National Sports

HEERENVEEN, Netherlands — Canada's women's team pursuit squad opened the long-track speedskating World Cup season Friday with a bronze medal while Japan took gold in a world record time.

LAKE PLACID, N.Y. — Canada's Justin Kripps and Alex Kopacz opened the World Cup season with a silver medal Friday in the two-man bobsled event. Competing for first time together, Kripps of Summerland, B.C., and Kopacz of London, Ont.

STOCKHOLM — Before newcomer Matt Duchene can fully fit in, the Ottawa Senators still have others to make the difference.

VANCOUVER — Derek Dorsett spent a recent day off playing with his kids in a gymnastics studio. That physical activity, however light, would have been next to impossible last winter.

NYON, Switzerland — Patrice Evra was fired by Marseille on Friday after being suspended by UEFA for all remaining European games this season for kicking a fan of the French club. The volatile defender was also fined 10,000 euros ($11,650) by UEFA.

Former middleweight champion Anderson (The Spider) Silva has been pulled from a Nov. 25 UFC card in China for a potential doping violation dating back to an Oct. 26 out-of-competition sample.

MONTREAL — The Quebec government has announced Montreal's Olympic Stadium will have a new roof by 2023. The facility and its roofs have had a checkered history since the stadium was opened in July 1976.

WINNIPEG — Tristan Okpalaugo wasn't playing for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers when head coach Mike O'Shea made a lasting impression on him. After all, it's not every day someone saves your mother from being hit by a car.

MONTREAL — A new roof for Montreal's Olympic Stadium will serve as a reminder of the perils of unchecked ambition and vanity but also as a sign of confidence in the future, says the head of the agency that oversees the facility.

TORONTO — Masai Ujiri has asked the question likely dozens of times, of every young camper at every summertime Giants of Africa camp.