News In Brief

Call him forward-looking

In japan, where admission to a prestigious university can be one's passport to a lifetime of upward mobility, high school graduates are now celebrating as their acceptance notices arrive. Among them is Toyokuni Utagawa, who passed rigorous entrance exams and expects to enroll in Osaka's Kinki University law school when the new academic year begins in April. Upon graduation in 2003, he then hopes to study for a doctorate. What makes him so special, you ask? Only that when he accepts his law degree he'll be the first known centenarian to do so. A sixth-generation printmaker, he quit school early this century after the elementary grades.

Top amateur athlete award goes to female hoops star

Hours before her final regular-season home game last week, University of Tennessee basketball star Chamique Holdsclaw became the first female basketball player to win the James E. Sullivan Award as the nation's top amateur athlete. Holdsclaw is the second straight Tennessee athlete to do so. Peyton Manning, quarterback of the Volunteer's football team, was named Sullivan Award winner for 1997. The last 15 winners of the award, presented annually since 1930 by the US Amateur Athletic Union:

1984 Greg Louganis diving

1985 Joan Benoit-Samuelsson marathon

1986 Jackie Joyner-Kersee track and field

1987 Jim Abbott baseball

1988 Florence Griffith Joyner track

1989 Janet Evans swimming

1990 John Smith wrestling

1991 Mike Powell track and field

1992 Bonnie Blair speedskating

1993 Charlie Ward football

1994 Dan Jansen speedskating

1995 Bruce Baumgartner wrestling

1996 Michael Johnson track

1997 Peyton Manning football

1998 Chamique Holdsclaw basketball

- Associated Press