Peppers Pride won her 16th straight race in April in Farmington, N.M., and will try to break the modern North American record of 17 straight Saturday.

Related articles:

New Mexico mare sets record in win New Mexico horse runs for North American record streak

Health Care
Rio Salado College
PA's/Online Instructors General
CORT
WAREHOUSE/DRIVER Construction
Komatsu Equipment Co
Mechanic Education
Assessment Technology, Inc
Social Studies Content Writer General
CORT
Warehouse Supervisor

ALBUQUERQUE — With one more victory in a 6-furlong allowance race Saturday at Zia Park in Hobbs, N.M., Peppers Pride, a 5-year-old thoroughbred mare, would improve to 17 victories in 17 starts, a modern North American record.

Peppers Pride is poised to break the mark of 16 straight victories that she shares with Triple Crown winner Citation, two-time Horse of the Year Cigar, Mister Frisky and Hallowed Dreams.

Some have compared Peppers Pride's run to a minor-league baseball record because she has never raced outside New Mexico, all of her starts have been against fillies and mares, and she has never run on a sloppy track.

Joel Marr, who trains Peppers Pride, said most of the grumbling comes from fans and reporters or race commentators — but never from anyone who makes a living by handling horses.

Fellow trainer Bob Baffert, a UA graduate and a native of Nogales, Ariz., said the circumstances do not matter.

"It's significant. It's very difficult to win, no matter what. It's tougher in open company, but it still takes a great horse to go out and win every time."

NEW YORK — David Stern responded to a report on NBA referees Thursday by vowing to build the "most effective possible system" to monitor illegal gambling and preserve the game's integrity.

The commissioner ordered the investigation last August after former referee Tim Donaghy was accused of betting on games he officiated and providing inside information to gambling associates to win their bets. Donaghy began serving a 15-month sentence on Sept. 23 at a federal prison in Pensacola, Fla.

Stern promised to implement all the recommendations included in former federal prosecutor Lawrence Pedowitz's review of the NBA's referees operations department, the result of a 14-month probe that cost the league several million dollars.

"We will be up there with the very best. No one will have a better system than we do," Stern said on a conference call. "But all of that said, to the idea that, you know, criminal activity will exist every place else in the world except in sports is just something that we can't guarantee. But we're going to have the most effective possible system that's ever been devised."

The report recommended it include: a hot line to anonymously raise questions about gambling and game integrity issues; making available any complaints the league receives about refs — beginning in the 2008-09 playoffs — to both teams to avoid suspicions of bias; requiring officials to annually report their contacts among players and team personnel to the league so it can monitor fraternization.

The report also suggests mandatory gambling education for players.

● Knicks forward Jared Jeffries fractured his left fibula at practice Thursday and is expected to miss six to eight weeks.

STORRS, Conn. — Connecticut freshman basketball player Nate Miles told a newspaper Thursday night that he does not know if he will appeal being expelled from school after being arrested for violating a restraining order.

Miles made his comments by telephone to the Connecticut Post.

The Hartford Courant reported that Miles' guardian, Sean Patterson, said the 6-foot-7-inch forward was expelled following an administrative hearing Thursday.

"In my mind, he was railroaded today," said Patterson, a former youth coach who became Miles' legal guardian.