Wednesday's Sports In Brief

By The Associated Press

Here's a look at Wendesday's sports in brief around the world.

BASEBALL

WASHINGTON (AP) — Attorney General Eric Holder has recused himself from any role in deciding whether to charge Roger Clemens with lying to Congress about steroids.

A federal grand jury in Washington is investigating whether the star pitcher lied when he told a congressional committee a year ago that he didn’t use illegal performance-enhancing substances.

Clemens’ former trainer, Brian McNamee, testified before the same committee and said he repeatedly injected Clemens with steroids and human growth hormone, known as HGH.

Holder “has always been recused” from the Clemens investigation, Justice Dept. spokesman Matt Miller said. Before becoming attorney general, Holder worked at the firm Covington and Burling LLC, which had Clemens as a client.

As Clemens dealt with the congressional inquiry, one of the lawyers working for him was another prominent Covington attorney, Lanny Breuer. Breuer has since been nominated to become a top deputy of Holder’s at the Justice Department, overseeing the criminal division.

Breuer is also expected to recuse himself from the Clemens matter.

COLLEGE BASKETBALL

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — Few Connecticut residents are calling foul on UConn men’s basketball coach Jim Calhoun’s recent outburst to a blogger who pressed him on his $1.6 million annual salary.

More than three of every five Connecticut residents surveyed in a new Quinnipiac University poll say Calhoun, the highest-paid public employee in the state, should keep his entire salary rather than donate a portion to help ease Connecticut’s fiscal problems.

Eighty percent also said he should not be disciplined for his angry response to freelance journalist and political activist Ken Krayeske, who questioned Calhoun about his salary at a Feb. 21 post-game press conference.

Calhoun had a 68 percent favorability rating in the Quinnipiac poll results. Only 12 percent described their opinion of him as unfavorable.

Douglas Schwartz, the poll’s director, said politicians would love to have Calhoun’s level of support.

COLLEGE FOOTBALL

NEW YORK (AP) — The Fiesta, Orange, Rose and Sugar bowls extended their agreements with the Bowl Championship Series, deals that will keep the national championship game at the sites of those games through the 2013 college football season.

The BCS was not expected to change its bowl partners, so the new four-year deals come as no surprise.

The current contracts with those four games run out after the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, Calif., hosts the BCS national championship game in 2010.

The new deal starts with the January 2011 bowl games, and the championship game rotation will start in Glendale, Ariz., with the Fiesta Bowl hosting two games about a week apart.

New Orleans will host the Sugar Bowl and BCS national championship game in 2012. Miami will be the site of the 2013 title game, a week after the Orange Bowl. The championship game returns to the Rose Bowl in 2014.

The deals between the BCS and its bowl partners run concurrent to its TV deal.

The BCS is in its final season of a four-year deal with Fox. Its new four-year deal with ESPN, worth $125 million per year, begins with the 2011 bowl games.

HOCKEY

PALM DESERT, Calif. (AP) — Former Edmonton Oilers owner Peter Pocklington was arrested at his home on charges that he concealed assets during bankruptcy proceedings.

The 67-year-old Pocklington was later arraigned and pleaded not guilty in federal court in Riverside, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Sean Lokey.

Pocklington is accused in an indictment of making false statements in bankruptcy and making false oaths and accounts in bankruptcy. If convicted, he could face up to 10 years in federal prison.

It could not be determined if he had a lawyer.

Hockey great Wayne Gretzky played on Oilers teams owned by Pocklington. The franchise won five titles in seven years before Pocklington sold it in 1998.

Pocklington filed for personal bankruptcy last year. He is suspected of failing to disclose to a bankruptcy court two bank accounts as well as the contents of two storage units. He claimed to have debts of nearly $20 million and assets of only about $2,900. It wasn’t immediately disclosed how much money was in the bank accounts.

DOPING IN SPORTS

LONDON (AP) — A key test for catching drug cheats in sports should be scrapped because it fails to take into account vital ethnic variations, according to a study by a leading Olympic anti-doping lab.

The study, published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, claims the testosterone test is “not fit for purpose” and should be replaced by a system that tracks a competitor’s biological patterns.

The study, funded by soccer’s world governing body FIFA, was conducted by scientists at the anti-doping laboratory in Lausanne, Switzerland.

Testosterone is a naturally occurring hormone but is believed to be widely used as a steroid in synthetic form to enhance performance among athletes.

The Swiss researchers examined the testosterone levels of 171 soccer players in six different countries after steroids were deliberately added to their urine samples. The scientists studied the steroid profiles of 57 Africans, 32 Asians, 50 Caucasians and 32 Hispanics using a chemical analysis.

The researchers reported “significant differences” among the groups.