Hamed Retains Title By Flooring Sanchez

Prince Naseem Hamed retained his World Boxing Organization featherweight title Saturday night at Manshantucket, Conn., beating Augie Sanchez with a technical knockout 2 minutes 34 seconds into the fourth round and sending Sanchez out of the ring on a stretcher.

Sanchez launched a surprising attack in the second and sent Hamed to the canvas three times, though none was ruled a knockdown. Hamed laughed it off, dancing away from Sanchez with his torso before countering in the fourth.

With Sanchez’s right eye swollen, Hamed hit him with a three-punch combination in the fourth that sent him staggering to the floor. Sanchez tried to get up before falling back into the ropes. Referee Michael Ortega immediately stopped the fight.

Tennis

Serena Williams set up a title match with top-ranked Martina Hingis in the du Maurier Open at Montreal, beating Arantxa Sanchez Vicario, 6-2, 6-4.

Hingis, the defending du Maurier champion, defeated Conchita Martinez of Spain, 6-3, 6-2. Hingis is seeking her fifth tournament victory this year, but has only won three times in seven matches against Williams.

Top-seeded Andre Agassi routed 14th-seeded David Prinosil of Germany, 6-1, 6-3, to advance to the final of the Legg Mason Classic at Washington.

Trying to prevent Agassi from winning his sixth Legg Mason title will be second-seeded Alex Corretja, who beat his doubles partner and third-seeded Nicolas Kiefer, 7-6 (2), 6-2.

Top-seeded Gustavo Kuerten, fell behind 5-2 in the first set before he gained control of the match and finished with a 7-5, 6-2 victory over Lleyton Hewitt in the RCA Championships semifinals at Indianapolis.

Kuerten will play Marat Safin of Russia, a 7-5, 6-4 winner over Tim Henman of Britain, in today’s final.

Motor Racing

Todd Bodine, who had gone winless in 69 races, held off Michael Waltrip to win the NAPAonline.com 250 at Michigan Speedway at Brooklyn, Mich.

Bodine and his crew disagreed about tires on the high-banked two-mile track. He felt he needed four new ones, but finally made a pit stop on the 74th lap to take on two new tires for his Phillips 66 Chevrolet.

When he came back out, Bodine regained the lead--passing Waltrip’s Chevrolet on lap 118--and stayed in front to the end of the 125-lap race.

Dale Earnhardt Jr., a rookie seeking his third victory of the season, will start on the pole of the NASCAR Pepsi 400 at Brooklyn, Mich. His brother, Kerry, earned his first Winston Cup start in second-round qualifying and will start in the 27th position.

And their father, Dale Earnhardt?

Dale needed a provisional in order to race for the first time with both his sons and will start 37th in the field of 43 cars, driving a Chevrolet owned by Dave Marcis.

Dario Franchitti won the pole of the Motorola 220 at Elkhart Lake, Wis., with a record lap of 145.924 mph.

The fast lap on the 4.048-mile, 14-turn natural terrain road course broke the record of 145.748 set in 1998 by Michael Andretti.

Miscellany

Kajsa Bergqvist, the 1999 NCAA high jump champion, cleared 6 feet 7 inches at the Swedish Olympic trials at Uppsala, Sweden, tying the year’s second-best performance. . . . Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf, an eight-year NBA veteran guard who did not play last season, signed with the Vancouver Grizzlies. . . . The Little League World Series begins in Williamsport, Pa., today, with four teams from the U.S.: Davenport, Iowa; Bellaire, Texas; Goffstown, N.H.; and Vancouver, Wash., competing to play the winner of the four-team international bracket in the championship game next weekend. . . . Kuo Sheng-An homered, scored three runs and pitched 3 2/3 relief innings to lead Taiwan to an 8-3 victory over West Covina and its fourth Pony League World Series championship in seven years at Washington, Pa.