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Dinara Safina pulled off her third upset of a top-10 player in a week at the German Open, winning the title Sunday by defeating ninth-ranked Elena Dementieva 3-6, 6-2, 6-2.
The 17th-ranked Safina also beat No. 1 Justine Henin and No. 8 Serena Williams at the clay-court event in Berlin.
The tournament’s field included six of the world’s top seven female players but failed to produce a favorite for the French Open, a Grand Slam tournament that starts May 25.
•Third-ranked Novak Djokovic won the 10th title of his career, rallying to defeat unseeded Stanislas Wawrinka 4-6, 6-3, 6-3 at the Rome Masters.
Ex-NFL star sent to prison
Former NFL lineman Luis Sharpe was sentenced to six years in prison and four years’ probation for a series of drug offenses in Phoenix.
Sharpe, 47, played for the St. Louis and Arizona Cardinals during 1982-94 and was a three-time Pro Bowl selection. He has been convicted of nine felonies since 1995.
•The Green Bay Packers released wide receiver Koren Robinson, the latest setback for the player who is trying to resurrect his career after serving an NFL suspension and jail time.
•The older brother of New York Jets safety Abram Elam was fatally shot, the third sibling in the family to die by gunfire since 1987.
Finland beats U.S. in world hockey
Mikko Koivu scored with less than 4 minutes remaining, giving Finland a 3-2 come-from-behind win over the United States at the world hockey championships at Halifax, Nova Scotia.
After Koivu scored with 3:50 left, the United States’ Adam Burish was ejected for butt-ending a Finland player.
After the game, there was a brawl. As the final horn sounded, U.S. forward Dustin Brown drilled a Finnish defenseman into the boards with a hit to the head, touching off a melee that featured a fight between David Backes of the U.S. and Amsso Salmela of Finland.
Pizzas cheap, customers angry
Papa John’s Pizza sold 23-cent pizzas in the Cleveland area Thursday in an effort to apologize for a T-shirt that offended Cleveland Cavaliers fans, but the pizza sale went over about as well as the franchise-sponsored shirts that called LeBron James a “crybaby.”
Lines were so long that customers had to wait more than three hours and store owners were forced to call in police as customers began to get unruly. Reports of line cutting were commonplace and stores ran out of pizzas after selling upward of 300 an hour.
Man arrested for torch threat
Police said a Chinese man was arrested for saying on the Internet that he planned to grab the Olympic torch during its relay through eastern China.
The 28-year-old man, identified only as Tang, was detained in Zhenjiang in Jiangsu province in eastern China for allegedly spreading rumors online and disturbing public order, said an official in the local public security bureau who would give only his surname, Zhang.
Quick hits
•Megan Gibson threw a three-hit shutout and also drove in one run as Texas A&M beat Nebraska 5-0 at Oklahoma City for its first Big 12 softball championship.
•Taylor Twellman scored in the 59th minute in his 2008 debut, lifting the New England Revolution to a 2-1 MLS win over Chivas USA at Carson, Calif.
•Hennie Otto won his first European Tour golf title by shooting a 3-under 69 and holding off Oliver Wilson by 1 stroke at the Italian Open in Milan, Italy. Otto finished at 25-under 263. John Daly was 12 shots back at 275.
•Denis Nizhegorodov of Russia set a world record in the men’s 50-kilometer walk at a World Cup meet in Cheboksary, Russia, shaving 1 minute, 34 seconds off the previous mark. He finished in 3 hours, 34 minutes, 13 seconds.
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