College Athletics
Texas athletic director given the horns
AUSTIN, Texas – Texas athletic director Steve Patterson was fired after two rocky years on the job, pushed out after clashing with fans and donors upset with his aggressive push to raise money for the nation’s wealthiest athletic department, a person with direct knowledge of the decision said Tuesday.
Patterson has overseen two popular hires at Texas – football head coach Charlie Strong and men’s basketball head coach Shaka Smart, both now in charge of underperforming programs – but has been unable to win over fans and university donors and has had several meetings with Fenves to soften his approach to business.
Patterson raised football ticket prices after a 6-7 season in 2014 and instituted a “loyalty” program for tickets that rewarded some long-time donors. It also pushed some long-time season ticket-holders out of their seats.
By last weekend’s home-opening game against Rice, a plane flew around the stadium with a banner “Patterson Must Go.”
College Football
Blind long-snapper Olson joins practice with USC
LOS ANGELES – Jake Olson completely lost his sight six years ago. He still has his dream of playing football at Southern California.
The blind long-snapper is one step closer to the Coliseum after practicing with the Trojans on Tuesday.
Olson impressed his teammates during his first official practice at USC, where the freshman is on a special scholarship for physically challenged athletes. Eligibility issues had kept him out of uniform this fall until he joined the sixth-ranked Trojans for a rainy morning workout.
Olson was the long-snapper on field goal attempts for his high school team in Orange, California. He gets help from teammates to line up properly, putting his hand on the shoulder of the player next to him as they walk to the line, but takes care of the rest himself.
Olson is a lifelong Trojans fan who has been around the program since Pete Carroll was the coach in 2009, the same year Olson completely lost his sight.
Golf
Feherty will bring his jokes to NBC coverage
LAKE FOREST, Ill – Golf funnyman David Feherty is joining NBC for analysis on tournament coverage and to continue his “Feherty” series on Golf Channel.
Feherty had been with CBS Sports for nearly two decades until he did not renew his contract after The Barclays three weeks ago.
NBCUniversal now will be his exclusive network home. The former Ryder Cup player from Northern Ireland will be part of the NBC team for PGA Tour coverage, the Olympics next year and when NBC gets the British Open starting in 2017.
NFL
Four missed extra points halfway to 2014 total
If opening weekend was any indication of what is to come, these post-touchdown conversions could be must-watch moments rather than the bathroom breaks they’ve long been for viewers on the couch or customers at the stadium.
Cleveland’s Travis Coons made an outlandish 48-yard attempt, after a pair of penalties pushed him back. But four extra points failed over the weekend in 75 attempts. That’s already half the amount of extra points that were missed in 2014, when NFL kickers went 1,222 for 1,230 (99.3 percent).
Over the previous 10 years, according to STATS research, the league had an average of 10.2 missed extra points per season. The collective success rate over that period was 99.1 percent. Hence the reason why the NFL’s competition committee devised the shift for 2015.
Associated Press
