SI VIEW THE WEEK IN TV SPORTS

Saturday 4/12

HIGH SCHOOL BASKETBALL
WBCA All-America Game

Twenty of the nation's top high school girls basketball
players--including Tennessee-bound, Naismith Player of the Year
Tamika Catchings--meet in Nashville. Refreshingly, all are
headed to college. It only seems as if all are also headed to
Knoxville. Catchings, a 6'1" guard-forward from Duncanville,
Texas, will be joined by fellow Naismith finalists and future
Lady Vols Kristen (Ace) Clement, a 5'11" guard from Broomall,
Pa., and Semeka Randall, a 5'10" guard from Cleveland. Next
season this trio will help Pat Summitt try to join UCLA's John
Wooden as the only coaches to win three consecutive NCAA
Division I basketball titles.
ESPN2, 1 PM

Sunday 4/13

BOXING
Oscar De La Hoya vs. Pernell Whitaker

Welcome to boxing's version of Politically Incorrect, featuring
the Golden Boy (De La Hoya, 23-0) and Sweet Pea (Whitaker,
40-1-1). This WBC welterweight title bout between two former
Olympic gold medalists didn't need verbal sparring to sell
tickets, but media darling De La Hoya, 24, and the underexposed
Whitaker (left), 33, obliged anyway. Whitaker: "[De La Hoya has
fought] very few African-Americans. You ain't fought nobody
until you fought a brother." De La Hoya: "The Afro-Americans I
fought, they don't have heart. No Afro-American fighter can take
my punch." Can we get Bill Maher to referee this one?
PAY-PER-VIEW, 9 PM

GOLF
The Masters

In 1987 Augusta native Larry Mize won the Masters by draining a
140-foot chip shot for birdie on the second hole of a
sudden-death playoff, and the air is filled with anticipation of
a dramatic 10th-anniversary finish. Might we see Greg Norman,
for whom a green jacket would be redemption from last year's
collapse, and Tiger Woods, for whom a green jacket would mean
validation as golf's biggest star, after only seven months on
the Tour, paired in the last group for the final round? Or might
defending champ Nick Faldo (right) propel himself into the
Nicklaus-Palmer stratosphere by winning his fourth Masters? If
any of those names are high on the leader board as the final
round begins, don't miss a minute of the telecast.
CBS, 4 PM

Wednesday 4/16

PRO BASKETBALL
Bulls at Heat

The Eastern Conference division leaders meet for the first time
since Miami handed Chicago its only home loss of the season,
83-80, on Dec. 7. The Bulls will have a tough time
double-teaming center Alonzo Mourning as effectively as they
have in the past. Forward Dennis Rodman is out until the
playoffs with a sprained left knee, and backup center Bill
Wennington is sidelined indefinitely with a ruptured tendon in
his left foot. It seems unlikely that newly signed
center-forward Brian Williams, who sat out the season until
April 2, will be able to take up the slack. Now that Mourning
and guard Dan Majerle have returned to the lineup, Miami is
healthy for the first time in more than three months and eager
to avenge the three-game sweep it suffered against Chicago in a
'96 first-round playoff series.
TBS, 8 PM

Thursday 4/17

BASEBALL
Orioles at White Sox

Call it Home Run Derby. Baltimore set a major league record last
year with 257 round-trippers, and most of its heavy
artillery--Brady Anderson, Rafael Palmeiro and Cal Ripken
Jr.--is back. Chicago counters with Frank Thomas (below), Albert
Belle and Harold Baines, who averaged 37 home runs in '96. By
the way, the Sox may be from the Second City, but the Orioles
have been runners-up in the AL East nine times in the past 22
years.
WGN, 8 PM

COLOR PHOTO: RICHARD MACKSON [Pernell Whitaker]

COLOR PHOTO: BOB MARTIN [Nick Faldo]

COLOR PHOTO: AL TIELEMANS [Frank Thomas]

THE ! ZAPPER

ESPN's enhanced baseball score box (not to be confused with the
network's new, indecipherable in-game box score) is another
excess of an info-mad age. This year the box in the upper
left-hand corner of the screen not only features the score,
inning, ball-strike count and number of outs as in the past
several years but also the speed of each pitch and a baseball
diamond noting the position of base runners. In the first week
of the season the graphic was only a minor annoyance, but soon
it will drive us mad as we find out for the 316th time that Tim
Wakefield has thrown another 68 mph knuckleball for the Boston
Red Sox.

All times Eastern. Schedules are subject to change.