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Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton holds a big lead in an early presidential primary poll in New Hampshire released Thursday, underscoring the challenge Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley has before him should he decide to seek the Democratic nomination against her. Clinton, who has not declared whether she will run for president in 2016, would have support from 63 percent of New Hampshire primary voters, according to the University of New Hampshire...

UMBC guard Brian Neller hit a 28-footer at the final buzzer, but the visiting Retrievers trailed the entire overtime period and lost to New Hampshire, 92-86, in men's basketball Wednesday. Neller hit five 3-pointers, scored 19 points and moved into third place on UMBC's all-time 3-pointer list with 241. Joey Getz scored a career-high 22 points to lead the Retrievers (6-19, 4-8 America East). Senior guard Ryan Cook (St. Vincent Pallotti) added 15 points. The Wildcats (7-16, 3-8)

Editor's note: Each week, InsideMdSports.com provides this blog with a Maryland recruiting feature that previously appeared as premium content on its site. Now holding a handful of offers, 2014 Brewster (N.H.) Academy point guard Kevin Zabo had a successful summer campaign and has been hearing from a wide-range of high-majors of late. Running with the successful CIA Bounce program this past summer, the 6-foot-1, 170-pounder started the summer playing up with the 17U team -- which finished second in Nike's EYBL circuit -- but ended up playing in his own age classification.

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton holds a big lead in an early presidential primary poll in New Hampshire released Thursday, underscoring the challenge Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley has before him should he decide to seek the Democratic nomination against her. Clinton, who has not declared whether she will run for president in 2016, would have support from 63 percent of New Hampshire primary voters, according to the University of New Hampshire...

NASHUA, N.H. -- Struggling to halt his steep slide in New Hampshire, Gov. Bill Clinton of Arkansas said yesterday that he'd "fight like hell" in the final week of the Democratic primary contest here.But if he's devised a new plan for erasing voter doubts about his character, it was not immediately evident. Mr. Clinton resumed campaigning after conferring with his political strategists in Little Rock for most of the weekend.Allegations of marital infidelity and questions about whether he avoided the draft in the late 1960s have damaged his standing among likely voters.

DUNBARTON, N.H. -- Jean Dimock caught up with Sen. Phil Gramm near the stand selling "Clinocchio" T-shirts."You're going to keep your pro-life stand?" she asked. The Texas Republican assured her he would."You're going to stick with the Republican platform?" she continued. Mr. Gramm once again assured her he would.That done, Ms. Dimock peered around the crowd for another presidential candidate to buttonhole. Asked if she had decided whom to back, she shook her head as if in horror. She still had to talk to several of them, she said, and then study their voting records.

HOLLIS, N.H. -- In a closing appeal for New Hampshire support, President Bush urged Republicans yesterday to reject TV commentator Patrick J. Buchanan's protest candidacy and cast a "serious" vote in tomorrow's primary.Mr. Bush's personal campaign ended in New Hampshire the same way it began: with jabs and counterpunches at Mr. Buchanan but nary a mention of his name.At a breakfast in Nashua, N.H., Mr. Bush tried to appeal to this state's enormous pride in its political influence, telling supporters: "You make serious choices here, and you don't elect the loudest and the biggest protesters."

MANCHESTER, N.H. -- President Clinton returned yesterday to the state that once made him the "Comeback Kid," bathing in nostalgia and hoping for a resurrection of sorts to rebuild the stature of his tarnished presidency.Seven years ago to the day, a young Arkansas governor revived his presidential campaign by surging to a second-place finish in the crucial New Hampshire primary, surviving allegations of marital infidelity and draft dodging.Yesterday, on his first domestic trip since his impeachment trial to once again right his listing political ship, Clinton returned to the Granite State.

ALTON, N.H. -- On a cold, drizzly morning this week, Bill Davies woke up itching for a candidate fix. So he jumped out of bed to get to a 7: 45 a.m. town hall meeting where Sen. John McCain was speaking.Then he followed the Republican presidential hopeful in the rain to American Legion Post 72 here. By lunch, he had gripped McCain's hand and had looked him in the eye. Twice."He showed me the man behind the politician," Davies said. "That's important."Only in New Hampshire is a candidate's personal touch considered a voter's birthright.

BEDFORD, N.H. -- Vice President Al Gore and Sen. John McCain are slight favorites going into today's New Hampshire primary, with independent voters holding the balance of power in this famously independent-minded state. An aggressive closing drive by Gore's Democratic challenger, Bill Bradley, and support among registered Republicans for front-running Gov. George W. Bush of Texas have left the final result in doubt, politicians and analysts say. "It's still too close," says Andrew E. Smith of the University of New Hampshire's survey research center.

Editor's note: Each week, InsideMdSports.com provides this blog with a Maryland recruiting feature that previously appeared as premium content on its site. Now holding a handful of offers, 2014 Brewster (N.H.) Academy point guard Kevin Zabo had a successful summer campaign and has been hearing from a wide-range of high-majors of late. Running with the successful CIA Bounce program this past summer, the 6-foot-1, 170-pounder started the summer playing up with the 17U team -- which finished second in Nike's EYBL circuit -- but ended up playing in his own age classification.

Four Maryland hospitals will be contacting patients who might have come in contact with a health care worker infected with hepatitis C when he worked in the state between 2008 and 2010, according to the state health department. David Matthew Kwiatkowski, 32, who worked as a health technician, was arrested Thursday in New Hampshire, according to a statement on the FBI website. He was charged with illegally obtaining Fentanyl, a powerful anesthetic, and with infecting at least 30 people with hepatitis C at Exeter Hospital in New Hampshire, the FBI said.

No. 3 North Harford played tension-free baseball Wednesday, which resulted in one of the Hawks' most dominating performances of the season. Senior Cody Brittain threw a one-hitter as North Harford rattled off 11 hits and defeated C. Milton Wright, 10-0, in five innings. "We were very relaxed," said Brittain, who improved to 4-1 and lowered his ERA to 1.20. "We were as relaxed as we've ever been. We knew what we could do. I felt if I pitched as well as I could, my teammates would be behind me the whole time.

Thirteen years after major open-wheel formula-style racing failed miserably at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, the IZOD IndyCar Series returns to the track today for the running of the MoveThatBlock.com 225. "We need to be here," series veteran driver Ryan Hunter-Reay said. "Hopefully, we'll have a good attendance here on Sunday that makes it worthwhile coming back. Hopefully, this can be a future event for us that we come back to year after year. We'd all certainly like that. I think the short ovals are good for racing.

A Baltimore private equity firm and a College Park venture capital firm said Tuesday they bought eCoast Sales Solutions Ltd., a fast-growing outsourced sales and marketing agency, for an undisclosed price. ECoast, which has 150 employees and is based in Rochester, N.H., was acquired by Slate Capital Group, of Baltimore, and New Markets Venture Partners, of College Park. ECoast provides outsourcing support for companies' sales and lead generation efforts, and has several big clients, including Cisco and Microsoft, according to Erik Ginsberg, a managing partner with Slate Capital.

The same Democratic wave that made history yesterday by electing Barack Obama to the presidency drowned Republicans in the House and Senate and seemed poised to give Democrats commanding power in Congress. Voters appeared to be looking for someone to blame for the state of the nation and the economy - and their wrath seemed aimed squarely at the GOP. Democrats captured Republican-held Senate seats in Colorado, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Carolina, and Virginia, drawing closer to a 60-vote supermajority that would ward off any Republican filibuster - the tactic that allows senators to stonewall bills - and aggressively advance their legislative agenda.

NASHUA, N.H. After listening to Sen. John McCain pitch his political reform ideas at a luncheon here, Caroline Wojcicki said she believed the Republican presidential candidate "has earned our respect."But he has yet to gain her support. Wojcicki is also seriously considering another self-styled reformer who's been drawing enthusiastic crowds in the first primary state: former Sen. Bill Bradley, a New Jersey Democrat."The Republican Party no longer represents me," says Wojcicki of Amherst, N.H., who brought her teen-age daughter to the McCain event.

BEDFORD, N.H. -- Tapping the fears and resentments of an anxious working class, Patrick J. Buchanan threw the Republican nomination up for grabs yesterday with a stunning upset of Sen. Bob Dole in the New Hampshire primary.The race was the closest here in at least 20 years. Out of more than 200,000 votes cast, only about 2,300 votes separated the leaders.Former Tennessee Gov. Lamar Alexander, who badly wanted to finish in the top two, had to settle for third. Magazine publisher Steve Forbes, once a leader in the polls, was a distant fourth.

MANCHESTER, N.H. -- Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's victory in Tuesday's New Hampshire primary was born of two forces - a sympathetic turn by voters, particularly women, who tired of seeing her attacked; and a political organization focused on her experience and economic concerns. Campaign activists suggest that the election shifted, at first imperceptibly, in Saturday night's debate when Illinois Sen. Barack Obama and former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards ganged up on her, and when Clinton was faced with another blunt question about her likability.

WASHINGTON -- The night of the living dead in New Hampshire was the dawn of a new campaign. Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and John McCain, once written off as primary losers, resurrected their candidacies last night and set the presidential race on a new, potentially longer course that few would have predicted. Clinton's comeback, even more astonishing than her husband's in 1992, when he finished second, reshaped a Democratic contest in which Illinois Sen. Barack Obama had begun to look unstoppable.