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Sports Briefing

Penn State Stirs Outcry With Plans to Honor Joe Paterno

Joe Paterno in 1999. Penn State’s athletic department plans to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Paterno’s first game as coach.Credit...Tom Strickland/Associated Press

Penn State’s athletic department on Thursday announced plans to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Joe Paterno’s first game as coach, a decision that ignited backlash on social networks by people critical of Paterno’s role in the Jerry Sandusky child sexual abuse scandal.

An athletic department spokesman, Jeff Nelson, said Penn State planned to announce specifics of the commemoration to ticket holders during the week of a Sept. 17 home game against Temple. He declined to comment further on the plans.

After 15 seasons as an assistant, Paterno was Penn State’s head coach for 46 seasons, finishing his career with the most wins in Division I history. But he was fired by the university’s board of trustees shortly after Sandusky, who had been his longtime defensive coordinator, was arrested in November 2011 for child sexual abuse.

The announcement of the Paterno tribute was met with disdain on social media from those who partly blame him for the scandal.

According to court documents unsealed in May, a Sandusky accuser said he complained to Paterno about Sandusky in 1976 and was rebuffed. The university’s president, Eric Barron, has said the allegation was not substantiated in court or tested by any other process. Paterno was never charged with a crime related to the scandal.

Sandusky was convicted on 45 of 48 charges in June 2012 and is serving a 30- to 60-year sentence. Paterno died of lung cancer in January 2012.

Moving forward from the scandal has been a difficult challenge for Penn State, requiring leaders to distance the university from the scandal while juggling the wishes of ardent Penn State supporters who credit Paterno for giving the university a strong identity.

“Depending on their position, people may look at him differently, but it doesn’t change that he created that here, or helped to create that here,” Athletic Director Sandy Barbour said in August.

A statue of Paterno was removed from outside Beaver Stadium on July 22, 2012, and university-sponsored signs of him are hard to find. Paterno’s name is still on the campus library, which was built in part by his donations.

Freddie Freeman homered, and the host Atlanta Braves used a five-run fifth inning to beat the San Diego Padres, 9-6, and complete their first three-game sweep at Turner Field this season.

One day after Minnesota dipped below Atlanta for the worst record in the majors, the Braves kept on winning behind six solid innings from Mike Foltynewicz.

The Braves scored at least seven runs for a fifth consecutive home game, the first time they had done that since Aug. 7-10, 1953, the team’s debut season in Milwaukee.

DRUG SUSPENSIONS ISSUED The Boston minor league outfielder Chad Hardy received a 60-game suspension without pay after testing positive for Tamoxifen, a performance-enhancing substance.

The free-agent pitchers Julio Lugo and Adolfi Telleria were each suspended for 72 games without pay after testing positive for stanozolol.

Chella Choi ended the first round atop the L.P.G.A. Manulife Classic leaderboard when Belen Mozo closed with a triple bogey. Choi shot a six-under-par 66 at windy Whistle Bear in Cambridge, Ontario.

Mozo was seven under before running into trouble on the par-4 18th. The wind took her drive wide right into thick rough. She hacked her way out, found two bunkers and finally putted out for a 68.

STENSON PLAYING HURT Henrik Stenson revealed that he had shot the lowest score in major championship history, a 264 to win the British Open, with a slight cartilage tear in his right knee. Stenson withdrew after one round of the Barclays last week because of pain in his right knee, and tests revealed an injury dating to the United States Open.

Frank Lampard scored his second goal of the match three minutes into stoppage time to give New York City F.C. a 3-2 victory over visiting D.C. United.

Lampard took a pass from Khiry Shelton at the top of the penalty area, faked out a defender and goalkeeper Bill Hamid with his right foot, and then slammed the ball home with his left. David Villa scored for N.Y.C.F.C. (12-8-8) and assisted on Lampard’s first goal.

U.S. MIDFIELDER TO RETIRE Midfielder Heather O’Reilly announced her impending retirement from international soccer after a 15-year career with the United States women’s national team. O’Reilly will play her final international match on Sept. 15 against Thailand in Columbus, Ohio.

O’Reilly made her debut with the United States when she was 17. Now 31, she has 230 international appearances (seventh in national team history), 46 goals (12th) and 54 assists (sixth). She won three Olympic gold medals, as well as a World Cup title last summer.

Marissa Coleman and Shenise Johnson each hit six 3-pointers and the host Indiana Fever matched a W.N.B.A. record with 40 points in a quarter — the first — in a 98-77 victory over the Liberty. The Fever also set a franchise scoring record for a half, leading by 63-38 at the break.

Tina Charles made seven 3-pointers and had 22 points and 11 rebounds for the Liberty.

Elaine Thompson of Jamaica, the women’s 200-meter champion at the Rio Olympics, ran the world’s second-fastest time this year to edge Dafne Schippers of the Netherlands at the Weltklasse Diamond League meet in Zurich.

Thompson led only in the final five meters and finished in 21.85 seconds — seven-hundredths slower than her gold-medal-winning time. Schippers finished in 21.86, and Allyson Felix of the United States ran a season-best 22.02.

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section B, Page 14 of the New York edition with the headline: Planned Honor for Paterno Prompts Outcry. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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