NATIONAL SPORTS BRIEFS
Published 3:40 am Monday, November 12, 2018
Louisville fires head coach Bobby Petrino
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Louisville’s seven-game skid was bad enough. Worse were the large margins of defeat and opponents’ apparent ease in lighting up the scoreboard.
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That combination spelled the end of coach Bobby Petrino’s second chapter with the Cardinals.
Louisville fired Petrino on Sunday morning with two games left in a spiraling season that includes five blowout losses in which the Cardinals allowed at least 50 points.
The school announced Petrino’s dismissal with a statement from athletic director Vince Tyra, who wasn’t confident the coach could turn things around next season. He said a new head coach would be chosen soon to restore the program to national prominence.
The AD said at a news conference later that he considered a number of factors in Petrino’s status, but noted that the three games since Louisville’s bye showed no progress.
“It was clear the players weren’t responding,” he said. “The coaches’ and the players’ efforts have to go in the right direction, but I didn’t feel it was going that way.”
Purdue head coach Jeff Brohm, a former Louisville quarterback who later became an assistant under Petrino, has frequently been mentioned as the top candidate to replace him. Tyra said he had “a list in mind” but didn’t want to interfere with potential candidates with the season still in progress.
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For now, second-year safeties coach Lorenzo Ward, 51, would coach Louisville on an interim basis.
Also let go were quarterbacks coach Nick Petrino, the coach’s son; linebackers coach Ryan Beard and defensive line coach L.D. Scott, Petrino’s sons-in-law; and fifth-year director of football operations Andy Wagner.
Louisville (2-8) lost 54-23 at No. 12 Syracuse on Friday night, dropping to 0-7 in Atlantic Coast Conference play.
It’s a girl for model Kate Upton, Astro Verlander
HOUSTON (AP) — It’s a girl for supermodel Kate Upton and her husband Houston Astros pitcher Justin Verlander.
Upton used her Instagram site to announce the birth of the couple’s first child — Genevieve Upton Verlander — and the date Nov. 7. The site features a black-and-white photo of an infant with her hand to her mouth.
Further details about the baby and where the child was born weren’t released.
No. 20 TCU rolls past Oral Roberts 79-62
FORT WORTH (AP) — With nine newcomers and the first preseason ranking in 20 years, TCU figures to lean on holdovers Alex Robinson, Desmond Bane and JD Miller to try to live up to the billing early.
Such was the case in the season’s second game.
Robinson scored 23 points, Bane added 22 to go with the 6-foot-8 Miller’s game-high seven assists and the 20th-ranked Horned Frogs never trailed after struggling in the opener, rolling to a 79-62 victory over Oral Roberts on Sunday.
“Those three guys, we’re real comfortable with them. They’re real comfortable with us,” said coach Jamie Dixon, starting his third season at his alma mater. “But they’re more comfortable with each other. We’ve just got guys that got to play together. That’s what those guys bring.”
The Horned Frogs (2-0) were sluggish in their opener, trailing by as many as 11 points before rallying to beat Cal State Bakersfield.