LOS ANGELES (AP) Reggie Bush is overjoyed to win the Heisman Trophy once more.

Now he also wants to regain his popularity.

The former Southern California quarterback says the Heisman return is the biggest step yet in his fight with the NCAA to restore his good name and records from an incredible college football profession. Bush bluntly stated that he “never cheated” during his three seasons at USC.

“I never had any doubt that this would happen,” Bush said. “Because I know the truth is on my side.”

Bush and his family celebrated his restoration of Heisman honors Thursday during a news conference atop the venerable Coliseum, where Bush played for the Trojans before an 11-year NFL profession. Bush and his three children held the trophy together as his wife, mother and plenty of supporters cheered.

Bush praised the Heisman Trust for reinstating him, but the former linebacker and his lawyers made clear their fight against the NCAA was not over. Bush has indicated he has no plans to drop a defamation lawsuit filed last 12 months against the NCAA over the governing body’s characterization of the circumstances that led to Bush’s 2021 troubles.

“It pretty much meant I was considered a fraud,” Bush said. “The trophy… to be taken away from me (was painful), but being labeled a cheater was much worse because I never cheated and there is no proof that I cheated.”

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Bush won the Heisman Award in 2005 but gave it up in 2010 after massive sanctions were imposed on USC, partly related to Bush’s dealings with two aspiring sports marketers. The Heisman Trust restored the honor and returned the trophy to Bush in Jacksonville, Florida, on Wednesday, citing fundamental changes in the structure of faculty athletics over the past 14 years.

The NCAA also voided 14 of the Trojans’ victories under its sanctions and erased lots of Bush’s accomplishments from the record books. The decision continues to infuriate Bush, who clearly hopes that his lawsuit and public pressure will force the governing body to change its position.

“This is a clear call for the NCAA to do the right thing and be on the right side of history,” attorney Ben Crump said.

Bush, whose NCAA-mandated separation from USC resulted in 2020, hopes to see his retired No. 5 on the peristyle of the Coliseum this fall. He also hopes to lead coach Lincoln Riley’s team out of the Coliseum tunnel by accepting an honor bestowed upon the Trojans’ top former team.

But Bush says he won’t be satisfied until his name can also be cleared.

“You can’t achieve this goal or a national championship by cheating,” Bush said. “I promise you that.”

After calling his daughter Shelomi’s decision to transfer from the University of Colorado and play basketball at Alabama A&M University “stupid,” Deion Sanders was slammed by his mother, his ex-wife Pilar Sanders.

She criticized the previous NFL star for being an absent father as a substitute of a “present” father and never supporting his daughter’s selections.

“You always talk about the current person, don’t do that. Stop talking about your current parent. Don’t make me say more than I have to say. Stop talking about being a present parent,” Pilar said in a YouTube video directed at her ex-husband.

Coach Prime apparently responded by taking to social media to spread a few of his sage advice, telling his 1.8 million followers to “stay positive” and “act from love.”

Early on the morning of Saturday, April 27, he posted a message on X: “Let’s go, baby! Be positive and act based on Love. Hate is enough that they don’t need your emotions and sensitivity. God bless you. #CoachPrime.”

Let’s go, baby! Be positive and act based on Love. Hate is enough that they do not need your emotions and sensitivity. God bless you. #CoachPrime

— COACH PRIME (@DeionSanders) April 27, 2024

His tweet got here after his ex-wife Pilar Sanders slammed him for not being loving and supportive. According to Pilar, Coach Prime didn’t respect his daughter’s decision because she made it herself.

In the video she recorded, she said: “When a child, a young adult, decides to act on his own and even seeks advice, not even in an arrogant or disrespectful way, but takes care of his own life, looking out for his own career and doing everything he can to her best, the girl wants to play football.

She also claimed that the athlete dad deprived his daughter of recruiting experience and that he had favorites among his five children: Deiondra, Deion Jr., Shilo, Shedeura and Shelomi Sanders. In his mini unit, the three youngest children share with Pilar.

She added: “What about supporting someone else? We know you have your favorites. We all know it; we’ve all seen it all our lives.”

Many social media users took Deion’s positive quote as an attempt to cover up his comments about Shelomi’s decision to go to an HBCU.

“Disagreement is not hate,” someone he tweeted.

While most of the tweets seemed to ignore the fact that his family was going through a major rift over Shelomi’s decision, many of the tweets reflected how each parent was dealing with it.

“No shade, but I’m glad she makes him tea,” one tweet To read. “Pilar is a GIRL’S MOTHER. she came to her daughter’s games, even if she didn’t play in them. I think I’ve only seen Deion in one. it’s sad because it’s the same with Deiondra. It seems he’s only interested in boys.

no shade, but I’m glad she’s making him tea. Pilar is the GIRL’S MOTHER. she came to her daughter’s games, even if she didn’t play in them. I think I’ve only seen Deion in one. it’s sad because it’s kind of the same with Deiondra. It seems he’s only interested in boys. pic.twitter.com/6rS9UUa0cA

— 🐦‍⬛🪐 (@gothspoulz) April 26, 2024

Some fans took the tweet as evidence that there is a parenting war going on between Deion and Pilar.

“Deion and Pilar are arguing again about Shelomi’s school choice, smh,” one X user he wrote.

Others consider that his ex-wife is guilty, writing“Pilar Sanders is basically attempting to brainwash her children and switch them against Deion, it’s terrible.”

One fan focused his comments on the young lady at the center of the screaming: statingthat they will simply “pray” for all parties involved.

Shelomi initially played for Jackson State University and moved to Colorado after her dad moved to an NCAA Division 1 school. However, she announced on YouTube this week that she was headed to Alabama A&M to play for newly hired head coach Dawn Thornton.

Her dad, the only athlete in history to appear in both the Super Bowl and the World Series, was furious about the move, calling it “silly.”

“You get the team before you enter the portal. This is what I would advise your child to do. I know it’s illegal, come on, come on. Everyone knows someone who knows someone who knows someone. “You kind of want them to do something. (…) And she actually got counseling,” he said.

He added: “You have to understand. I am a real father; I am a real man and a real dad. Where I come from and historically, children follow their parents. When do parents start tracking their children? It doesn’t work in my book. It doesn’t work where I come from. I am the leader of the family and I dictate where my children go, not them dictating where I go.”

LOS ANGELES (AP) – Lawyers for Sean “Diddy” Combs dismissed a lawsuit from a girl who accused him of sexual assault, filing a motion Friday to dismiss certain claims that weren’t lawful when the alleged incident occurred.

The motion, filed in a New York court, said Combs couldn’t be sued because certain laws didn’t exist when Joi Dickerson-Deal brought charges against him in 1991.

The music mogul’s lawyers want some statues of Dickerson-Deal’s claims, akin to revenge porn and human trafficking, to be dismissed with prejudice.

In a deposition last yr, she said Combs “intentionally drugged her” after which brought her home and sexually assaulted her after a date in Harlem when she was a 19-year-old college student.

The lawsuit alleges that Combs recorded the assault on video without her knowledge and later shared it with several friends in the music industry. He denied the allegations, accusing her of trying to make the most of a New York law that temporarily prolonged the statute of limitations.

Combs’ lawyers say Dickerson-Deal filed the criticism nearly three many years after his alleged misconduct, and New York State’s Revenge Porn Act was not codified until 2019.

His lawyers also pointed to several others, including New York’s Trafficking Victims Services Act, which went into effect in 2007.

The Associated Press doesn’t typically name individuals who say they have been victims of sexual abuse unless they arrive forward publicly, as Dickerson did.

Last month, federal authorities raided Combs’ properties in Los Angeles and Miami as part of a sex trafficking investigation. The criminal investigation has significantly tightened scrutiny of Combs, who has been a defendant in several recent sexual harassment trials.

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In Combs’ lawsuit, settled a day after it was filed in November, his former protégé and girlfriend, R&B singer Cassie, sued him, alleging years of sexual abuse, including rape. The lawsuit said he forced her to have sex with male prostitutes while he filmed them.

In February, the music producer filed a lawsuit alleging that Combs forced him to solicit prostitutes and pressured him to have sex with them.

Combs’ other accuser was a girl who claimed he raped her twenty years ago when she was 17.

Combs and his lawyers have denied all allegations in the lawsuit.