Puerto Rico

Notes from the Puerto Rico Tip-Off: SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - Assistant coach Scott Spinelli sat in the lobby of Maryland's beachfront hotel on Saturday and attempted to verbally chart the progress of sophomore guard Terrell Stoglin. Consider the strange arc of Stoglin's season so far: It began when head coach Mark Turgeon wanted to send a message to the player by not starting him in the opener against UNC-Wilmington.   “There were some things that Coach Turgeon wanted Terrell to work a little harder on in practice.

Beth Schub started surfing with one of her uncles on Long Island when she was 13, but she went off to college in Pennsylvania and later settled there after getting married, she thought she was pretty much done with the sport. It took a move to Emerald Isle, N.C., with her husband Greg and their two young sons to get Schub back into surfing. "When they were young I stopped surfing altogether, there were too many things to carry besides the surfboard," Schub, now 62, recalled last week.

The Puerto Rico Tip-Off is very much a made-for-TV event (what isn't these days?). Which makes it strange to actually be here live. Not that I'm complaining, but I feel like a prop. A stage set with a laptop. Here's what I mean: The Coliseo de Puerto Rico normally seats more than 14,000. Maybe it will attract that many for the coming Demi Lovato concert. But for college basketball? Here's what you could tell, even from watching on TV, about attendance, particularly at yesterday afternoon's games : there wasn't any!

Adam Jones delivered again at the World Baseball Classic, driving home a run in the seventh inning of the U.S. team's 7-1 win over Puerto Rico in Miami on Tuesday night. Jones' single up the middle against former Orioles lefty J.C. Romero stretched the U.S. lead to 4-0. The Orioles center fielder had the go-ahead hit in the U.S. team's win over Canada on Sunday, which sent them through to the double-elimination second round. The U.S. is off Wednesday and faces the Dominican Republic on Thursday at 7 p.m., also at Marlins Park.

It's a good thing that Gov. Pedro Rossello will not be petitioning Congress to make Puerto Rico the 51st state. The issue would not bring out the best in Congress, or even among his Republican allies.The prospect of a new state retaining Hispanic identity and language would get tied up in arguments over the role of Spanish in the life of the existing United States. Statehood would not be assured, even though former Republican presidents campaigned for it and President Clinton promised to favor whatever the Puerto Rican people want.

WASHINGTON -- Into the volatile political racial wars, Congress is now preparing to throw another complication -- statehood for Spanish-speaking Puerto Rico.The island has been an American commonwealth for nearly 100 years, locked in an anachronistic half-baked status that no longer makes much sense either in Washington or San Juan. Denying the territory full rights has kept it in dependent second-class limbo for too long.But the politics of elevating Puerto Rico into full participation in the union are murky, messy and even a bit mean.

Guard Jannah Tucker (New Town) had one rebound and one assist before leaving in the first quarter with a left knee injury as Team USA (2-0) rolled to a 68-28 victory over Argentina (1-1) on Thursday at the FIBA Americas U18 Championship on Thursday in Gurabo, Puerto Rico. Lexie Brown, a guard who has committed to Maryland, had six points, two rebounds and two steals but committed six turnovers. Brown said of losing Tucker: "We lost Allisha [Gray] earlier [Aug. 7] and we're just short on guards right now. So her hurting her knee is killer, but it's going to give us more fire to win this for her, for Allisha, and for each other, basically.

A Salisbury man was arrested Wednesday as part of a nationwide, coordinated seizure of 50 individuals prosecutors say are involved in a Puerto Rico-based identity-trafficking ring, according to the federal immigration agency. Darcia Ramirez-Segura, 43, has been charged with conspiracy to commit identification fraud, according to a statement from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, relating to the alleged trafficking of the identities of Puerto Rican U.S. citizens and their identity documents.

REPUBLICAN leaders are about to do something so stupid and venal that maybe they don't deserve to retain control of Congress in this year's election. They want to make Puerto Rico the 51st state in the union, and next week, the House will vote on a measure to start the process. Why? Expect to hear plenty of platitudes about self-determination and full democracy for Puerto Rico's 3.7 million people. But what the Republicans are really interested in is the potential votes of some 25 million Hispanics on the U.S. mainland.

A study tour of Puerto Rico and Cuba in January 1994 is being arranged for students and others by Western Maryland College and Global Exchange, a nonprofit educational organization."

Gwen Darwin McDade, a retired architect who worked on the Johns Hopkins medical campus and later designed structures for the State Highway Administration, died of heart disease Saturday at his Glen Arm home. He was 87. Born in Verona, Pa., he was the son of a contractor and a secretary. The family lived in New Kensington, Pa. Mr. McDade joined the Army immediately after graduating from New Kensington High School. He was assigned to an infantry unit fighting in Belgium during World War II. Family members said he was injured as he was loading heavy- armament shell casings during the Battle of the Bulge.

Darion Atkins scored a career-high 17 points as one of four players in double figures to lead Virginia over visiting Morgan State, 75-57, on Wednesday night. Dewayne Jackson had a season-high 32 points - one shy of his career high - on 11-for-16 shooting to lead the Bears (3-5), who have lost two straight after a two-game winning streak. Akil Mitchell added 15 points to go with 12 rebounds for the Cavaliers (9-2), who won their eighth straight game. Virginia overcame an early challenge from a pesky Morgan State squad that kept fighting well into the second half, continuing an impressive run in which their average margin of victory has been more than 20 points.

THURSDAY'S TELEVISION HIGHLIGHTS M. bask. Liberty@Georgetown (T) MASN10 a.m. Puerto Rico Tip-Off, Akron vs. Okla. St. ESPNU10:30 a.m. UMBC@Loyola (T) MASNNoon Puerto Rico Tip-Off, UNC-Ash. vs. Tenn. ESPNU12:30 Charleston Classic, Baylor vs. BC ESPNU3 P. Rico Tip-Off, N.C. State vs. Penn St. ESPN25 Charleston Cl., Charleston vs. St. John's ESPNU5 Legends Cl., Sam Hou. St.@Indiana BIGTEN7 2K Sports Classic, Ala. vs. Oregon St. ESPN27 Samford@Louisville MASN7 Illinois State@Drexel NBCSP7 Mount St. Mary's@American CSN7:30 P. Rico Tip-Off, UMass vs. Providen.

Guard Jannah Tucker (New Town) had one rebound and one assist before leaving in the first quarter with a left knee injury as Team USA (2-0) rolled to a 68-28 victory over Argentina (1-1) on Thursday at the FIBA Americas U18 Championship on Thursday in Gurabo, Puerto Rico. Lexie Brown, a guard who has committed to Maryland, had six points, two rebounds and two steals but committed six turnovers. Brown said of losing Tucker: "We lost Allisha [Gray] earlier [Aug. 7] and we're just short on guards right now. So her hurting her knee is killer, but it's going to give us more fire to win this for her, for Allisha, and for each other, basically.

Entering the summer, Maryland men's basketball coach Mark Turgeon knew he had two pretty good options regarding Jake Layman's immediate future. Either the promising, 6-foot-8 forward would join the Terps for summer workouts, allowing him to bond with future teammates. Or else the incoming freshman would make the USA Men's Under-18 Team, potentially gaining valuable experience playing against international opponents. The latter scenario unfolded, giving Maryland bragging rights to a player who is using the 2012 FIBA Americas U18 Championship to showcase his varied skills.

Clarks, a British footwear store, is opening a store in Towson Town Center in late April. The store will be in the Nordstrom Wing on the fourth level. The retailer has more than 250 stores in the United States and Puerto Rico. Among them are three stores in Maryland at Montgomery Mall in Bethesda, the Mall in Columbia and Westsfield Annapolis.        

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico -- At the home of Maria Rodriguez, 27, a housewife with four children, the plants are dead, the washing machine is idle and the driveway is dirty.She gets water from civil defense trucks that, on most days, stop by to fill up the large drums and assorted buckets that now sit permanently by her front door. She does laundry with a washboard in a nearby brook. And she forages for bottled water in supermarkets.High on the mountains in Caguas, a city of 134,000 people 17 miles south of San Juan, the residents of Barrio Beatriz drew not a drop of water from their faucets for a month and a half, and only a trickle for a few hours this week.

Adam Jones delivered again at the World Baseball Classic, driving home a run in the seventh inning of the U.S. team's 7-1 win over Puerto Rico in Miami on Tuesday night. Jones' single up the middle against former Orioles lefty J.C. Romero stretched the U.S. lead to 4-0. The Orioles center fielder had the go-ahead hit in the U.S. team's win over Canada on Sunday, which sent them through to the double-elimination second round. The U.S. is off Wednesday and faces the Dominican Republic on Thursday at 7 p.m., also at Marlins Park.

A Salisbury man was arrested Wednesday as part of a nationwide, coordinated seizure of 50 individuals prosecutors say are involved in a Puerto Rico-based identity-trafficking ring, according to the federal immigration agency. Darcia Ramirez-Segura, 43, has been charged with conspiracy to commit identification fraud, according to a statement from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, relating to the alleged trafficking of the identities of Puerto Rican U.S. citizens and their identity documents.

Even in the best of times, Maryland basketball coach Mark Turgeon can be a glass-half-empty kind of guy. Coming off a game in which his team lost by 26 points and committed 26 turnovers against Iona in the Puerto Rico Tip-Off tournament, the glass Turgeon has been drinking from has a couple of drops - tops. Continuing the tone of his post-game session with the media Sunday in San Juan, Turgeon was just as blunt during a news conference Wednesday at Comcast Center. Maryland (2-2)