It's championship weekend for the City and Southern Section. Here's a look at some of the matchups Friday and Saturday.
College football conference tiebreakers that will decide the CFP race
With one week to go before college football conference races are settled, there's a multitude of possible tiebreakers in play ahead of Week 14.
CFP rankings grades: Why Michigan gets an F
Michigan's big jump in the College Football Playoff rankings raising questions, while Oregon jumped up, but not by as much as it could have.
How Cal football firing its coach could send a top QB into transfer portal
Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele has stated he wants to stay at California, but the firing of Justin Wilcox could lead teams to entice him to transfer.
17 must-see women’s college basketball games, including Texas at UCLA
There's so much great women's college basketball left before the new year, including seven top-15 matchups. Here are the biggest through December.
Why Feyenoord’s 1970 European Cup win was a sliding doors moment for Celtic
The final remains curious in a Celtic context because it is the showpiece occasion the club would rather forget
It feels cruel in part to use Thursday’s meeting of Feyenoord and Celtic to reflect upon illustrious times. The Dutch side are 29th in the 36-team Europa League table, with Celtic’s position in 27th only more slightly more palatable to supporters because Rangers are bottom of the pile.
Those fans disrupted an annual general meeting to the point of abandonment last week, demonstrating the disharmony that has engulfed Celtic for months. A club that progressed to the Champions League’s knockout phase last season, looking an overdue but serious European force, have starkly regressed. Celtic have the spending power to outshine clubs who routinely embarrass them in a bigger pond than St Mirren and Motherwell occupy.
Continue reading...The Spin | First-over destroyer Mitchell Starc deserves place among Australia’s greats
Kerry O’Keeffe has called the veteran left-armer ‘one of the most underrated cricketers Australia have produced’, and the figures back him up
When I close my eyes at night, Mitchell Starc is at the top of his run. It might be punishment for forgetting to vote for him in the Guardian’s all-time Ashes players list.
His 6ft 6in frame elongates and stretches until he’s uncomfortably filling my mind’s eye and then the legs start, a nightmare-beautiful rhythmic run. The arms piston, the eyes steady, the head as still as a marble mantelpiece. He’s a cheetah in giant white wristbands, a moon-marauding wolf, a river of melted chocolate, that expensive, unpalatable, 95% stuff.
Continue reading...No more house money. Pressure back on Sherrone Moore, Michigan in The Game
The weight of The Game — the unique pressure Sherrone Moore avoided by circumstance for two seasons — now rests squarely on the Michigan coach.
Auburn football needs an exorcism. Call these two names first
Auburn football is in danger of becoming Nebraska. It needs an exorcism after this Iron Bowl. Two coaches with Alabama roots would be good fits.
This isn’t same MSU football that got whacked last time at Ford Field
MSU Spartans will be looking to end an eight-game losing streak Saturday against Maryland, which has lost seven straight. The game is at Ford Field.
These next two weeks could be a defining stretch for 2025-26 Celtics
These next two weeks could be a defining stretch for 2025-26 Celtics originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston
We’re about to find out a whole bunch about the 2025-26 Boston Celtics.
On Thanksgiving Eve, the Celtics launch into a brutal seven-games-in-12-days stretch. That includes the second dreaded five-games-in-seven-nights span of the season, with five games in four different cities and travel before each tilt.
The next seven games will also feature:
- Matchups with four of the top five teams in the Eastern Conference (Detroit, Toronto, Cleveland, New York)
- Two games against teams with double-digit win totals in the West (Minnesota, LA Lakers)
Take away a pit stop in Washington on December 4 — the night before a rivalry showdown with the Lakers back in Boston — and the other six opponents in this seven-game stretch have a combined .702 winning percentage (73-31).
In the ’90s, the World Wrestling Federation often held an annual pay-per-view on the night before Thanksgiving. Now, the Celtics are about to launch into their own Survivor Series.
The Celtics are 4-6 this season against opponents with a record of .500 or better. Two of those wins came against Orlando, with the others against Cleveland and Philadelphia.
After a roller-coaster 9-8 start to the season, these new-look Celtics are either going to show that they can measure up against some of the NBA’s elite, or get a bit of a reality check about the ceiling of this team while hunting for their identity as Jayson Tatum rehabs from his ruptured Achilles.
The gauntlet starts Wednesday with a showdown against the streaking Pistons. How ironic that, as Boston was starting its title march two years ago, the Celtics handed Detroit their record-tying 28th consecutive loss (albeit needing overtime) as the Pistons matched their longest losing streak in league history.
This year? Detroit will be looking to set a new franchise record Wednesday night while hunting its 14th consecutive win. Life comes at you fast in the NBA.
Adding to the daunting nature of the upcoming schedule, the Celtics will start this stretch without center Neemias Queta, who owns the best net rating (+16.4) and on/off differential (+21.0) on the team. The Celtics defense is 21.3 points per 100 possessions better with Queta on the floor and the team is severely undersized without him.
Yes, Boston starts this tall task without its tallest player (and the only 7-footer on the roster).
After kicking away some wins earlier in the season, the Celtics have won five of their last seven. As part of that stretch, they let a win slip away in Philadelphia, then played down against an inferior Brooklyn team on Sunday.
Despite some early bumps in the road, the 2025-26 Celtics sit a game above .500. There have been a lot of positives, though they’ve sometimes been masked by consistency woes.
The next two weeks ought to tell us a lot more than the first four weeks did.
Is the glass half full for the Celtics? Boston owns the fifth-best offensive rating in the league and sits inside the top 10 in net rating (tied for ninth, +4.8). Boston ranks in the top five in half-court defense and has been slowly tightening up its early-season rebounding woes.
Still, navigating even a short stretch without Queta could be daunting. Can the Celtics survive going small with Josh Minott or Chris Boucher eating the majority of center minutes? Can the team confidently lean on Luka Garza, who logged a rare DNP even after Queta limped off on Sunday night? Can rookie two-way center Amari Williams hold up if thrown into the NBA spotlight the next two weeks?
The next two weeks could answer a lot of the lingering questions about the Celtics, and it might dictate a whole new batch of questions about where the season goes from there.
Simon Harmer routs India and lifts South Africa to Test series sweep
2nd Test: SA, 489 & 260-5d, bt India, 201 & 140, by 408 runs
Spinner takes 6-37; Markram takes nine catches in Test
South Africa completed a memorable 2-0 series sweep against India after the off-spinner Simon Harmer claimed six for 37 to bowl the Proteas to a 408-run victory in the second Test in Guwahati.
Chasing an improbable 549 to win, India were all out for 140 in the second session on the final day, with only Ravindra Jadeja (54) offering some resistance with the bat. Aiden Markram took a record nine catches in the match for the world Test champions, who won the opening Test in Kolkata inside three days.
Continue reading...Aden Holloway scores 26 as Alabama routs UNLV 115-76
Dra Gibbs-Lawhorn led the way for UNLV (3-4) with 25 points while Issac Wiliamson scored 18 points and Kimani Hamilton added 13. The Rebels kept the lead under 10 points through much of the first half and trailed by only four, 29-25, with 8:04 remaining before halftime. But the Crimson Tide scored the next eight points to go up by 12.
Luka Doncic owns the Clippers again as Lakers win NBA Cup matchup
Luka Doncic drilled a three-pointer right in front of the Clippers’ bench late in the first quarter and then glared at them, shaking his head as he ran back down court to play defense for the Lakers, just one of the many piercing stares he sent their way after delivering one of his three-point bombs.
It seems as if Doncic has his own personal rivalry against the Clippers and it just simply folded into the inter-city rivalry.
And once again, Doncic overwhelmed the Clippers in directing the Lakers to a 135-118 win Tuesday night at Crypto.com Arena.
He came up one rebound shy of a triple-double, dropping 43 points, 13 assists and nine rebounds. He was 14 for 28 from the field, seven for 12 from three-point range and eight for 11 from the free-throw line.
Read more:'Legend': Claire Rothman, Forum president during Lakers' 'Showtime' dynasty, dies at 97
In leading the Lakers to their fifth straight win, Doncic now has recorded 39 double-double games of at least 40 points, which moved him past Anthony Davis for the fourth most among active players and tying Magic Johnson for the sixth most 40-point double-doubles as a Laker.
Doncic also tied Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O’Neal for the most 40-point double-doubles as a Laker before the age of 27 since the NBA/ABA merger (five).
"I think we played a great game,” Doncic said. “I think they were getting a lot of shots, especially in the first half.”
Late in the fourth quarter, the game turned physical, and Doncic was in the middle of it.
Kris Dunn pushed Doncic in the back, and Doncic confronted Dunn, who then put the basketball in Doncic’s chest. Jaxson Hayes then stepped in and pushed Dunn.
In the end, Dunn was assessed two technical fouls and ejected from the game and Hayes was assessed a technical foul. Doncic shot a technical foul free throw with 3:33 left in the game.
“Of course, I appreciate it,” Doncic said about Hayes stepping in to help him. “I told him right away, ‘Thanks for having my back.’ And that says a lot about him. That says a lot about this team. Everybody has got each other's back.”
Doncic scored 24 points against the Clippers in the first quarter alone, making his first five three-pointers before finishing the quarter five for eight from three, nine for 14 from the field, many of the baskets punctuated by a stare down at the Clippers’ bench.
By the half, Doncic had posted 32 points on 11-for-17 shooting and six for 10 on three-pointers and six assists.
Over the course of his career with the Lakers and the Dallas Mavericks, Doncic, who is averaging 12.5 free-throw attempts per game, has torn the Clippers apart.
Entering Tuesday night’s game, he had averaged 32.2 points per game over 20 games, his highest against any Western Conference foe. He had produced 7.9 rebounds, 7.4 assists and shot 48% from the field, 36% from the three-point line.
When asked why he has performed so well against the Clippers, Doncic shrugged.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I think we just met a lot of times in the playoffs. They beat me the first two times, so I don't know what it is. I guess I like it.”
Read more:Shooters shoot: How the Lakers are handling their early three-point slump
With Deandre Ayton (right knee contusion) out and Hayes starting in his place, Austin Reaves (31 points) and LeBron James (25), did their part to help the Lakers clinch Group B of the NBA cup with a 3-0 record.
The Lakers finish group play against the Dallas Mavericks here Friday night and the Clippers complete their group play against the Memphis Grizzlies on Friday night at Intuit Dome.
Etc.
Lakers coach JJ Redick said that Ayton got an MRI exam on his knee that “was clean other than just some swelling, a little bit of a bruise.” Ayton was injured in the first half against the Jazz Sunday. “Don’t think it’s going to be a long-term thing,” Redick said. “Hopefully it’s a game-to-game thing and he’s back at some point by the end of the week.”...The Lakers announced that they signed forward Drew Timme to a two-way contract and waived two-way center Christian Koloko. Timme has played for the Lakers’ G League team, the South Bay Lakers, and posted averages of 25.5 points, 7.5 rebounds and 4.0 assists in 25.5 minutes over six games. The 6-foot-10 Timme played his college basketball at Gonzaga.
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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Michigan, Gonzaga face off in Players Era Championship title game
No. Michigan will play No. Gonzaga in the title game of the Players Era Championship on Wednesday.