By STEVE WILSTEIN / AP Sports Columnist On a college campus last fall, sports sociologist Richard Lapchick was speaking about ethics to all of the school’s athletes when suddenly a group of men in the audience walked out. “I was told with some embarrassment afterward,” Lapchick said, “that the athletes were going to a lavish…

MURFREESBORO — Middle Tennessee’s John Williams and Chase Swing combined to throw just the third no-hitter in school history, while senior Shane Kemp was 3-for-4 in helping the Blue Raiders to a 4-0 victory over IP-Fort Wayne Saturday afternoon at Reese Smith Field. Williams tossed six innings, striking out 12 and walking one, the only…

MTSU Media Relations LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — Mike Dean scored 14 of his game-high 18 points in the second half, but it wasn’t enough as Middle Tennessee lost a 59-54 decision against East Division leader Arkansas-Little Rock Saturday night. The Blue Raiders (14-11, 6-6 Sun Belt) could have moved into a tie for first place…

By ROBERT TANNER / AP National Writer WASHINGTON (AP) — Governors beginning an annual meeting in the capital hope to find common ground on education, health care, roads and other policy issues caught up in the contentious politics of a presidential campaign. Some state leaders on Saturday described that mission as near impossible. On the…

By The Associated Press American jobs and foreign competition will be important issues in the 2004 elections, say nine in 10 in a poll released Saturday that highlighted the increasing importance of jobs to the campaign. Two-thirds of those polled for Newsweek said those issues would be “very important.” More than half in the poll,…

By RON FOURNIER / AP Political Writer John Kerry was the Democratic front-runner early last year, a bad one, and the status didn’t last long. Now that he’s back on top, the dominant figure in a two-man race, the Massachusetts senator may be slipping into his old habits — cautious, cold and a creature of…

CLINTON (AP) — A sex discrimination lawsuit filed by three former Anderson County employees against Mayor Rex Lynch has been settled out of court. The federal complaint was scheduled to for trial Monday in U.S. District Court in Knoxville. Instead, it was settled for $707,700 on Friday after Anderson County commissioners voted 12-3 Thursday to…

MEMPHIS (AP) — Confirmation of a gay bishop is causing more than spiritual rifts in Tennessee’s Episcopal churches. It’s leading to budget troubles, too. Church members at their annual meeting for West Tennessee congregations were told the diocese has had to cut $200,000 from its budget this year, at least partly because of philosophical clashes…

NASHVILLE (AP) — A 114-year-old Victorian church designed by the architect of the Ryman Auditorium, former home of the Grand Ole Opry, is in danger of demolition. A real estate and development company plans to replace the Community Baptist Church with a town home development. But the discovery last week that the church was the…

NASHVILLE (AP) — Gaylord Entertainment Center will owe $6.1 million in the new fiscal year, the arena’s largest deficit to date. The price tag for the building, home to the NHL’s Nashville Predators, includes an operating deficit of $5.19 million, as well as $900,000 in debt service. The deficit is about $1 million more than…