Football

Report: Auburn paid players — A report published Wednesday by Selena Roberts, a former Sports Illustrated and New York Times reporter, delves into charges toward the Auburn football program including academic fraud and pay-for-play incentives and positive drug testing. “Auburn’s Tainted Title: Victims, Violations and Vendettas” was published on the website Roopstigo.com. The report focuses on former Auburn safety Mike McNeil, who faces robbery charges stemming from a March 2011 arrest, two months after Auburn won the BCS national championship. Roberts also alleges in her report that three players were told before the BCS championship victory over Oregon that up to nine teammates would be ruled academically ineligible, including star running back Michael Dyer, before unnamed school counselors fixed transcripts to keep them on the field. Several ex-Tigers reached for comment condemned how their remarks were used out of context.

Cycling

Armstrong turns to swimming — Lance Armstrong is looking to make a splash with a return to competition. The disgraced cyclist is signed up to swim three events this weekend at the Masters South Central Zone Swimming Championships at the University of Texas. U.S. Masters Swimming is not covered under the same drug testing rules of the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, which banned Armstrong for life from its sanctioned events for his performance-enhancing drug use during his cycling career.

Basketball

Cal’s Crabbe to NBA— Pac-12 Player of the Year and leading scorer Allen Crabbe will forego his senior season at California and enter this summer’s NBA draft. Crabbe announced through Cal on Wednesday that he would declare for the draft, a long-expected move by the junior guard. Crabbe, the conference freshman of the year in 2011, ranks 10th on the school’s career scoring list with 1,537 points in 98 games. The 6-foot-6 Crabbe is projected to be a first-round pick in this summer’s draft after leading Cal to a surprising second-place finish in the Pac-12 and an NCAA tournament berth. He averaged 18.4 points and 6.1 rebounds per game.

Delay on Kings vote? — The future home of the Kings may not be settled this month after all. With owners facing a difficult choice between a move to Seattle or the team staying put in Sacramento, NBA Commissioner David Stern says the expected vote in two weeks may be delayed. Stern says, “We’ve never had a situation like this.” A Seattle group led by investor Chris Hansen and Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has a pending agreement with the Maloof family to buy 65 percent of the team and move it back to the city the SuperSonics left in 2008. Sacramento has put together its own group to make a competing bid. Both sides made presentations to a committee of owners Wednesday that left enough questions that Stern says he doesn’t know when a decision will be made.

Colleges

Big East gets new name — The current Big East will be called the American Athletic Conference starting next season. The conference announced the decision Wednesday after university presidents approved the new moniker earlier in the day. The Big East football schools were in need of a new name after they agreed to let seven basketball schools break away from the conference to start a new league this summer to be called the Big East. The American Athletic Conference will have 10 members in its first season: Rutgers, Louisville, Connecticut, South Florida, Cincinnati, Central Florida, Memphis, Houston, SMU and Temple.

— From wire reports