Wayne Gretzky, the National Hockey League's all-time leading scorer, will become the new coach of the Phoenix Coyotes, the Arizona Republic reported on its Web site Sunday.
Gretzky, the team's managing partner, is expected to be introduced as coach Monday, multiple anonymous NHL sources told the paper.
Team spokesman Rich Nairn told The Associated Press he could not confirm the story. He said the team had no events scheduled for Monday.
There had been speculation for several months that Gretzky would move from the Coyotes' executive offices to their bench. But the nine-time most valuable player award winner had said he would wait until a new collective bargaining agreement was in place before deciding whether to coach.
The newspaper also reported that former Detroit assistant coach Barry Smith would be one of Gretzky's assistants.
Former Coyotes player Rick Tocchet or interim head coach Rick Bowness will be Gretzky's other assistant, according to the report.
Gretzky, who is the final year of a five-year contract with the club, is a longtime friend of Coyotes general manager Mike Barnett. Barnett said the day after the new NHL collective bargaining agreement was reached last month that Gretzky was very interested in the position.
Barnett, Gretzky's former agent, said the decision would rest with the hockey great and his family, who live in Los Angeles.
Gretzky retired in 1999 after 20 seasons in the NHL. "The Great One" helped the Edmonton Oilers win four Stanley Cups, and is the NHL's all-time leading goal, assist and point producer in the regular season and playoffs.
Gretzky has already committed to serve as executive director for Team Canada at the Winter Olympics in Turin in February.
The Coyotes have a new US$220 million arena.
Ziggy Palffy left the Los Angeles Kings to become the second marquee free agent in a week to join the previously cash-strapped Pittsburgh Penguins, agreeing Saturday to a US$13.5 million, three-year contract with the NHL's worst team in 2003-2004.
Palffy, long one of the NHL's top scorers, agreed to the deal while in his native Slovakia. He joins a fast-growing stable of Penguins offensive talent that includes Hall of Famer Mario Lemieux, Mark Recchi, free agent defenseman Sergei Gonchar and No. 1 draft pick Sidney Crosby.
In leaving the Kings, Palffy turned down the chance to play with friend Pavol Demitra.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier