Miscellany

The PBA winter tour, a fixture on ABC television for 34 years, will change radically next year under a two-year deal that will be signed soon.

The familiar January-to-April winter tour is gone. In its place will be a 14-week split schedule starting in mid-March and ending the first weekend in July. There will be a two-week break after the first six weeks, and the final first-half telecast will be the World Tournament of Champions - April 27 next year.

The shift was engineered by ABC to clear the way for a new NCAA basketball package in cooperation with Raycom Sports.

Halo America led wire to wire, beating Eclipse Award-winning Heavenly Prize by 3 1/2 lengths in the $148,500 Budweiser Breeders’ Cup at Oaklawn Park in Hot Springs Ark.