,000 lower than Ilie Nastase was paid for his run to the trophy there.

The U.S. Open was the primary main event to pay men and women the identical, beginning in 1973. The Australian Open completely established equal prize cash in 2001; the French Open gave its two singles champions the identical quantity in 2006 and unfold that to each spherical in 2007; Wimbledon dedicated to equal pay throughout the board in 2007.

“Fifty years after the players found strength in unity, I’m proud the WTA continues to be a global leader focused on providing opportunities,” King mentioned, “and hope that women in other sports and walks of life are inspired by its example.”