NEW YORK, N.Y. - NBA Commissioner Adam Silver will run the first three miles of the New York City Marathon on Sunday as part of a 24-person relay of basketball luminaries.Dikembe Mutombo will cross the finish line for the group, which is trying to encourage kids to exercise.Silver said Monday that he will run over the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge from Staten Island to Brooklyn then pass a baton to Chris Mullin, the Brooklyn native who starred at St. Johns in Queens before a Hall of Fame NBA career.Mullin, now an executive with the Sacramento Kings, will be followed by a long list of big-name players to cover the 26.2 miles.Most also have local ties, including Bronx native and fellow Hall of Famer Nate Tiny Archibald; Knicks greats Charles Oakley, Bernard King and Allan Houston; the Nets Darryl Dawkins; Brooklyn native Sam Perkins; and New York City high school legends Felipe Lopez and Albert King.Also running is Jason Collins, who made history last season with the Nets as the first openly gay player in the four major North American pro sports leagues.WNBA stars Swin Cash, Teresa Edwards, Ruth Riley and Katie Smith are on the relay along with players-turned-NBA TV analysts Greg Anthony and Steve Smith.Rounding out the group are executives from the league, Knicks and Nets and broadcaster Mike Breen.Each celebrity will be joined on his or her one-mile leg with a local student who takes part in marathon organizer New York Road Runners youth programs. Silver will run alongside Lauren Pitarresi, a 14 year-old from Staten Island, who Im concerned is going to smoke me, he joked.Silver is an avid runner who has twice completed the NYC Marathon, finishing in just under four hours in both 2002 and 2010. He competed in track and cross country — and not basketball — in high school in Rye, New York, where he was a quarter- and half-miler.The 52-year-old Silver hasnt been running as much since he became commissioner in February. He still gets in four or five workouts a week, often taking two laps around the reservoir in Central Park for just over three miles.Hes not in good enough shape to do the full race Sunday, though its a strange sensation as a marathoner to stop after only a few miles.I felt awkward running only a leg of the marathon and not the entire marathon, having remembered some famous New York stories of people who started and didnt necessarily finish, Silver said.Plans for the relay began in the early spring. New York is home to this seasons NBA All-Star weekend, with events at the Nets Brooklyn arena and the game at Madison Square Garden.The league is seeking to reach a half-million youngsters in the five boroughs through fitness programs in conjunction with hosting the festivities.Silver will start just after Wave 1 on Sunday. He needs to be ready to leave his home on Manhattans West Side at 6 a.m. to get to Staten Island, though he said hes negotiating a later pick-up.Other participants will gather at a hotel in Manhattan or another in Brooklyn to be ferried to their baton-passing points, which will take place at mile-markers.Twenty-seven vehicles will be required to get everybody to the proper places, with co-ordination from the New York Police Department to ensure they can be transported through the crowded streets.Marathon officials expect the relay to take more than five hours. Iman Marshall Youth Jersey . 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Ferrer will play Mikhail Youzhny on Sunday after he defeated Dmitry Tursunov 6-2, 6-4 in an all-Russian semifinal. "Youzhny is a good player," Ferrer said.TORONTO - Amid new reports linking the NHL to expansion, most notably to Las Vegas, Gary Bettman again downplayed the leagues plans to add more teams in the near future.The commissioner said at Brian Burkes Prime Time Sports Management Conference on Monday that the board of governors would not hold a vote on expansion at next months meeting.All Ill do is continue to report on the levels of interest that are being expressed, Bettman said. Theres no effort crying out for immediate expansion. But we are getting expressions of interest. Even if we decided tomorrow were going to do it, it still wouldnt happen for two, three years.The New York Post recently reported the NHL had already chosen owners for a potential expansion team in Las Vegas. Bettman said the league has not even looked that far into the topic, and deputy commissioner Bill Daly echoed that by saying the proper analysis hasnt been done.Still, Daly called Las Vegas a unique market when asked about the possibility of it getting a pro sports team.The thing that jumps out at you about a Las Vegas market as a possibility is obviously its uniqueness, Daly said. Its high-level tourism in the market, it also has pretty strong local demographics, too. But how and whether that market could embrace and support a professional sports franchise, I think thats one of the things thats going to be difficult for anybody to really kind of make a judgment on.Las Vegas will have an arena ready by the 2017-18 season, the earliest expansion would be possible based on the need for board of governors approval. There coulld be a benefit for the NHL to be the first pro sports league there, Daly said, but he added you cant also make a decision on that basis alone because the world changes and its dynamic.ddddddddddddBettman quashed speculation about the Florida Panthers relocating to Quebec City or elsewhere. The team is averaging the fewest fans in the league, 9,072 a game, and photos of empty seats have provided bad optics on the situation.I dont think its fair for the speculation on any franchise, including the Panthers, to be that its moving. Its not, Bettman said. The Panthers have good ownership thats committed to South Florida and any speculation that the teams future is anywhere but in South Florida is unfounded.Bettman also threw cold water on the possibility that advertisements are coming to NHL jerseys sooner than later. It might be inevitable because of the money available, Bettman conceded, but the league isnt in any rush.Well watch whats going on with other sports and the magnitude of the opportunity, Bettman said. But its not something that were focused on right now because, frankly, I think weve got the best uniforms in all of sports. I think this is one of those where were never going to be an initiator.We may get dragged kicking and screaming, but its not something thats a front-burner for us.Rather than expansion and ads on jerseys, Bettman said the NHL was focusing on talks for the return of the World Cup of Hockey and other issues.There are lots of other things were doing to continue to grow the game, he said.---Follow @SWhyno on Twitter ' ' '