Newsmakers

Died The Oregon Ducks basketball coach who broke the John Wooden-led UCLA Bruins’ 98-game home winning streak has died. Dick Harter was 81. He died Monday night in a South Carolina hospital. In 1976, Harter led his team to UCLA’s Pauley Pavilion, where the rival Bruins hadn’t dropped a game since 1970. Oregon won 65-45, making good on Harter’s pledge to take on Wooden’s intimidating squad. Harter compiled a 113-81 record in seven years at Oregon. He left Oregon for Penn State. After his first team went 6-20, Harter led the Ducks to six consecutive winning seasons and three appearances in the National Invitation Tournament.

Guilty The Fiesta Bowl’s former CEO pleaded guilty in federal court to a felony conspiracy charge stemming from his role in an illegal campaign- finance scheme. John Junker entered his plea Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Phoenix. It’s his second plea agreement in the case. Both guilty pleas stem from a scheme in which the Fiesta Bowl reimbursed with bowl funds employees who made political campaign contributions.

Fired SMU fired men’s basketball coach Matt Doherty after six seasons in which the high-profile former North Carolina coach failed to take the Mustangs to the NCAA tournament. Doherty went 13-19 this year and 80-109 in six years with SMU. The Mustangs will move from Conference USA to the much tougher Big East in 2013.

Dismissed Georgia Tech kicked Glen Rice Jr. off the basketball team after being charged in a shooting incident outside an Atlanta nightclub. Rice, son of the former NBA star, led Georgia Tech in scoring and rebounding but already was serving his second suspension at the time of the incident, in which a gun was allegedly fired accidentally.

Hired The Mississippi State Bulldogs hired Vin Schaefer to be its next women’s basketball coach. Schaefer comes to the Bulldogs after 15 years as the associate head coach at Texas A&M. Schaefer takes over for previous coach Sharon Fanning-Otis, who announced her retirement last month after 17 seasons.