Sports briefs

McSorley gone for rest of season

NEW YORK (AP) - Marty McSorley was suspended today for the rest of the season for hitting Donald Brashear in the head with his stick - the harshest punishment in NHL history for an on-ice attack.

McSorley's suspension also would include the playoffs, but Boston, which has won only 18 games with 23 remaining, will probably miss the postseason.

The Boston enforcer was suspended indefinitely Tuesday, one day after he swung his stick with both hands against the side of Brashear's head in the Bruins' 5-2 defeat to the Canucks.

"I apologize to Donald Brashear and all the fans who had to watch that," McSorley said Monday. "I embarrassed my hockey team. ... I got way too carried away. It was a real dumb play."

With only 2.7 seconds remaining Monday night, and the Canucks ahead 5-2,

McSorley skated up - out of Brashear's view - and connected against Brashear's

right temple.

``It's disgusting, terrible, absolutely disgusting,'' Vancouver right wing Todd Bertuzzi said. ``That does not need to be in the game of hockey. I've never seen anything like that in my life.''

Canucks general manager Brian Burke, once the NHL's chief disciplinarian, said the police should stay out.

``Leave this stuff on the ice; leave it to the National Hockey League,'' Burke told Vancouver radio station CKNW. ``We don't need the Vancouver police department or the RCMP involved in this.''

Referee Brad Watson restored order after the hit sparked a melee, and declared the game over with time still on the clock.

``We couldn't believe what we saw and didn't know what to do,'' Canucks left wing Brad May said. ``It was crazy out there. I have no respect for that guy ever again. Anybody who has ever had respect for him should lose it.''

McSorley, who received a match penalty for attempt to injure, has lasted 17 years in the league because of his ability to fight and protect his more skilled teammates. He has had six previous suspensions in his career.

``It's a shocker,'' Boston captain Ray Bourque said. ``I've never been a part of anything like that or witnessed anything like that. There is no way to justify it.''

McSorley is best known for serving as Wayne Gretzky's protector with the Edmonton Oilers and then with Los Angeles as the two were traded together in one of hockey's biggest deals.

``Marty has always been an honest player,'' said Vancouver captain Mark Messier, a teammate of McSorley's on the Oilers' Stanley Cup teams. ``He has always been a tough player and he's always played the game hard and played the game tough.''

Brashear, 28, fought with McSorley just two minutes into Monday's game and clearly got the best of his opponent.

He landed several hard lefts before dragging McSorley down to the ice. McSorley challenged Brashear again in the first period, but Brashear skated away, leaving McSorley with a double-minor for cross-checking and roughing and a 10-minute misconduct.

Brashear also was involved in a goal-mouth tangle that caused a knee injury to Bruins goalie Byron Dafoe.

As on-ice policemen, Brashear and McSorley are natural rivals by job description.

``Brash fought him one time and beat him and beat him bad like he always does against him,'' Vancouver's Markus Naslund said. ``I don't know if he was so embarrassed and gutless that that is the way he's got to take it out.''

McSorley, who has only two goals and three assists, said he was trying to goad Brashear as the game was ending.

In only 27 games this season, McSorley is second on the Bruins with 62 penalty minutes. With 3,381 career minutes, McSorley trails only Dave ``Tiger'' Williams and Hunter on the NHL list.

Police have gotten involved in several previous on-ice conflicts in the NHL.

In 1970, Wayne Maki of the St. Louis Blues and Ted Green of Boston were the first NHL players taken to court after a stick-swinging duel at a September 1969 preseason game. Green, who fractured his skull, and Maki, who was not injured, were acquitted of assault charges.

In the most recent, Minnesota's Dino Ciccarelli was sentenced to one day in jail and fined $1,000 in 1988 for striking Luke Richardson several times in the head with his stick.

Cincinnati frosh Johnson suspended

CINCINNATI (AP) - Freshman DerMarr Johnson, third in scoring for No. 3 Cincinnati, was suspended for one game Wednesday for violating NCAA rules on amateurism.

Bob Goin, Cincinnati's athletics director, said Johnson accepted money from his AAU basketball coach to help pay tuition at a New England prep school.

"This relationship occurred prior to us knowing DerMarr,'' Goin said.

"This is not a university issue, this is not a basketball issue; this is an amateurism issue. There is no culpability on the part of the university.''

The NCAA told the university to sit Johnson down for a game, the school's associate sports information director said.

Johnson, a 6-foot-9 guard from Riverdale, Md., has been averaging 13 points a game.

Goin said Johnson accepted about $7,000 his senior year for academic expenses not covered by his scholarship to Maine Central Institute. One year's tuition is $22,500, Goin said.

"DerMarr didn't do anything wrong,'' Goin said. "He got nothing in his pocket.''

The amount Johnson will have to pay back was being negotiated, Goin said.