Defeat

Sparked by Andy Hoffman's 33 on the front nine, Pikesville handed Dulaney's golf team an 11-7 defeat -- its first loss in any Baltimore County match in more than two decades -- at Longview Wednesday.Hoffman, who finished with a 44 in his 12-hole match and contributed three points to the team score, got support from Sam Grilli's 2 1/2 points, Jasson Sieden, Steve Hoffman, Alex Scher and Jordan Steinfelder."The Dulaney coaches said they had gone back more than 20 years and couldn't find the last time they lost," said Pikesville's sixth-year coach Jerry Miller.

Democrats appeared to take control of the Anne Arundel County Council, as five of the seven Republicans were losing their races, according to early election returns last night.Going into yesterday's voting, Republicans had been clinging to a 4-3 majority, but they seemed to be losing that with 140 of 170 precincts reporting.Probably the biggest Republican upset appeared to come in District 4, where Republican incumbent Bert L. Rice, the council chairman, was trailing Bill D. Burlison, the longtime U.S. representative from Missouri who moved to Maryland after he was voted out of office in 1980 in an ugly political scandal.

STELLENBOSCH, South Africa -- A student in this charming campus town in the heartland of lost white supremacy has just told former President F. W. de Klerk he is yesteryear's man."You had your chance, and you blew it," the student told the veteran politician, leader of the waning National Party and the country's last white president.Facing his audience last week, de Klerk didn't miss a beat. "Yes. And we did something. We abolished apartheid and admitted the wrongs of the past."With that he launched into a spirited defense of his party's record and a ferocious critique of the ruling African National Congress, led by President Nelson Mandela, the man with whom he shared the 1993 Nobel Peace Prize.

CINCINNATI -- The Ravens recorded the greatest defeat in their history yesterday at Cinergy Field.Their 16-14 loss to the Bengals was so beneficial in so many ways that you almost expected the players to douse coach Ted Marchibroda with a Gatorade bath as the final seconds ticked off the clock.With losses this profitable, who needs wins?It may have seemed like a "bah, humbug" end to the season -- another close loss, blah, blah -- but it was actually a holiday gift to the Ravens' fans: a defeat that smelled as sweet as a rose, unlike the Ravens' 20 prior defeats, most of which smelled about as sweet as a spoiled piece of fish.

Capitals: Peter Bondra had one assist Tuesday night in Washington's 2-2 tie with the New York Islanders, giving him a point in the past 15 games in which he's played.Devils: Sheldon Souray scored his first NHL goal with 4: 58 to play to help New Jersey defeat the New York Rangers, 4-3, for its sixth straight victory.Penguins: Goalie Tom Barrasso had 35 saves in Pittsburgh's 1-1 tie with Tampa Bay.Senators: Alexi Yashin, who came into Tuesday's game with Carolina with 13 goals and 31 points, was held scoreless on four shots in a 2-1 defeat.

PASADENA, Calif. -- So, they didn't win. Lost it late in the fourth quarter.Big deal.The Northwestern Wildcats didn't need to beat Southern Cal yesterday in the Rose Bowl.Wildcats players, coaches and alumni will howl in disagreement, of course. They wanted to win. That would have been a lot more fun than watching USC receiver Keyshawn Johnson run so wild that he set a Rose Bowl record for receiving yards in the first 39 minutes of USC's 41-32 victory.But hey, you can't have everything. Especially when you're Northwestern.

WASHINGTON -- Before a packed but hushed chamber, Senate Democrats defeated the balanced budget amendment yesterday, sending the centerpiece of the Republican reform agenda into limbo, possibly until just before next year's elections.The vote ended a bare-knuckle political battle. The Republican effort to make good on a key campaign pledge was tripped up by Democratic leaders, who said the amendment would permit Congress to balance the budget with money intended for Social Security pensions.

Claremont, Calif. -- DEFEAT, some say, is the Serb form of happy ending.Rebecca West, who loved the Serbs as only a fellow romantic could, devoted the most profound pages of "Black Lamb and Grey Falcon," her study of the South Slavs, to a meditation on "Kosovo Polye," the Serb national epic.In that poem, which recalls a battle of 1389, the Serb leader, Prince Lazar, is betrayed to the Turks by one of his followers.Yet it is not the betrayal that causes the ensuing catastrophic defeat. In the hour of decision, Prince Lazar chooses defeat because nothing is more poignant, more perfect, more heroic than death for a sacred cause.

After a three-month winning streak, the House Republican "Contract with America" is likely to suffer a stinging defeat tomorrow with the expected failure of a constitutional amendment limiting congressional terms. Supporters of term limits say they are about 60 votes short of the 290 needed to pass an amendment.Article on Page 6A

Republican John G. Gary won the race for county executive yesterday, defeating Democrat Theodore J. Sophocleus in the battle to succeed fellow Republican Robert R. Neall.Mr. Gary finished with 53 percent of the vote and Mr. Sophocleus with 47 percent."Elections are thrilling, and it is certainly nice to be on the winning side," Mr. Gary, a state delegate, told supporters at the Annapolis Holiday Inn about 10 p.m. "Now the job of governing begins."Mr. Sophocleus, who narrowly lost to Mr. Neall in 1990, conceded defeat about 9:20 p.m. at his campaign headquarters in Glen Burnie.

It wasn't particularly pretty, but the end result was the same as it has been all season. After giving up two runs in the top of the inning, the No. 2 Fallston baseball team was staring at a two-run deficit as it prepared to bat in the fourth against Franklin. But a six-run inning broke the game open, and the Cougars (8-0) went on to defeat the visiting Indians, 11-6, to remain unbeaten. Ryan Ziolkowski was 2-for-4 with three RBIs to lead Fallston, which added four more runs in the sixth after Franklin (4-2)

Aura Payne had 11 points, eight steals and six assists as No. 12 Severn jumped out to an 18-point halftime lead en route to a 61-44 win over visiting John Carroll yesterday. Payne scored nine points in the first half as the Admirals (9-1) took control of the game early. Severn's Leanne Hug led all scorers with 15 points and added five rebounds. GLENELG COUNTRY SCHOOL 70, KEY 24: : Ashley Dolgoff scored a career-high 34 points as the Dragons (4-3) defeated the visiting Obezags. Dolgoff's 34 points broke her school record of 33, set this season against Mount Carmel.

Fifth-ranked Arundel used six three-pointers to take a 14-point halftime lead, then held on to defeat Wise of Prince George's County, 50-43, in the fifth-place game of the IAABO Tournament yesterday at Prince George's Community College. Senior Ashley Davis made four of the three-pointers to lead Arundel with 16 points. The game put her over 1,000 points for her career. Sheronne Vails had 11 points and a team-high 11 rebounds for the Wildcats (5-3), who lost to Good Counsel in the first round before defeating Blake on Saturday to advance to last night's game.

ASUNCION, Paraguay -- A former Roman Catholic Church bishop won a historic victory yesterday in this impoverished country's presidential election, ending the 61-year reign of the world's longest ruling party. With 83 percent of polling stations reporting, Fernando Lugo received 40.7 percent of 1.57 million ballots cast. Running a distant second was former Education Minister Blanca Ovelar, the candidate of the long-ruling Colorado Party, who got 30.8 percent. Former general and ex-Colorado Lino Oviedo garnered 22 percent.

Mitt Romney stopped John McCain cold yesterday with a favorite-son victory in icy Michigan that threw the Republican presidential race wide open again. No clear front-runner has emerged after the first four state tests, and at least four Republicans have a credible chance to become the nominee. In the Democratic primary, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton finished ahead of "uncommitted" but the vote had no bearing on the delegate count. Michigan was not among the four states authorized to hold Democratic primaries before Feb. 5, and Barack Obama and John Edwards removed their names from the ballot.

Folks in Salisbury figure their town is more than just a rest stop for beach-goers. They've got a baseball team to prove it. The kids from West Salisbury have reached the 2007 Little League World Series, which begins today in Williamsport, Pa. One of 16 teams in the international tournament, West Salisbury - the Mid-Atlantic champion - plays Chandler, Ariz., the West winner, in a first-round game at 3 p.m. tomorrow. The game will be televised on Channel 2 (ABC). It's the first trip to Williamsport for West Salisbury (16-4)

Jan. 8 1815: Gen. Andrew Jackson led U.S. forces to defeat the British in the Battle of New Orleans -- the War of 1812's closing engagement.

WASHINGTON -- Coming as they did within hours of each other, two news stories defined the differences between America and its enemies. In the wake of the devastation in South Asia from a tsunami that has taken tens of thousands of lives, the United States is mobilizing to send food, water, medical supplies and teams of doctors, nurses, rescue workers and others to help the victims, many of whom are Muslim. Meanwhile, halfway around the world, a man who defines himself as a Muslim leader, Osama bin Laden, calls on his followers to kill not only Americans but fellow Muslims who dare to participate in elections in Iraq to choose their own leaders.

WASHINGTON -- Political protocol dictates that after a presidential election, the losing party's nominee is referred to as its "titular leader" until another nominee is chosen for the next election. It is a meaningless "honor" that almost mocks its bearer. On rare occasions, the "titular leader" has survived to be renominated, as Democrat Adlai E. Stevenson, the loser in 1952, did in 1956, and Republican Thomas E. Dewey, defeated in 1944, managed in 1948. In both cases, they lost again.

Robert Smylie, 89, the only man elected to three consecutive terms as governor of Idaho, died Saturday at his home in Boise. He had recently struggled with pneumonia and suffered several illnesses, including emphysema, cancer and congestive heart failure, said his son, state Rep. Steve Smylie. It was Robert Smylie's decision to embrace the imposition of a sales tax in 1965 that enabled supporters to round up the votes needed for passage. In his autobiography, Mr. Smylie wrote that his support for the 3-cent tax was probably a major factor in his defeat in the Republican primary a year later by then-state Sen. Don Samuelson.