Hockey
SMYTH OUT 8 WEEKS: Colorado Avalanche forward Ryan Smyth has a broken right ankle and will miss up to eight weeks. Smyth was hurt during Colorado's 4-3, overtime loss at Phoenix on Monday. The club said Thursday the fracture was discovered during a follow-up MRI. Smyth has 28 points, third-best on the team, with 11 goals and 17 assists in 36 games.
Baseball
CARDS SIGN CLEMENT:Matt Clement and the St. Louis Cardinals agreed to a $1.5 million, one-year contract on Thursday with a club option for 2009. Clement (87-86 with 4.47 ERA) missed last season while recovering from shoulder surgery. He last pitched for the Boston Red Sox in 2006.
Tennis
QATAR OPEN: Top-seeded Nikolay Davydenko beat Dmitry Tursunov 7-5, 6-3 Thursday in the Qatar Open and next faces Andy Murray in a repeat of last year's semifinal matchup. Third-seeded Murray advanced by defeating Thomas Johansson 7-6 (4), 6-0 in the quarterfinals. Davydenko was beaten by Murray last year, but the Scotsman went on to lose to Ivan Ljubicic in the final.
VENUS WINS 1ST MATCH: At Hong Kong, Venus Williams beat China's Peng Shuai 6-1, 6-2 Thursday in her first match of the year at the JB Group Classic exhibition tournament, a warmup for the Australian Open. Peng, a powerful double-handed hitter on both sides, outhit Williams occasionally but never posed a serious threat to the more consistent American. Williams will next play Russia's Elena Dementieva, who upset top seed Ana Ivanovic of Serbia, 6-4, 1-6, 6-3 in Thursday's other quarterfinal. The other semifinal pits Russians Maria Sharapova and Anna Chakvetadze.
DAVENPORT NOW 16-1: At Auckland, New Zealand, Lindsay Davenport advanced to the semifinals of the ASB Classic on Thursday with a 6-3, 6-3 win over Italy's Sara Errani. Davenport is 16-1 in singles since she returned to the tour after the birth of her first child. She is closing in on a third title in the first four tournaments of her comeback. New Zealand wild card Marina Erakovic, ranked 153rd, upset top-seeded Vera Zvonareva of Russia 6-3, 2-6, 7-6 (5). Unseeded Aravane Rezai of France took little more than an hour to beat third-seeded Katarina Srebotnik 6-1, 6-3. Rezai faces Erakovic in the semifinals.