NBA
James scores 34, Cavaliers beat Nuggets 93-87
DENVER – LeBron James scored 34 points on the eve of his 31st birthday, Iman Shumpert added a season-high 16 and the Cleveland Cavaliers beat the Denver Nuggets 93-87 on Tuesday night.
Kevin Love had eight points and 14 rebounds to help Cleveland finish off a four-game West Coast swing with a 2-2 mark.
Reserve Will Barton had 29 for the injury-riddled Nuggets, who’ve now dropped six of seven. They were once again without Danilo Gallinari (sprained left ankle) and rookie Emmanuel Mudiay (sprained right ankle).
Trailing by 11 with 3:07 remaining, the Nuggets resorted to fouling Tristan Thompson, who’s a 56 percent free throw shooter. Thompson struggled at the line, hitting 1-of-4, but Denver couldn’t capitalize.
NFL
Eagles moving on, fire experimental coach Kelly
PHILADELPHIA – The Philadelphia Eagles fired Chip Kelly with one game left in his third season, dumping the coach after missing the playoffs in consecutive years.
Kelly was released Tuesday night just before the end of a disappointing season that began with Super Bowl expectations. The Eagles are 6-9 after going 10-6 in each of Kelly’s first two seasons. They were eliminated from playoff contention after losing to Washington at home Saturday.
Eagles CEO Jeffrey Lurie issued a one-sentence statement to the media, saying he appreciates Kelly’s contributions and wishes him success.
Lurie told fans in an email that he decided to make a change after “evaluating the many factors involved in our performance as a team.”
Kelly made several bold moves that backfired after assuming full control of personnel decisions last offseason. Since March 2014, he released three-time Pro Bowl wide receiver DeSean Jackson, traded two-time All-Pro running back LeSean McCoy, didn’t re-sign 2014 Pro Bowl wideout Jeremy Maclin, cut two-time Pro Bowl guard Evan Mathis and traded quarterback Nick Foles and a 2016 second-round draft pick for Sam Bradford.
Skiing
Theaux wins as Innerhofer puts on show with gate
SANTA CATERINA VALFURVA, Italy – Adrien Theaux won a wild World Cup downhill by a large margin Tuesday while Christof Innerhofer grabbed most of the attention by finishing fourth after skiing halfway down the course with a gate attached to him.
Theaux won in 1 minute, 47.29 seconds on the dark and steep Deborah Compagnoni course to finish with a 1.04-second advantage over Hannes Reichelt of Austria. It was the Frenchman’s third career win.
David Poisson of France came third, 1.15 behind.
Innerhofer missed the podium by just 0.07. About a minute into his run, the Italian got his left arm wrapped around a gate and the bright fluorescent orange panel and long pole caught onto his equipment.
Hansdotter edges Holdener to win women’s slalom
LIENZ, Austria – Frida Hansdotter held on to her first-run lead to win a women’s World Cup slalom Tuesday and extend her lead in the discipline standings to 100 points.
The Swede finished in a combined time of 1 minute, 47.02 seconds to edge Wendy Holdener by 0.07 for her third career win.
Petra Vlhova of Slovakia, who won the previous slalom in Are, Sweden, two weeks ago, posted the fastest second-run time and finished 0.43 behind in third.
Hansdotter, the only skier to reach the podium in all four slaloms this season, leads the discipline standings with 320 points, followed by Vlhova with 220 and Mikaela Shiffrin with 200. The Olympic champion from the United States won the first two races this season but is out recovering from a knee injury.
Associated Press
