Sports in Brief: Two top football players returning to Notre Dame

Notre Dame nose guard Louis Nix III and offensive tackle Zack Martin will return to school next year and skip the NFL draft, coach Brian Kelly said Monday. Running back Cierre Wood will make a decision after getting an evaluation of his draft stock.

The 325-pound Nix anchored one of the top defenses in college football. The junior had 45 tackles and two sacks.

The American Football Coaches Association recognized Penn State for its graduation success rate for the 22d time in the association's annual academic achievement award survey.

Notre Dame leads Football Bowl Subdivision schools in honorable-mention citations with 23, followed by Penn State, Rice, and Virginia at 22.

Western Michigan hired 32-year-old Tampa Bay Buccaneers assistant P.J. Fleck, a former Rutgers receivers coach, making him the youngest coach in the Football Bowl Subdivision, according to a person familiar with the decision.

SOCCER: Fans of two-time defending Russian champion Zenit St. Petersburg are calling for non-white and homosexual players to be excluded from the team, another sign of the racism plaguing the country that will host the World Cup in 2018.

The club quickly sought to distance itself from the fans. "Being tolerant means that you fight against any kind of stupidity," said Luciano Spalletti, Zenit's Italian head coach.

Mohamed bin Hammam, a FIFA executive committee member from Qatar who challenged incumbent Sepp Blatter for the presidency last year, gave up a dispute with the organization after being found guilty by FIFA of "repeated violations" of its code of ethics while head of the Asian Football Confederation.

WINTER SPORTS: Lindsey Vonn, who suffered an intestinal infection last month, is taking a break in the middle of the World Cup ski season to get her strength back.

BASKETBALL: Allison McNeill resigned as the Canada women's coach after after more than a decade in the job.

- Associated Press