Glavine ailing after crash

New York — Tom Glavine got into the taxi, called his wife on his cell phone as the cab pulled away from LaGuardia Airport and then he heard the driver shout.

He slammed face first into the partition between the front and back seats as the taxi collided with an SUV, and the next thing he knew, he had one tooth in his hand and blood was streaming from his mouth.

“I was pretty sure I wasn’t going to pitch on Wednesday, but at least I knew, I felt good enough that nothing else was out of whack, and it wasn’t going to be a career- or a life-threatening thing,” he said.

Two days after the accident, Glavine talked about the crash Thursday following New York’s 2-1 win over the Houston Astros. He estimated he wouldn’t return to the mound for the Mets until Aug. 21 at San Francisco.

College basketball

Former WSU player dead

Wichita — Al Tate, a former Wichita State University basketball standout, has died. He was 66.

Tate, who averaged 14.6 points and 9.9 rebounds in three varsity seasons with the Shockers, died Saturday of pancreatic cancer at his home in Hacienda Heights, Calif., said his son, Marquis.

Tate was a high school standout at Coffeyville, and he led the Shockers in both scoring and rebounding his final two seasons. In his last game, on March 5, 1960, he scored 40 points against Tulsa.