Hernandez gave up two quick hits and little else over seven impressive innings, and the New York Mets beat the San Francisco Giants 4-2 Thursday night for their fifth win in six games. "Sometimes you've just got to get your rhythm," Mets manager Willie Randolph said. "El Duque is like that sometimes." Jose Reyes energized the Mets with a leadoff walk, his major league-leading 29th steal and an RBI single.

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Flying cross-country is nothing new to the Anaheim Ducks. So their four-plus hour flight to Ottawa on Thursday was quite familiar to the NHL's southwestern-most team that features only three opponents located within its Pacific time zone. Anaheim coach Randy Carlyle followed the team's regular plan by having his players sleep at home before flying out at 10 a.m. "It's kind of like we get into this routine, and it's a routine that you start not just for the playoffs but that you start in September," Carlyle said. "And the number of miles that we put on, it's the nature of our business." The flight to Ottawa was just a little longer than Anaheim's two trips to Detroit in the West finals.

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The Stanley Cup crossed the continent from Anaheim to Ottawa on Thursday morning. If the Ducks have their way, the prized trophy won't make that journey east again. The most successful hockey team in Southern California history carried a 2-0 lead in the Stanley Cup finals to Canada's capital city, full of confidence and holding a tinge of hope that when they return home after Game 4 they will be in possession of the cherished chalice that was unveiled in Ottawa in 1892.

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Michelle Wie withdrew from the Ginn Tribute on Thursday after playing much of the first round with bandaged wrists and shooting 14 over par through 16 holes. After Wie bogeyed the par-4 seventh, the 17-year-old star from Hawaii told an LPGA tour official: "We're not going to play anymore." Her round included a 10 on the par-5 third hole. She shook hands with her playing partners on the eighth tee and rode the cart back to the clubhouse with her caddie and parents.

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Gene Gibson, who coached the Texas Tech men's basketball team from 1961-69, has died. He was 82. Gibson died Saturday at Presbyterian Hospital in Plano from complications resulting from five operations in the last few months, daughter Lisa Gibson said Thursday. In 1962, his first year as coach, Gibson led the Red Raiders to the second round of the NCAA tournament. Texas Tech won the 1965 Southwest Conference title but had to forfeit because of an ineligible player.

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A state investigation found no evidence that workers at Mike Shannon's restaurant knew Josh Hancock was drunk when they served the Cardinals pitcher alcohol in the hours prior to his fatal accident. Peter Lobdell, supervisor of the state Division of Alcohol and Tobacco Control, said at a news conference Thursday that investigators interviewed four employees of the restaurant and two of Hancock's teammates who were with him that night.

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