GOLF

Camden native Cole Anderson shot even-par 72 in the opening round of the U.S. Amateur tournament on Monday at Colorado Golf Club in Parker, Colorado.

Anderson, 22, was at 3-under par after 15 holes, but shot double-bogey 7 on the 16th and bogeyed the 17th to drop to even. He had birdies on the fifth, seventh, 11th, 13th and 15th holes. He is tied for 45th.

Anderson also played in the U.S. Amateur in 2017 before his junior year at Camden Hills. He earned an automatic berth in this year’s tournament as one of the top 50 players in the World Amateur Rankings.

Anderson is six shots back of leader Sampsonyunhe Zheng, who opened with a 66. Ben James and Ryggs Johnston are tied for second at 5 under.

The tournament continues Tuesday with another round of stroke play before the field is cut to 64 for match play.

EUROPEAN TOUR: The European tour will feature a 44-tournament schedule for 2023-24 that has various swings in the 12-month season and finishes with a model similar to the PGA Tour.

Among the changes is moving the Abu Dhabi Championship, which had become the signature event of the Middle East Swing, from January to November as part of a two-tournament playoff system for the top performers.

The schedule is broken down into five swings, and players who do the best in each of those chunks of the schedule will earn a $200,000 bonus and qualify for the meat of the season in September and October. That is when most of Europe’s heritage events take place, such as the Irish Open at Royal County Down.

Leading players from each swing also will earn a spot in the $9 million Rolex Series events. Money from majors would not count toward the swing standings.

The European tour — commercially known as the DP World Tour — also will start with consecutive tournaments in Dubai as a four-week stretch in the United Arab Emirates.

The prize fund will be just shy of $150 million, a record for the European tour.

BASKETBALL

MEDIA: Doris Burke will become the first woman to serve as a game analyst on television for a championship final in one of the four major professional U.S. sports leagues.

ESPN announced that Burke and Doc Rivers will join Mike Breen on ESPN and ABC’s top NBA broadcast crew.

Burke, who joined ESPN in 1990, has been an analyst on the network’s NBA games since 2017. She called the past four finals on ESPN Radio after being a sideline reporter for ABC’s coverage of the finals from 2009-19.

Rivers, who was fired as coach of the Philadelphia 76ers in May, called games on ESPN during the 2003-04 season as well as the 2004 finals on ABC.

Burke and Rivers replace Jeff Van Gundy and Mark Jackson, who were laid off as part of job cuts by the network. Breen, Van Gundy and Jackson called 15 finals together.

WNBA: The New York Liberty and Las Vegas Aces are living up to the preseason WNBA hype and will meet for the first time with a championship on the line when they play for the Commissioner’s Cup title on Tuesday night.

The budding rivals were predicted to win the WNBA title before the season tipped off and have loftier aspirations of taking home that trophy. The first-place Aces won both the Commissioner’s Cup and the WNBA title last season and wouldn’t mind double-dipping again this year.

Each member of the winning team will receive around $30,000 for the in-season tourney. Players on the losing squad each gets about $10,000.

HOCKEY

NHL: Toronto Maple Leafs prospect Rodion Amirov has died less than 2 years since being diagnosed with a brain tumor. He was 21.

Agent Dan Milstein confirmed to The Associated Press that Amirov died Monday in Munich, Germany. The team said in February 2022 that Amirov had a brain tumor and would go to Germany for treatment, in the hopes of being able to resume his hockey career at some point.

Toronto selected Amirov with the 15th pick in the 2020 NHL draft. The Salavat, Russia, native was playing in the KHL with his hometown team in 2021 before being sidelined by an injury 10 games into the season.

• The International Ice Hockey Federation ruled in favor of the Philadelphia Flyers by agreeing Russian goaltender Ivan Fedotov had a valid NHL contract for the upcoming season when he signed with CSKA Moscow in the KHL.

The decision paves the way for Fedotov to play in North America, like he planned to do a year ago before being conscripted into the Russian military.

It was not immediately clear if he’d seek to leave Russia to play in North America. Relations between Russia and the U.S. are strained over the war in Ukraine, the NHL cut ties in Russia last year and no transfer agreement exists between the league and the KHL.

SOCCER

CHELSEA: Chelsea took its spending on players to a staggering $1 billion in 15 months under its American owners by signing Ecuador midfielder Moises Caicedo from Brighton for a reported 115 million pounds ($146 million).

It is a record fee for a transfer in Britain, surpassing the 106.7 million pounds (then $131.4 million) that Chelsea paid for Argentina midfielder Enzo Fernandez in the January window.

Since taking control of the London club in May last year from Roman Abramovich, Chelsea’s ownership — fronted by Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital — has spent $280 million on players in the 2022 summer transfer window, $350 million in the January window and now around $370 million, and counting, this summer.

SAUDI LEAGUE: Neymar is set to complete a move to the Saudi Pro League after Al Hilal agreed a reported 90 million euros ($98 million) transfer fee with Paris Saint-Germain.

The fee would be a record for the league, backed by the oil-rich state, in its spending spree on high-end soccer talent.

Neymar has reportedly been offered a two-year contract expected to pay the 31-year-old Brazil star an annual salary of about $100 million. That would be around half of the 38-year-old Ronaldo’s reported salary.

TENNIS

WESTERN & SOUTHERN OPEN: Venus Williams beat a top-20 player for the first time in four years, rallying from big deficits in both sets to knock off 16th-ranked Veronika Kudermetova 6-4, 7-5 in the first round at Mason, Ohio.

The 43-year-old Williams, a seven-time Grand Slam champion, improved her match record this year to 3-5. She came in ranked 533rd.

Another American veteran, 2017 U.S. Open champion Sloane Stephens, beat Elisabetta Cocciaretto 7-5, 6-2. The start of the match was delayed 2 hours, 44 minutes.

The 30-year-old Stephens will face defending champion and No. 6 seed Caroline Garcia in the second round.

On the men’s side, No. 12 seed Felix Auger-Aliassime beat Matteo Berrettini 4-6, 6-2, 6-3.