Sports

Deputed Testamony is 32-years-old. His dark brown coat is shaggy, and his biggest excitement is going into his paddock at Bonita Farm for three or four hours of grazing each day. He is a pensioner, an icon. The oldest living winner of a Triple Crown race. But when Billy Boniface looks at the horse in his paddock, he sees the striking colt that was born and trained at the family farm and raced to victory in the 1983 Preakness - the last horse bred or trained in Maryland to do so. "Oh my gosh, I still get goose bumps when I look at him and remember that day," said Boniface, who was 18 then and had just taken over the breeding operation at the farm.

FRIDAY'S TELEVISION HIGHLIGHTS AFL Jacksonville@Orlando NFL8 IndyCar Indianapolis 500: Carb Day NBCSP11 a.m. F1 Monaco Grand Prix: practice SPEED1 a.m. MLB Kansas City@Orioles MASN27 Tampa Bay@Boston MLB7 Washington@Atlanta MASN7:30 C. base. ACC tourn.: Ga. Tech vs. Virginia CSN11 a.m. Big Ten tourn.: Ohio St. vs. Nebraska BIGTENNoon ACC tourn.: Fla. State vs. Clemson CSN3 Big Ten tourn.: TBA vs. Mich.

Last year, 8.8 million viewers saw NBC's coverage of the Preakness. That's the kind of big-tent mass audience that makes the race one of Baltimore's showcase events. And that doesn't count the hundreds of thousands who will watch pre- and post-race coverage on the NBC Sports Network cable channel. But how Baltimore is seen by all those eyeballs largely depends on how NBC Sports chooses to cover the race and related events starting Saturday at 2:30 p.m on NBC Sports Network. NBC's network coverage of the race starts at 4:30 p.m. and runs until 6:30 p.m., with a closing half hour from 6:30 to 7 on NBC Sports Network.

Baltimore Sun reporters Jeff Barker and Don Markus and editor Matt Bracken weigh in on the three biggest topics of the past week in Maryland basketball and football. As Maryland's nonconference basketball schedule comes together , are there enough challenges to test the Terps before the league season begins in earnest?  Jeff Barker: There's Kentucky in Brooklyn on Nov. 9, followed by a game at Northwestern later in the month. The Terps will participate again in the BB&T Classic at Verizon Center, likely against George Mason.    Maryland fans have been known to wince when they examine the team's early-season schedules.

Kevin Plank can't help himself. The Under Armour CEO might know, in his heart of hearts, that his horse is a long shot against the world's finest 3-year-old thoroughbreds. His farm manager, Tom Mullikin, describes the dark bay colt as more "grinder" than star. But Plank's own rise, from blindly ambitious college kid to billionaire apparel mogul, is an underdog tale. So he can't help but play Joe Namath and talk big about his colt's chances in the 137th Preakness Stakes. "Tommy, did you guarantee on Tiger Walk?"

Mike Smith appeared dazed in the moments after his horse, Bodemeister, was again beaten by Kentucky Derby winner I'll Have Another - this time by a neck in Saturday's Preakness Stakes at Pimlico Race Course . The veteran jockey wore the frozen smile of a man hardly able to fathom what had just transpired. "I swear I don't know how he ran me down, man," Smith said after trainer Bob Baffert approached in the fading sunlight. "You did a good job," the 59-year-old trainer told the 46-year-old jockey, a fellow Hall of Famer and former Preakness winner who recently passed 5,000 career victories.

THURSDAY'S TELEVISION HIGHLIGHTS M. bask. Lafayette@Holy Cross CBSSN7 Wake Forest@Duke ESPN7 Vanderbilt@Alabama ESPN27 Virginia@Georgia Tech 54, 208 William & Mary@VCU ESPNU8 North Carolina@Virginia Tech ESPN9 Illinois@Penn State ESPN29 San Francisco@Gonzaga ESPNU10 ...

There comes a point in every man's life when he sits back, puts his feet up on the desk and thinks: How can I get a gig doing something I love that involves no heavy lifting? Ladies and gentlemen, I have found that gig. So let's get the introductions out of the way first, shall we? The name is Kevin Cowherd, and after years of writing a features column for The Baltimore Sun, I switch over today to writing a sports column. Actually, this is my second time with this gig - I was a sports columnist with The Evening Sun from 1981 to 1987.

NBC Sports says it had 170 employees in Baltimore this week to cover the Preakness, and from the looks of the TV package it presented, all of them earned their keep. NBC's network coverage started at 4:30 p.m., and it hardly ever sagged for more than a minute or two right up until the start of the race some two hours later. And that's no mean feat given that the horse racing world is essentially on hold until the start of the race on the day of a Triple Crown event. What I am saying is that once you show the infield crowd dancing to Maroon 5, overhead shots of the Inner Harbor and Pimlico, ground level shots of the grandstand, women in hats, tables full of crab cakes, Black-eyed Susans all in a row, and the horses in their stalls, what do you do for the other hour and 50 minutes?

The deadline for submitting sports copy is 9 a.m. on Mondays. We prefer email (howardcountysports@patuxent.com). We do not accept results by phone. When two Howard County teams play, players from both teams (first and last names) must be mentioned in the write-up. Questions? Call 410-332-6578. Volleyball MAV First Rites of Summer Three Howard County volleyball players — Jamie Carey (Howard), Elyse Smith (Mt. Hebron) and Lindsey Scepura (Mt. Hebron) — teamed up to win the MAV First Rites of Summer 18-U Junior Triples beach volleyball tournament at Rehoboth Beach, Del. on May 12. Softball Maryland Chill After a slow start in the first pool play game and tying the PA Avalanche in the second pool play game, the Maryland Chill 14-U Purple bats got hot in elimination play last week.

Submitting sports notices The deadline for submitting sports copy is 9 a.m. Monday. We prefer email (howardcountysports@patuxent.com). Questions? Call 410-332-6578. Special Olympics Orioles fans who plan to attend games at Camden Yards this year have the opportunity to help Special Olympics athletes at the same time. Special Olympics has obtained vouchers for $15 tickets to all Oriole games except the prime games. Five dollars from each ticket purchased will go to Special Olympics.

Boys lacrosse No. School   Record   Prev.   1. Calvert Hall  16-2  1  2. Loyola  16-4  2  3. Boys' Latin  14-7  4  4. Gilman  12-4  3  5. McDonogh  9-8  5  6. Severn  15-7   6  7. Hereford  18-1  7  8. South River  ...