Donald the tops
ALREADY No. 1 in the world, Luke Donald now is No. 1 in the eyes of PGA Tour players. Donald capped off a sensational season yesterday by winning PGA Tour player of the year, the most significant of the postseason awards because it's a vote of the players. He became the first British player to win the award since it began in 1990.
ALREADY No. 1 in the world, Luke Donald now is No. 1 in the eyes of PGA Tour players.
Donald capped off a sensational season yesterday by winning PGA Tour player of the year, the most significant of the postseason awards because it's a vote of the players. He became the first British player to win the award since it began in 1990.
"It's a great honor to cap off what has been an amazing year for me," Donald said from the Australian Masters in Melbourne. "Thank you to all the players for their votes. There was obviously some other worthy people to vote for, and I guess my overall consistency and having to go to Disney and win, and win the money list like I did, was a deciding factor.
"I feel very honored at the moment."
Donald won the award over Keegan Bradley, Bill Haas, Webb Simpson and Nick Watney. An official familiar with the results described it as a landslide. The tour does not release the votes or the order in which the players finished.
Bradley, whose two wins included the PGA Championship, was voted rookie of the year.
It was only the fifth time in the last two decades that the PGA Tour player of the year did not win a major.
Olympics *
Triple Olympic champion Stephanie Rice, of Australia, has undergone shoulder surgery in a setback to her plans to defend her three swimming gold medals at London 2012.
* The Athletics Federation of Nigeria says retired sprinter Sunday Bada, a former Olympic medalist and indoor world champion, has died at 42 in Lagos. The circumstances of his death were still unclear. Bada was a member of the Nigerian team that won silver in the 4x400-meter relay at the 2000 Sydney Olympics. He also took gold in the 400 at the 1997 World Indoor Championships in Paris.
* The integrity of Olympic boxing's governing body has been upheld by its inquiry into allegations of a bribery plot, according to the organization's president, Wu Ching-Kuo. The AIBA's own investigative panel dismissed accusations in a BBC program that Azerbaijan paid bribes to try to secure two boxing gold medals at next year's London Games.
Colleges *
Colorado State introduced Jim McElwain as its head football coach. McElwain, Alabama's offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach, replaces Steve Fairchild, who was fired Dec. 4 after going 16-33 in four seasons.
* Boston University hockey star Corey Trivino has been kicked off the team after his arrest on charges that he groped and tried to kiss a female student.
* South Carolina has extended football coach Steve Spurrier's contract through 2015.
Sport Stops *
Jilleanne Rookard won the 3,000-meter race and Jonathan Kuck took the 5,000 on the first day of the U.S. Speed Skating long track championships in West Allis, Wis.
* Health officials are testing stool samples from runners in the Rock 'n' Roll Marathon in Las Vegas who say water passed out during the race made them ill.