Here is the latest Mid-America sports news from The Associated Press

CINCINNATI (AP) — Joey Votto drove home a pair of runs with a double and a single, and Asher Wojciechowski went five innings in his return to the rotation on Friday night, leading the Cincinnati Reds to a 3-2 victory over the St. Louis Cardinals. The Reds have won all five games against St. Louis at Great American Ball Park this season. They lead 8-3 in their season series.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — James Paxton tied a Mariners’ record by winning his seventh straight start, and Seattle beat the Kansas City Royals 5-2 Friday night to move back over .500. Jason Hammel gave up three runs and six hits in six and one third innings.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Chiefs linebacker Derrick Johnson is back at training camp after another Achilles’ tendon injury. The 34-year-old star was sorely missed after he was hurt last December, especially in a playoff loss to Pittsburgh. But despite the quick turnaround time from his injury, the Chiefs believe Johnson is back to playing at his same old level.

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is heading to Ohio to celebrate Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones’ entry into the NFL Hall of Fame. Christie is scheduled to be in Canton Saturday to see Jones’ induction. Christie is a lifelong Cowboys fan despite most New Jersey football fans favoring two of the Cowboys’ biggest rivals: the New York Giants and Philadelphia Eagles.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — Nebraska receiver Stanley Morgan Junior said he is committed to doing the right thing after a misdemeanor marijuana possession charge against him was dropped. The junior from New Orleans is the Cornhuskers’ top returning receiver. Morgan said he wants to atone for a number of passes he dropped last season.

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The Northern Iowa football team is looking to turn things around after a 5-6 season last year, and Panther coach Mark Farley says work they’ve already done and the work they are doing prior to the season opener will determine if that happens. He says they don’t know yet what this team will be. “Every team takes its own course. This team will find that course when it happens. It’s already been started of course, it started in January. Some things happened this summer, they became stronger in some units. So, it will play out as it plays out,” Farley says.

Farley says they’ve been successful by adapting to the strengths of the players.”We have changed every year, based on the players that we’ve had,” Farley explains. “So, we will go along, we will identify what becomes our strength and that’s what we’ll play to.” The Panthers return a lot of experience on defense. On offense, Farley says the key is building the line. “Your offensive line is always your culture — it’s not the quarterback — it’s the offensive line. And then if you’ve got two tight ends who are just as tough, then you’ve got a chance,” according to Farley.

He says even if they offensive line becomes a strength, they will have a tough task ahead with the teams they face. “There’s five teams from this league in the top ten — and we ain’t one of them,” Farley says, “so it’s a strong league, strong coaches, strong players, and we go on the road for some difficult games.

The Panthers have six games on the road, including their season opener September 2nd at Iowa State.

(Learfield Sports)

Kurt Warner will become the first native Iowan to be enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame in a ceremony in Canton, Ohio Saturday. Warner played at Cedar Rapids Regis High School and after graduating in 1989 went to Northern Iowa. Terry Allen was Warner’s coach at U-N-I and says he’s probably mentioned in more books for the fact that he started Warner only one year in college. Allen says the way Warner handled the situation at U-N-I showed early on the qualities that would lead to his eventual success. “Kurt never complained…he kept working at it, kept working at it, and when he got his opportunity with us he had a great senior year,” Allen says.

Kurt Warner photo courtesy UNI via Radio Iowa.

Warner’s rags-to-riches story after college includes a stint stocking shelves at Hy-Vee, playing for the Iowa Barnstormers in the Arena League, then N-F-L Europe and finally getting a chance through injury to become the starter for the Saint Louis Rams. He led the Rams and a high-powered offense to a Super Bowl win. Allen, now lives in Nixa, Missouri, and works for the city’s Chamber of Commerce. He talked about what it means to see Warner go into the Hall of Fame.  “I don’t know if you can say it’s gratifying — you just appreciate the success he’s had,” Allen says.

Allen will be attending the ceremony along with former U-N-I assistant coaches Bill and Ken Salmon. Current Panther coach Mark Farley says he tells current players Warner’s story to illustrate what they need to do to be successful. He says he texted Warner at the start of this week. “The one thing that he represents, and I told him this, his whole family does, his whole family represents perseverance. And to me that’s the key to his success,” Farley says.

Warner won two regular-season N-F-L M-V-P awards along with a Super Bowl M-V-P. He took the Rams to one other Super Bowl and later took the Arizona Cardinals to their only appearance in the Super Bowl. Warner is still the only quarterback to throw for 300 yards in three different Super Bowls. He was voted into the Hall of Fame in his third year of eligibility.

(Learfield Sports)

The Iowa Hawkeye basketball team is preparing to travel to Europe for a 12-day trip. Coach Fran McCaffery spoke with reporters about the trip and says they are allowed 10 practices before they go. “It was great to be able to get everybody together because we were able to use the other time available for skill development. “So, then we had practices and then we had skill development sessions,” according to McCaffery. “And I think that was incredibly beneficial, because even though we have a lot of guys back we still have a lot of young guys. So I think that’s important.”

McCaffrey says they have had to spend some time working on the rules of the European game, which he says are dramatically different in some cases. “What we consider goal tending they don’t. What’s a travel over there is not a travel here — and we run, so we are susceptible to more travels — can you get your mind to understand that,” he says.

There’s a big difference in the type of ball they will use. He says some of the guys really like it and some don’t. “That’s all we’ve played with for two months, so they are getting used to it.” McCaffery says. He says they will face some good teams, but he’s not concerned about the wins and losses. “We’re just going to try to really, truthfully focus on what do we have to do to get better,” McCaffery says.”Obviously we are going to try to win. But if you win or lose, nobody will even remember it. It’s not as critical as getting quality playing time for our young guys trying some different things on the court. Just work on our motion game, work on our press.”

McCaffery says the experience gained on this trip will pay dividends this winter. “You know my experience has been in the past has been that the teams that have this opportunity have always jelled and played well the following year. “They’ve just come together,” McCaffery says. “So that’s probably as important a component of this opportunity as any other. Maybe more.”

Iowa will play a total of four exhibition games in Germany, Switzerland, and Italy. They leave for Europe on Sunday.

(Learfield Sports)

Iowa State football coach Matt Campbell is in his second season in Ames and says the biggest difference in opening fall practice this year is knowing what he has. He says they were apprehensive last year as they were only six months in and were not trying to create trust and belief among the players, but also trying to figure out what the players could and couldn’t do.

Campbell says they’ve also had more than a year now to be with the players and teach and work with them. “And that to me is the essence of a football program. It’s not just go recruit guys and get good players here — its’ really develop those people within your walls and give them the tools and resources to have sustained success,” Campbell explains. “I think that we feel really comfortable even though we’ve only been here now a year-and-a-half, that we’ve been able to give some of those tools. and it’s been fun to watch some of our improvement.”

He says there are a lot more people involved in the program than when he was at Toledo and a big key is that everyone now is on the same page. He says the one word to describe it is alignment as everyone now is aligned to the same vision. “As we came in here, whether it was players, whether it was strength and conditioning, athletic training, nutrition, academics, all of us are together, unified, going in the same direction,” Campbell says.

Campbell isn’t predicting a number for season wins or that the team will get to a bowl game. “You know really for me the future of the program has zero to do with wining and losing. My humble opinion,” Campbell says. “Obviously at the end of it, winning and losing will take care of itself. No greater competitor in this room than Matt Campbell — I’ll cheat in golf if I have to to win okay — but at the end of this, the deal in football wining and losing takes care of itself.”

He says that doesn’t mean they don’t have goals. “Yeah we want to go play in bowl games, yes our goal is to win Big 12 champions some day. But for us to get there we have to learn what the process is and laying a foundation to continue that. I think we’ve laid a good foundation,” according to Campbell.

He says they’ll know a lot more about the team after the first few weeks of the season.
“Where are we as a football program? Gosh I don’t know. We are in year two of taking this program over and seeing it, there are lot of young that’re guys playing,” Campbell says. “Does that mean that we can’t win and not have success — absolutely not, that doesn’t mean that. But it’s going to be really fun to see where this program is in four weeks.”

Iowa State opens the season with back-to-back in-state home games against Northern Iowa on September 2nd and then Iowa on September 9th.

(Learfield Sports)

MILWAUKEE (AP) – Keon Broxton drove in the go-ahead run and saved a run with a leaping catch, Matt Garza made a strong start in his return from the disabled list, and the Milwaukee Brewers beat the St. Louis Cardinals 2-1 on Thursday afternoon.

Broxton, who robbed Jose Martinez of a homer in the second when he stretched his glove atop the center field wall, gave Milwaukee a 2-1 lead with a single in the fifth off reliever Brett Cecil (1-4).

Garza (5-5), making his first start since July 21 because of a right leg strain, gave up one earned run on four hits in 5 2/3 innings to give second-place Milwaukee its first home series win over St. Louis since July 2012.

Kolten Wong missed a tying home run by a few feet when his drive to right-center bounced off the wall in the eighth. He was stranded at second when Anthony Swarzak retired Tommy Pham on a groundout and Matt Carpenter on a flyout.

ST. JOSEPH, Mo. (AP) – Chiefs linebacker Derrick Johnson returned to training camp Thursday after missing two workouts with a tooth abscess, while a trio of cornerbacks had to leave practice early with various injuries.

Terrance Mitchell, who could start at cornerback alongside Marcus Peters, went to the locker room on a cart with a sore hamstring. Roster long shots J.R. Nelson left with a groin injury and Keith Baxter with a wrist injury.

Running back Charcandrick West continued to do rehab work after dealing with an ankle injury earlier in the week. Defensive end Chris Jones and left guard Parker Ehinger also continued their rehab. Jones had knee surgery in July and Parker had surgery to repair his ACL last November.

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MILWAUKEE (AP) — Yadier Molina hit two solo home runs, Kolten Wong added a two-run double, Luke Weaver pitched into the seventh inning and the St. Louis Cardinals held on for a 5-4 victory over the Milwaukee Brewers on Wednesday night.

Weaver (1-1) made one mistake in the first and Eric Thames hit it for his 25th home run of the season. Weaver regrouped and held the Brewers scoreless until Hernan Perez’s one-out RBI single in the seventh.

Weaver allowed five hits, struck out eight and walked two over 6 1/3 innings in his first road start of the season. Molina homered in the fourth and then crushed the first pitch from Brent Suter (2-2) leading off the sixth over the wall in left for his 12th of the season and fourth career multi-homer game.

Jesus Aguilar hit a pinch-hit, two-run homer off John Brebbia in the eighth. Trevor Rosenthal got the last four outs for his seventh save.