Briefs | Liverpool advances to Champions League final

Soccer

Penalty kicks decide home-and-home semifinal: Liverpool advanced to the final of the UEFA Champions League, beating visiting Chelsea 1-0 to force penalty kicks and winning the shootout 4-1 Tuesday.

Daniel Agger scored in the 23rd minute for Liverpool, which lost the first leg of the home-and-home, total-goals semifinal 1-0 at Chelsea last week. Neither team scored during the rest of regulation and 30 minutes of extra time, leaving the aggregate tied 1-1 in the matchup of English teams.

In the May 23 final in Athens, Greece, Liverpool will play Manchester United of England or AC Milan of Italy. Manchester United won the first leg 3-2 at home last week, and the teams meet again today in Milan.

Tennis

Exhibition will be on half-clay, half-grass court: One is the king of grass courts, the other the king of clay. After today's exhibition match in Palma de Mallorca, Balearic Islands, Roger Federer of Switzerland or Rafael Nadal of Spain will be king of both surfaces.

Federer will play Nadal on a $1.63 million, half-clay, half-grass court on the Spanish island.

Dementieva bundles up for a victory: With snowflakes falling on the red clay, Elena Dementieva of Russia beat American Meilen Tu 6-7 (5-7), 6-0, 7-5 in a first-round match at the J&S Cup in Warsaw, Poland, in which both players wore pants and long-sleeve shirts.

College basketball

Arizona's Olson will have O'Neill as assistant coach — again: Arizona coach Lute Olson hired Kevin O'Neill to replace Jim Rosborough, the longtime aide who has rejected an offer to move elsewhere in the athletic department.

O'Neill was an assistant to Olson from 1986 to 1989 before becoming a head coach at Marquette, Tennessee, Northwestern and the NBA Toronto Raptors. O'Neill, 50, known for emphasizing defense, dismissed speculation he has been pegged as the eventual successor to the 72-year-old Olson. Olson has said he has no plans to retire.

Clark to coach: Perry Clark, a former Tulane and Miami coach who has worked as a TV analyst in recent years, was hired as the coach at Texas A&M-Corpus Christi. He replaces Ronnie Arrow, who left to coach South Alabama.

Ex-Illinois player McBride sentenced: Former Illinois guard Rich McBride was told by a judge he cannot drink alcohol for two years as part of his sentencing for drunken driving.

Judge Richard Klaus also ordered McBride, 22, to perform 250 hours of community service, pay a $1,000 fine and submit to random testing to confirm he has not had alcohol.

Father of Arizona State's Johnson dies in crash: Tom Johnson, 50, the father of Arizona State women's player Aubree Johnson, died in a motorcycle accident Sunday in Tecate, Mexico.

Aubree Johnson's 15-year-old brother, Jordan, died in his sleep of heart failure in November.

Swimming

Thorpe reportedly gets more time: Ian Thorpe, retired Olympic and world champion, reportedly has been granted an open-ended extension to provide medical information to Australian investigators probing irregularities in his May 2006 urine sample.

Auto racing

Fans banned: Talladega Superspeedway in Alabama has permanently banned 14 fans from buying tickets for events at the track after their arrests Sunday for throwing objects on the track after Jeff Gordon's victory in the Aaron's 499 NASCAR Nextel Cup race.

The fans were charged with disorderly conduct and posted bond at the track's jail facilities. Track officials can't prevent the 14 fans from buying tickets through a third party.

Actor to drive Indy 500 pace car: Patrick Dempsey, a star on ABC's "Grey's Anatomy," will drive the Chevrolet Corvette pace car for the Indianapolis 500 on May 27. He has competed in sports-car races and off-road events.

Sailing

Louis Vuitton Cup racing postponed: Louis Vuitton Cup racing in Valencia, Spain, was postponed because of strong winds that could have resulted in damage to the yachts.

Seattle Times news services