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A roundup of the sports information of the week
BASKETBALL—Surprising PHILADELPHIA and BALTIMORE both made the divisional finals of the NBA playoffs by winning three games and losing only one in the opening rounds. The 76ers took their third game of the best-of-five series when Wilt Chamberlain scored 38 points, blocked 11 shots and got 26 rebounds in a 119-112 win over Cincinnati. The Bullets, led by Kevin Loughery's 31 points, defeated St. Louis 109-103 in the deciding game of the Western series. LOS ANGELES lost high-scoring Elgin Baylor for the rest of the playoffs when he tore his left kneecap in the opening minutes of the first game of the Western Divisional final. But Jerry West scored 49 points and the Lakers beat the Bullets 121-115. BOSTON jumped to a 1-0 lead in the Eastern final by easily defeating Philadelphia 108-98, despite Wilt Chamberlain's game-high 33 points. In their personal duel under the baskets, the Celtics' Bill Russell outrebounded Wilt 32-31.
BOWLING—Left-hander BILL ALLEN from Orlando, Fla. won the PBA's $35,500 Insurance City tournament by defeating Nelson Burton Jr. of St. Louis 231-177 in the final match. A week earlier Allen beat Burton in the finals to take the Buffalo Open.
BOXING—In a championship boxing doubleheader at New York's Madison Square Garden (page 24) EMILE GRIFFITH retained his welterweight title with a 15-round unanimous decision over José Stable, and JOSE TORRES became the new lightweight champion when Willie Pastrano was declared unfit to come out for the 10th round.
GOLF—SAM SNEAD, who will be 53 next month, won the Greater Greensboro Open for the eighth time and thus became the oldest player ever to win a major PGA tournament. Snead's rounds of 68, 69, 68 and 68 over the 7,029-yard, par-71 Sedgefield Country Club course gave him a 72-hole total of 273, five strokes up on Billy Casper, Phil Rodgers and Jack McGowan, all tied for second.
GYMNASTICS—The NCAA championship at Carbondale, Ill. was won by favored PENN STATE, with 68½ points to runner-up University of Washington's 51½. Penn State's only individual winner was MIKE JACOBSON, who tied for first in the horizontal bars with JIM CURZI of Michigan State. Curzi also took the parallel bars title. The only other double winner was FRANK SCHMITZ of Southern Illinois who had firsts in free exercise and trampoline and a second in the long-horse event. Jacobson gained the all-round individual title.
HOCKEY—Second-place MONTREAL took a two-game lead over fourth-place Toronto in the best-of-seven semifinal series of the Stanley Cup playoffs. Bobby Rousseau scored the winning goal at 12:29 of the third period as the Canadiens defeated the Maple Leafs 3-2, and in the second game Claude Provost and Jean Beliveau scored on power plays to lead Montreal to a 3-1 victory. In the playoff between the first- and third-place teams DETROIT, the regular-season champions, defeated Chicago 4-3, on Norm Ullman's goal with less than five minutes to play, and 6-3.
The American Hockey League's regular season ended with QUEBEC (44-26-2) in first place in the East and ROCHESTER (48-21-3) the winner in the West. Center ART STRATTON of Buffalo took the scoring title with 109 points on 25 goals and 84 assists (most in the league), and GERRY CHEEVERS of Rochester was the league's top goalie.
HORSE RACING—Making his belated debut as a 3-year-old, BOLD LAD ($2.50), 1964's juvenile champion, won a six-furlong race at Aqueduct by three lengths (page 82).
Native Charger ($6.80) became the biggest money-winning 3-year-old in Florida when he added the $119,800 Florida Derby at Gulfstream Park to his victory in the $143,600 Flamingo Stakes a month earlier. Ridden by John Rotz, Native Charger defeated Hail to All by a neck while Gallant Lad was third.
MOTOR SPORTS—The 191-mile Grand Prix of Siracusa (Sicily), an important warmup for the major grand prix title races later in the season, was won by JIMMY CLARK of Scotland, driving his Lotus Climax, in 1:43:47. Second place went to last year's world champion, John Surtees.
POCKET BILLIARDS—The world's championship, held at New York's Hotel Commodore, was won by JOE BALSIS of Minersville, Pa. Balsis, whose record was 12-2, defeated 1964 champion Luther Lassiter 150-70 in the final match.
ROWING—Former Yale oarsmen—Ed Trippe, Bill Fink, Duncan Spencer, Harry Howell Jr.—helped OXFORD to a four-length victory over Cambridge in the 111th revival of the four-mile, 374-yard crew race on the Thames through west London. The winning time of 18 minutes 7 seconds was the fastest since 1948 when Cambridge set the course record in 17:50.
SKIING—Competitors from France, Austria, Italy and Switzerland raced with Americans and Canadians in the national Alpine ski championships held at Crystal Mountain, Wash., although they were not eligible for the U.S. titles. NANCY GREENE of Rossland, B.C. swept the women's national titles by coming in fourth (CHRISTL HAAS of Austria was the winner) in the downhill, and first in both the slalom and giant slalom (a full second ahead of Marielle Goitschel of France). France's LEO LACROIX won the men's downhill, but the U.S. title went to LORIS WERNER of Western State College of Colorado who finished seventh. KARL SCHRANZ of Austria took the men's slalom, while ROD HEBRON of Canada won national honors with his fourth. BILL MAROLT of Aspen, Colo. finished third in the giant slalom for the title, but JEAN-CLAUDE KILLY of France won the race, the longest course ever set for the championship.
SWIMMING—STEVE CLARK, a Yale senior who won three gold medals in Tokyo, repeated his 1964 victory in the 100-yard freestyle at the National AAU championships at Yale. His time—45.6—was the first ever under 46 seconds, but it will stand only as an American mark since it occurred in a 25-yard pool rather than a world-standard 50-meter pool. Four other American marks were set by DON SCHOLLANDER of Yale in the 200-yard freestyle (1:41.7), THOMPSON MANN of the North Carolina Aquatic Club in the 100-yard backstroke (52.5), ROY SAARI of USC in the 200-yard individual medley (1:56.2) and GREG BUCKINGHAM of Atherton, Calif. in the 400-yard individual medley (4:08.9). USC took the team title, as it did in the NCAA championships a week earlier, with 74 points to runner-up North Carolina AC's 47.
TENNIS—Top-seeded MANUEL SANTANA of Spain held off Ramanathan Krishnan of India to win the men's singles of the Mexico City international tournament 6-3, 6-3, 4-6, 9-7. MARGARET SMITH of Australia defeated Monique Salfatti of France 6-4, 6-4 for the women's title.
TRACK & FIELD—BILLY MILLS of the Marines, ahead from start to finish in the three-mile run, led the U.S. track-and-field team to a 108½-80½ victory over Great Britain in a dual meet at Wembley Stadium, London. Ralph Boston lost in the broad jump, as he did in the 1964 Olympics, to Britain's LYNN DAVIES, who jumped 25 feet 9¼ inches to set a United Kingdom record. The U.S. men won eight of 11 events and the U.S. women five of seven.
Texas A&M sophomore RANDY MATSON was the outstanding performer of the Texas Relays in Austin. In addition to his winning discus toss of 188 feet 8 inches, his shotput of 67 feet 9 inches set a Relays record and was just one inch short of Dallas Long's world mark. With Roy Saddler sprinting a 45.4 leg, TEXAS SOUTHERN took the college-division mile relay in a sparkling 3:07.8. JOHN CAMIEN of Kansas State (Emporia) won his fourth Texas Relays mile in a slow 4:08.6.
USC lost its second dual meet since 1945, to the UNIVERSITY OF NEW MEXICO at Albuquerque 98‚Öì to 46‚Öî. The Trojans were last defeated by Oregon in 1962.
Running the final quarter in 56 seconds, JIM RYUN of Wichita's East High set a new U.S. interscholastic mile record of 4:04.4 at an invitational meet in Wichita, Kans. He had held the old mark for one week last year before Gerry Lindgren of Spokane broke it with a 4:06 run.
MILEPOSTS—SIDELINED: For the third time in four years, SANDY KOUFAX, the Dodgers' top left-hander, by an arthritic condition in his left elbow.
FIRED: FORREST (Forddy) ANDERSON, Michigan State's head basketball coach for 11 seasons (125-124), after a 1-13 Big Ten record this year.
RESIGNED: After four seasons (64-33) as head basketball coach at Holy Cross, FRANK OFTRING, to tend to his brokerage business.
RETIRED: From amateur competition at the age of 18, DONNA DE VARONA of Santa Clara, Calif., member of the U.S. Olympic swimming team in 1960 at the age of 13 and a double gold medal winner at the Tokyo Olympics in 1964. She plans to enroll at USC in September, but in the meantime is doing some radio-television commentating.
