IN BRIEF

HOCKEY

Crosby expects to play in Penguins' opener

Pittsburgh Penguins captain Sidney Crosby has practiced for the first time since injuring his groin during a preseason game Thursday in Columbus, Ohio.

Crosby took part in the Penguins' practice Tuesday and expects to play in the season opener Friday against the New York Rangers. The Penguins will raise their Stanley Cup championship banner at Mellon Arena that night.

Crosby skated Saturday and Sunday but did not play in the Penguins' final exhibition game Sunday in Detroit.

Also: The Phoenix Coyotes signed veteran center Robert Lang to a one-year contract.

Lang has 252 goals and 422 assists in 925 games in his 15-year NHL career with 18 goals and 27 assists in 87 playoff games. The Czech star was limited by injuries to 50 games last season with the Montreal Canadiens but had 18 goals and 21 assists.

The Vancouver Canucks sent highly touted first-round draft pick Cody Hodgson back to his junior hockey team.

Hodgson, selected 10th overall in the 2008 NHL Draft, was widely expected to make the Canucks as a 19-year-old center after earning Canadian Junior Hockey Player of the Year honors last season. He won the award ahead of John Tavares, who was taken first overall by the New York Islanders at this summer's entry draft.

BOXING

Pavlik-Williams bout scheduled for Dec. 5

Kelly Pavlik can't seem to get any respect, despite spending two years reigning over the middleweight division. Paul Williams gets so much that nobody is willing to step into the ring with him.

Good thing they have each other.

The humble pride of Youngstown, Ohio, will defend his WBO and WBC titles against Williams on Dec. 5 at Atlantic City's Boardwalk Hall in a fight originally scheduled for October before a stubborn staph infection on Pavlik's left hand flared up.

"I still have a lot to prove," Pavlik (35-1, 31 knockouts) said. "Even after the Williams fight, a dominant performance, there still would be a lot to prove."

Williams (37-1, 27 KOs) was impressive his last time out, winning a stunningly one-sided decision over former junior middleweight champion Winky Wright. Before that, the awkward left-hander beat Antonio Margarito and Verno Phillips, and avenged his loss to Carlos Quintana by knocking him out in the first round.

"This is going to be a real big fight. A lot of people are asking, 'How are you going to stand up to Pavlik's power?' " Williams said. "I'm going to do what I do best. I'm going to make an exciting fight for the fans and an exciting fight for me."

Also: WBC lightweight champion Edwin Valero denied reports he was arrested on domestic violence charges.

Valero told reporters the allegations were merely an effort to "provoke" him.

"I've never hit my little sister and much less my mother," Valero said in comments published by Venezuelan TV station RCTV on its Web site.

Venezuela daily El Universal reported Valero was arrested last week after a neighbor called emergency services and told authorities the boxer had struck his mother and a sister during a family dispute.

SOCCER

U.S. World Cup qualifier still set for Honduras

FIFA said the United States' World Cup qualifier against Honduras will take place in San Pedro Sula next month despite turmoil in the Central American country.

FIFA secretary general Jerome Valcke said after an executive committee meeting that the crisis in Honduras following the ouster of President Manuel Zelaya on June 28 hasn't caused safety concerns that jeopardize the match. He said FIFA's stance can change if the situation worsens.

The United States (5-2-1), seeking its sixth straight World Cup berth, leads North and Central America and the Caribbean with 16 points.

Also: A Kuwaiti soccer team will play in Iraq today in the first sports competition between the countries since Saddam Hussein invaded his southern neighbor in 1990.

The match between Irbil and Kuwait Sports Club in the second leg of the AFC Cup's quarterfinals will have extra security at the nearly 21,000-seat sold-out stadium in the Kurdish city of Irbil.

Mexico is withdrawing its bid to host the World Cup in 2018 or 2022, leaving the United States as the lone contender from the Americas.

MISCELLANEOUS

Mercury win in OT, take 1-0 lead in WNBA Finals

Cappie Pondexter missed a game-winning tip-in at the fourth-quarter buzzer, then scored seven of her 23 points in overtime to help the Phoenix Mercury escape with a 120-116 home victory over the Indiana Fever in a wild opener of the WNBA Finals.

Penny Taylor scored 23 points and newly crowned league Most Valuable Player Diana Taurasi 22 for Phoenix in the highest-scoring game in WNBA history.

Phoenix improved to 22-2 in games in which it scored 100 points.

Also: Investors trying to bring a WNBA franchise to Tulsa, Okla., said they have hired Nolan Richardson to be the coach -- if the city is able to secure a team.

Richardson remains popular in Tulsa, where he won the National Invitation Tournament in 1981 with the Golden Hurricane. He later moved to Arkansas, guiding the Razorbacks to the NCAA title in 1994 and a national runner-up finish the following season. He won more than 500 games at Tulsa and Arkansas.

Formula One driver Felipe Massa got behind the wheels of a kart, practicing for the first time in public since sustaining multiple skull fractures in a crash.

Massa, 28, had said he wants to race at the Brazilian GP next month, but Ferrari hinted he won't be back until next year.

Maria Sharapova cruised past Samantha Stosur of Australia 6-0, 6-1 in the second round of the Toray Pan Pacific Open in Tokyo.

The former top-ranked Russian, who has been struggling since returning from a 10-month injury layoff, will face Alisa Kleybanova, who defeated sixth-seeded Vera Zvonareva, 3-6, 6-4, 6-2.

Marat Safin of Russia defeated fifth-seeded Philipp Petzschner of Germany 6-2, 3-6, 6-1 in the first round of the Thailand Open in Bangkok.

Olympic silver medalist Meb Keflezighi will run in this year's New York City Marathon.

The 34-year-old American won silver in the marathon at the 2004 Athens Games and was also the runner-up in New York later that year. Other top Americans announced for the Nov. 1 race include Abdi Abdirahman and Magdalena Lewy Boulet.

The University of Missouri athletic department is changing its procedures after selling a box of old cell phones that included old text messages and contact numbers.

A Columbia, Mo., man paid $190 for 25 phones. They included text messages to and from basketball coach Mike Anderson, football coach Gary Pinkel and athletic director Mike Alden. E-mails and contact numbers were also on the phones.