Leading off today: Lansing senior Rachael Palladino recorded a hat trick yesterday in a 12-0 soccer romp against host Union Springs to set the Section 4 girls career record for goals.

   Palladino's third goal of the game and 30th of the season was No. 174 -- one more than Liz McGrail compiled for Stamford from 1992-95. Palladino also added a pair of assists in the victory for Lansing (9-0), ranked first in the state in Class B.

   Kaitlin Robbins of Watertown Immaculate Heart Central set the state mark of 208 goals a year ago.

   Stevens picks Holy Cross: Saratoga basketball star Jordan Stevens, who averaged 23.2 points a game as a junior, has made an oral commitment to play for Holy Cross next year, The Times Union reported.

   Stevens, a 6-foot-5 guard/forward who has scored 1,401 career points, was named eighth-team all-state in Class AA last season by the New York State Sportswriters Association. He made visits to Holy Cross and Colgate and had scheduled trips to Bucknell and Vermont before giving coach Ralph Willard his decision.

   From the courts: Former NFL running back John Harvey, 41, once a star for Spring Valley, was sentenced by a state Supreme Court justice to 12 years in prison for raping an underage girl, The Journal News reported.

   Harvey was indicted on multiple rape counts of having sexual intercourse with a 12-year-old girl. He pleaded guilty July 28 to a single count of first-degree rape and misdemeanor endangering the welfare of a child.

   The rape charge carries a sentence of five to 25 years.

   Harvey played collegiately at Texas-El Paso and signed with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

   Fomer Byram Hills teacher and varsity baseball coach Quentin Lindsey, 34, pleaded guilty yesterday to illegally filming female students in school last year, The Journal News reported.

   Lindsey will serve no jail time but must follow terms of sex-offender probation for a year to receive an additional five years probation at his sentencing in 2009, the paper reported.

   Lindsey, a former Lakeland High baseball star, resigned from his teaching job yesterday and must surrender his teaching license. He had been suspended from his position at Byram Hills shortly after his arrest. He pleaded guilty to second-degree unlawful surveillance, a felony.

   Football forfeits: Baldwinsville and Syracuse Fowler were awarded forfeit victories in football yesterday, The Post-Standard reported.

   Baldwinsville picked up a forfeit win for its Sept. 5 game against Liverpool, which used an ineligible 19-year-old player. Liverpool had won, 32-12. Fowler collected the forfeit from its Sept. 12 loss to Camden, 21-6. Camden used a junior varsity player for one play after he had appeared in the JV game the previous day.

   Meningitis cases: A child-care worker at a Hauppauge elementary school has been diagnosed with viral meningitis, Newsday reported. If confirmed, it would be the sixth case of the disease reported in connection with a Long Island school since last week.

   A third student in the Harborfields school district has also been diagnosed with meningitis and a student in the Wyandanch district has contracted the disease, officials said. Both cases are thought to be viral meningitis, which is serious but rarely fatal.

   The most recent case in Harborfields, involving a middle-school student, apparently is unrelated to last week's diagnosis of viral meningitis in two siblings at Harborfields High At least one of the Harborfields cases involved an athlete, previous reports indicated.

   The sixth case was a Levittiwn Division student who has since returned to school.

   Horrific allegations: Six Las Vegas, N.M., football players were accused of sodomizing six younger teammates with a broomstick during training camp, and now their coaches are accused of turning a blind eye to the hazing.

   The head football coach and all five assistants at Robertson High, which won state championships in 2005 and 2006 and played in the final last season, have resigned, and prosecutors are considering charges against adults and youngsters alike.

   The scandal unfolded at a four-day training camp last month in the mountains west of Las Vegas. According to state police reports, a group of juniors assaulted several younger teammates over two days, holding the victims down while a broomstick was forced into their rectums over their athletic shorts. The alleged ringleader was expelled from school and others were suspended from school for the year.

   A school district investigation released earlier this month accused the coaches of inadequately supervising the players and failing to look into initial reports of hazing. District Attorney Henry Valdez in Santa Fe said coaches and school administrators could face charges of failing to report child sexual abuse.

   Red Jacket issue prompts editorial: The Daily Messenger in Canandaigua came out unexpectedly strong last week in the case of Red Jacket boys basketball coach Timm Munn, who was denied reappointment by the school board.

   Here's an excerpt:

   "Who’s right and who’s wrong in the Munn case? Who knows? Most school board members aren’t talking, at least publicly, about why they fired Munn, other than Doug Gage, who would only say it wasn’t playing time or his coaching record.

   "'I am not bound to say why I voted no (on Munn’s reappointment),' he told an emotional audience at last week’s board meeting.

   "That may be true, but it’s certainly not helpful. Increasingly, it seems, area school board members seem to enjoy the authority that comes with deciding who coaches or not, or how high the school taxes will be. But when it comes to accountability, they duck and hide between elections. By speaking out, board members might get more support for their decisions. Instead, their silence fuels suspicions that they -- in the case of Munn, for example -- had personal beefs that didn’t measure up to a coaching change."

   There might be a lot more to the issue than the general public knows, but so far it appears that this case primarily about parents unhappy with the way playing time was dished out. If that's true, then shame on the school board.

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