The 30th National Women’s Handball Championship 2020 will be inaugurated on Saturday at the Shaheed (Capt) M Mansur Ali National Handball Stadium here.

Bangladesh Handball Federation (BHF) is organising the event, sponsored by Exim Bank Limited.

Managing Director of Exim Bank Ltd Dr Mohammed Haider Ali Miah will inaugurate the meet as chief guest while BHF President AKM Nurul Fazal Babul will preside over the programme, the federation said in a press release on Friday.

Fourteen teams will participate in the meet.

They are: Bangladesh Ansar, BJMC, Jamalpur District, Bangladesh Police, Panchagarh District, Naogaon District, Dhaka District, Faridpur District, Gopalganj District, Dinajpur District, Narail District, Madaripur District, Rangamati District and Bandarban District. 

The prestigious Aga Khan Gold Cup Golf Tournament began amidst fanfare at the lush green and picturesque Kurmitola Golf Course here on Friday.

Admiral AMMM Aurangzeb Chowdhury, Chief of Naval Staff, Bangladesh Navy, was the chief guest at the opening function in the morning, said a press release.   

Brigadier General Md Tajul lslam Thakur, Club Captain, Kurmitola Golf Club, Brigadier General (Retd) Abidur Reza Khan, Chairman, Tournament Committee, Kurmitola Golf Club, Brigadier General (Retd) GSM Hamidur Rahman, Chief Executive Officer, Kurmitola Golf Club, Lieutenant Colonel  (Retd) Md Abdul Bari, General Manager, Golf Operations, Kurmitola Golf Club, Amyn Saleh, President, Prince Aga Khan Shia lmami lsmaili Council for Bangladesh and Tanveer Ali, Vice President, Prince Aga Khan Shia lmami lsmaili Council for Bangladesh were present at the inaugural function.

Other members of the Aga Khan community in Bangladesh and high officials of Kurmitola Golf Club were also present on the occasion.  

The prize distribution ceremony will be held on Saturday evening at the Banquet Hall of Kurmitola Golf Club.

The Olympic rings have arrived in Tokyo.

They sailed into Tokyo Bay on Friday on a barge and will stay there until the Olympics open on July 24 and close on Aug. 9.

The blue, black, red, yellow, and green rings will be replaced after that by the symbol for the Paralympics Games, which open on Aug. 25.

The symbol for the Paralympics is called "agitos,"which resembles three brush strokes in red, blue, and green. The word in Latin means "I move."

The five Olympic rings are gigantic. They stand 15.3 meters high — about 50 feet tall — and are 32.6 meters from end to end — about 100 feet in length.

"We decided to install the Olympic rings at this time because we wanted to do it first thing in the Olympic year," said Kenichi Kimura, an Olympic official with the Tokyo Metropolitan Government.

The location of the rings in Tokyo Bay is the Odaiba Marine Park, which is the venue for triathlon and distance swimming. The venue is a made-for television location, with a view across the water of the Tokyo skyline and the Tokyo's Rainbow bridge.

Many of Tokyo's venues are located around the bay.

The rings will be the center of attention on Jan. 24 when Tokyo will note its six-months-to-go milestone with a fireworks display.

South Carolina earned its No. 1 ranking with a style coach Dawn Staley described as "fast and fluid."

The Gamecocks showed they could overwhelm an opponent with their size in a half-court game on Thursday, beating Missouri 78-45.

"We pass the bus test, for sure, with our length and our height," Staley said, referring to how impressive her team looks getting off a bus. "We use it to our advantage. … We pounded the boards and gave ourselves multiple opportunities to make baskets."

South Carolina (17-1, 5-0 Southeastern Conference) grabbed 25 offensive rebounds and held a 62-31 edge in total rebounds.

Aliyah Boston, a 6-foot-5 freshman, and Victaria Saxon, a 6-2 sophomore, each finished with 10 points and 10 rebounds. Zia Cooke and Mikiah Herbert Harrigan scored 14 each for the Gamecocks, who played their first game since taking over the top spot in the AP Top 25.

Freshman guard Aijha Blackwell scored 13 points to lead the Tigers (4-14, 1-4). Missouri shot just 27.3%.

After a sluggish start, the Gamecocks started to pull away in the second quarter, outscoring the Tigers 18-3 in the last six minutes of the first half for a 35-17 lead.

"They make you shoot from the outside," Staley said. "If you're not prepared for them sagging off you, you tend to make bad decisions and take bad shots. Fortunately for us, our bad decisions and bad shots were cleaned up by our ability to rebound the basketball."

Defensively, the Gamecocks blocked eight shots and smothered Amber Smith, who leads Missouri in scoring, averaging 13 points. Smith didn't score until the final minute of the third quarter and finished with four points on 1-of-8 shooting.

"We talked about what a great shot-blocking team they were, but you didn't see us play off two feet or use a shot fake at the rim," Missouri coach Robin Pingeton said. "Those little details make a big difference. We're still working our way through some of that, but I'm still proud of our girls."

MAJOR MILESTONE

South Carolina senior point guard Tyasha Harris finished with 11 points and five assists and became the second player in program history to surpass 1,000 points and 600 assists in a career. She joined Cristina Ciocan, who accomplished the feat from 2000-04.

"I'm kind of speechless," Harris said. "I didn't come here to get the assists record. I didn't even know about it. But now that I'm on target to get it, I'm determined to get it."

Harris has 603 assists, which is 12 off Ciocan's school record.

"We haven't really had a point guard like Ty," Staley said. "She's the consummate. She can pass the ball, obviously, but it's her intellect and her ability to lead since she got here. She's an old lady in our program. She knows exactly what we want, and she's able to get people to elevate and play at her level."

BIG PICTURE

Missouri: After qualifying for the NCAA Tournament four years in a row, the Tigers have struggled adjusting to life without the program's all-time leading scorer, Sophie Cunningham, who now plays in the WNBA and in Australia. They hope to build for the future around freshmen Blackwell and Hayley Frank, who average more than 12 points. But they're taking their lumps now, especially during the recent three-game stretch against ranked opponents Mississippi State, Arkansas and South Carolina.

"The season hasn't gone as we've hoped, but we've talked about the process, really committing one day at a time to getting better," Pingeton said. "Come March, when the SEC Tournament rolls around, hopefully we'll be a completely different team than we are today."

South Carolina: The Gamecocks have yet to be slowed down or seriously challenged in SEC play, winning each game by at least nine points. South Carolina is averaging 91 per game in conference play.

END/AP/UNB/TZ

Mark Stone made his return to Ottawa memorable - for himself and his new coach.

Stone scored a goal and picked up an assist, leading Vegas to a 4-2 victory over the Senators on Thursday night in Peter DeBoer's debut as the Golden Knights' coach.

The win snapped a four-game losing streak for the Knights, who fired Gerard Gallant on Wednesday. Peter Stastny, Chandler Stephenson and Ryan Reaves also scored for Vegas.

Stone, traded to Vegas last February, received a video tribute during the first TV timeout, with Senators fans giving him a standing ovation. Stone took to the ice to thank the fans and gave them a thumbs up.

"It was nice to get the win," Stone said. "It was weird, for sure. Six great years over there. They took a chance on me from Day One. I was no shoo-in to be an NHL hockey player and this team helped me develop and mold me into the player I am today. It was unfortunate that we weren't able to end my career here, but at the same time Vegas has become home and the place that I want to spend the rest of my career."

DeBoer didn't have a lot of time to settle in as he met with the team briefly Thursday morning and then prepared for the game.

"I told them if I call any of them Jumbo or Burnsie to kick me," joked DeBoer. "I didn't make any mistakes on names, but it was a good night. It's a good group and, like I said, a tough week and some hard days. I thought it was nice to get a win and kind of move past that."

DeBoer is looking forward to having some time together with the team both on and off the ice as he realizes there will be some adjustments.

On Wednesday, players took responsibility for Gallant's firing and know it's on them to turn things around.

"Nothing's really going to change," Stone said. "We know we need to be better. We know we have a good team. There's obviously going to be little tweaks that (DeBoer) is going to want us to do, but for us we need to get back to playing with that character we know we have."

Marc-Andre Fleury stopped 33 shots for Vegas, tying the New York Rangers' Henrik Lundqvist for fifth place on the NHL's career list with 458 wins.

Craig Anderson made 39 saves in his first game since Jan. 7, but the Senators extended their losing streak to nine games (0-5-4). Ottawa has scored just 19 goals through the winless drought. Vladislav Namestnikov and Connor Brown scored for the Senators.

"It's not ideal when you're dealing with young kids and confidence," Senators coach D.J. Smith said. "As long as we keep getting better, I think the biggest thing is we got healthy on the back end and I think we'll turn the corner there."

Ottawa hosts Calgary on Saturday night before an eight-day break and would hate to leave with a 10-game losing streak on their minds.

"When you're a young team and you're learning how to win, (it's tough)," said Brown, who also had an assist. "A lot of these games could have been won easily, especially the three prior to this one where we lost in OT and I thought we played pretty good games. It comes with maturity and learning, so we're learning how to play and how to play with a lead and play from behind.

"Obviously, it's important for us not to get discouraged and try to stay as positive as possible in a situation like this and focus on the process."

Vegas led 1-0 before Stone scored late in the second period on a wraparound effort.

Vegas made it 3-0 early in the third as Stephenson scored a short-handed after Thomas Chabot had a giveaway.

Ottawa got on the board one minute later when Chris Tierney found Namestnikov down low for a one-timer.

Vegas made it 4-1 after Anderson was caught behind the net and couldn't get back in time to stop Reaves from picking up his sixth of the season.

The Senators cut the lead in half as Brown scored on the power play.

Vegas opened the scoring just 36 seconds into the game when Stastny and Stone had a little give-and-go with Stastny beating Anderson for his 13th of the season.

END/AP/UNB/TZ