AP - Satellite tracking shows three mushers have left Cripple, the halfway point in the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race.

AP - Two off-duty Pennsylvania law enforcement officers were with Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger at the Georgia nightclub where a woman accused him of sexual assault, and the two men didn't see anything inappropriate, an attorney for one of them said Wednesday.

AP - Olympic silver medalist Tina Maze of Slovenia won the final giant slalom race of the season Thursday and Kathrin Hoelzl of Germany clinched the World Cup title in the event by finishing second.

AP - Erik Guay of Canada produced a daring run to win the final race of the season Thursday and claim a World Cup title in the super-G.

AP - Alex Rodriguez may soon be talking to federal authorities, and he hopes it will happen close to spring training.

Reuters - The Dallas Mavericks rallied after a stuttering start to extend their league-leading winning streak to 13 games with a 96-87 victory over the New Jersey Nets on Wednesday.

AP - Montana coach Wayne Tinkle shook off his assistants' suggestions to get the ball inside as the Grizzlies tried to rally from a 22-point deficit against Weber State.

AFP - European heavyweights Juventus and Liverpool will both seek to rescue disappointing seasons when the first legs of their respective Europa League last-16 ties kick off on Thursday.

AP - Adrian Aucoin beat Andrew Raycroft in a shootout with a little help from Phoenix backup goalie Jason LaBarbera.

AFP - World number one Roger Federer faces a potentially difficult path to the final of the Indian Wells hardcourt tournament, the season's first prestigious ATP Masters 1000 event.

AP - Lee Westwood is the leader of an English revolution in the world of golf as the highest-ranked player at No. 4 in the world and a two-time winner of the European Tour money list.

AP - A prosecutor served notice Wednesday that a grand jury may hear evidence that an associate of boxing champion Floyd Mayweather Jr. shot at a man who police said argued with the boxer last August at a Las Vegas skating rink.

AP - Team owner Jack Roush said Wednesday he's satisfied with the penalty NASCAR levied against driver Carl Edwards for his intentional accident with Brad Keselowski.

AP - The stick and glove Sidney Crosby used to give Canada its Olympic gold medal are back where they belong.

AFP - Victims of Hurricane Katrina are seeking to sue carbon gas-emitting multinationals for helping fuel global warming and boosting the devastating 2005 storm, legal documents showed.

AP - Many of the more than 1 million Northeastern homes and businesses plunged into the dark by a storm were running on electricity Monday, three days after the hard-hitting combination of snow, rain and hurricane-force winds.

AP - Rescue workers in dinghies cruised flooded streets on France's Atlantic coast Monday, searching for people still trapped in their homes by storms that smashed through concrete sea walls and killed at least 62 people across Western Europe.

AFP - Hurricane-force winds, surging seas and driving rain lashed western Europe on Sunday, leaving at least 53 people dead and more than a million households without power.

AFP - A powerful storm packing hurricane-force winds moved north to the west coast of France on Sunday after lashing Spain and Portugal, killing at least three people and causing transport chaos.

AFP - A powerful storm packing hurricane-force winds lashed Spain, Portugal and France on Saturday, killing at least three people, leaving tens of thousands of homes without power and causing transport chaos.

AP - A fire that started in an unoccupied oceanfront hotel was fanned by hurricane-force winds and spread to several nearby buildings, engulfing and destroying an entire block of businesses on a stretch of Hampton Beach popular with summer tourists. No injuries were reported.

Reuters - Seasonal rains and hurricanes spell trouble for Haiti in the best of times, but with hundreds of thousands of people living in flimsy makeshift shelters after last month's earthquake, this year the dangers are much greater.

AP - Top researchers now agree that the world is likely to get stronger but fewer hurricanes in the future because of global warming, seeming to settle a scientific debate on the subject. But they say there's not enough evidence yet to tell whether that effect has already begun.

AP - Nearly 1 1/2 years after Hurricane Ike battered Galveston, this southeast Texas island community fears the natural disaster could land another harsh blow.

AP - A powerful tropical storm missed American Samoa early Saturday morning, causing heavy rains and high winds but sparing more devastation to the U.S. territory battered by a deadly autumn tsunami.

AP - Two former Blackwater Worldwide employees say the security company repeatedly billed the U.S. government for excessive or inappropriate expenses, including a prostitute for workers in Afghanistan and strippers in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

AFP - The first heavy rains since a devastating earthquake four weeks ago brought new misery to Haitians Thursday with hundreds of thousands of people still living in flimsy homemade shelters.