Arizona rider first US champion since Lance Armstrong
Pre-race favourite Evenpoel fails to add second gold
Brandon McNulty, a UAE Emirates teammate of Tadej Pogacar, succeeded the Slovene as world champion with an unexpected solo win in the men’s UCI road race in Montreal.
In the biggest triumph of his career, the 28-year-old American took his country’s first win in the UCI’s blue riband event since Lance Armstrong’s lone victory in Oslo in 1993.
Continue reading...For the second consecutive season, the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox will provide a highly concentrated dosage of their rivalry at Yankee Stadium.
They meet once again in a best-of-three American League wild-card series and this time, New York's Cam Schlittler is starting Game 1 – not Game 3.
It's been exactly a year since Schlittler announced his arrival to the baseball world, striking out 12 Red Sox over eight shutout innings to clinch the series for the Yankees. He's since struck out 239 batters and posted a 1.95 ERA over 193 ⅔ innings, making him the heavy favorite to win the AL Cy Young Award.
And charged with giving the Yankees the upper hand in this very short series.
He'll be followed by left-hander Max Fried and, if necessary, Gerrit Cole in Game 3. The Red Sox will likely counter with left-handers Payton Tolle and postseason veteran Ranger Suarez, with 36-year-old Sonny Gray folded in there.
The Red Sox have been hit with untimely injuries. First baseman Willson Contreras sat out 10 days after getting struck on the hand by a pitch, and then received two at-bats, striking out and grounding out, in the Red Sox's season finale Sunday.
Reliever Tyron Guerrero (shoulder strain) and outfielder Mickey Gasper (biceps strain) are on the IL, as is outfielder Eli White. The Red Sox will have to pivot to run prevention, as was their mantra when they overcame a slow start to roar back and claim the No. 2 wild card spot behind the Yankees.
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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Yankees vs Red Sox predictions, MLB playoff schedule for AL wild card showdown
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It’s been discussed all offseason, but a transformative era for the Los Angeles Lakers finally starts this week with training camp.
Head coach JJ Redick and President of Basketball Operations Rob Pelinka brought in the Luka Dončić era with a joint press conference on Thursday and answered many of the questions we’ve grappled with all summer. This week, though, we get to hear from the players, ask them questions and see the effects of a transitional offseason bear out on the court.
With that in mind, questions remain before preseason play commences in Sacramento on Oct. 5. Let’s hash a few out.
Pelinka laid out his plan ahead of the offseason, keying in on three pillars of what success in building a team around Dončić looked like to him and Redick once it became evident that LeBron James was not returning, saying, “Re-signing Austin, putting together a trade to acquire Walker Kessler and then building out our team with young players that could dribble pass, shoot and have brought the average age of our roster to around 26 or 27, which lines up so perfectly with Luka and building a team around Luka Dončić.”
Archetypally, he did it. Pelinka ensured Dončić had a dynamic shot creator in Reaves and a defensive stalwart in Kessler alongside him and surrounded the three with athleticism, defense, (some) shooting and youth. But are they talented enough?
The 2023-24 Dallas Mavericks not only laid out the blueprint of a Luka-led Finals team, but they also formed a roster loaded with talent through to the bench. It was a process that hadn’t been idealized until they traded for Daniel Gafford ahead of the season’s trade deadline.
The Lakers still don’t have a fifth starter. Perhaps a similar midseason trade will jolt the team to the next level. But for now, we have to see if the pieces Dončić has around him are complementary enough to warrant that.
Los Angeles has been one of the league’smost switch-dependent teams through Redick’s tenure. In turn, the Lakers have sat around the bottom of the league in rim defense. Though up until now, given his personnel, Redick hasn’t had much of a choice.
Kessler changes that.
“I know that we have switched a lot, one through five, over the last two years,” Redick said. “That has been by necessity. We look at him as someone we want close to the basket, protecting the rim. … You guys watched the playoffs, you probably have a basic idea of how San Antonio used [Victor Wembanyama] and kept him low and kept him by the basket.”
Is this schematic shift exclusive to Kessler? Which other centers on the roster are capable of protecting the rim to his degree?
As it stands, Kevon Looney is slated to back up Kessler, but I’d expect Sandro Mamukelashvili to split time at the four and the five to limit the extent in which the Lakers have to rely on a degraded Looney down low.
Although the 6-foot-9 Mamukelashvili spent over 40% of last season guarding centers with Toronto, according to BBall Index, he was below average in rim protection (43rd percentile) and among the worst in the league in rim disruption (15th percentile) and rim deterrence (21st percentile).
A savvy way Redick could counteract this is by playing Mamukelashvili alongside Jarred Vanderbilt, who has shown a propensity to guard centers at an effective rate, but only if Redick trusts him enough to give him some burn.
Dončić blessed fans with an inside look of the team’s five-day trip to Slovenia over the summer in a vlog posted to his YouTube channel — something Lakers fans haven’t really had since Javale McGee’s vlogs throughout the 2019-20 season and in the bubble (those were some good times).
My biggest takeaway from the video: the type of dynamic shown throughout the roster perhaps would not have been the same had there been a subset of players who were much older than the rest of the group. I mean, could you imagine Marcus Smart trying to engage in the type of Gen-Z banter being tossed around the entire trip? What are the odds LeBron ever had an inside joke with Adou Thiero or Dalton Knecht?
What the Slovenia trip really did was set the standard for the kind of connectivity the team will need moving forward. Anything less shines a bigger spotlight on the fact that, on paper, this Lakers roster isn’t as talented as the behemoths that run the West. That’s why chemistry is so important. And that’s why we all need to see if it’ll translate to a more connected team on the court.
Redick tossed out a few names that have stood out unprovoked during his presser, namely Ziaire Williams, Matisse Thybulle and Adou Thiero, each of whom is in contention for the fifth starting spot. He also mentioned in passing that everyone is competing for playing time in training camp.
The Lakers are a deeper team than they were entering the offseason. That Thiero and Cameron Carr have the same opportunity for real rotational minutes as the likes of Collin Sexton, Williams and Thybulle is a testament to that depth. But who has the best chance to pop?
Thiero and Carr come in the prospect of Los Angeles being a significantly better team if even one of them pops. Quentin Grimes, Mamukelasvili and (to an extent) Sexton come in with the comfort of substantial contracts. Williams, Thybulle and Kevon Looney come in trying to prove they’re worth more than a minimum deal. Jake LaRavia, Vanderbilt and Knecht come in with at least a season of experience in Redick’s system.
There are plenty of options, and the Lakers can benefit greatly from a few of their role players outperforming their projections.
In retrospect, it’s ironic that Pelinka and Redick preached continuity when the franchise is in the middle of one of the messiest sales in recent sports history. Pelinka, acknowledging multiple times that he’s not at liberty to discuss many aspects of the sale, did mention that there have been initial meetings with the group led by Bob Iger and Josh Kushner.
With all the dysfunction at the top of the brand, how does it not trickle down to the roster? Is it even as important to the actual play? We’ve already seen cases where the Buss family infighting found its way to LeBron in the middle of last season. Will it be any different with Jeanie Buss being dragged out as the last link to the family and the franchise?
Redick mentioned that some of the league’s most successful teams are the ones most connected. It’s not delusional as a fan to believe that also includes ownership.
A great deal of the Luka-era Lakers’ future rides both on the outcome of the pending sale and how functional the team can perform during and on the other side of it. Players can save face throughout training camp by saying the situation doesn’t affect them (which isn’t a difficult conclusion to come to). But the Lakers have historically been a franchise with steady ownership. It’s been a core foundation of the exceptionalism.
Soon there will be answers to all these questions. But in the meantime, it’s time to get the season officially started with Monday’s media day.
You can follow Connor on Twitter at @cmorenoNBA.
The New York Rangers have placed goaltender Dylan Garand and forward Taylor Raddysh on waivers.
After Jonathan Quick retired last season, speculation suggested Garand would fill his role as the Rangers’ backup goaltender behind Igor Shesterkin.
However, the Rangers went out during the summer and acquired Joonas Korpisalo in exchange for Kalle Väisänen and a 2028 fourth-round pick.
Despite adding Korpisalo, the Rangers made clear that the backup goaltending position would be a competition between Korpisalo and Garand, and Mike Sullivan did not rule out carrying three goaltenders to kick off the 2025-26 season.
“Is that an option that is on the table for us, yes,” Sullivan said of the Rangers potentially carrying three goalies on the roster. “It's certainly not out of the realm of possibility. I think it's very manageable in the short term. I don't think it's in the best interest of the guys in the long term for obvious reasons.”
According to Mollie Walker of The New York Post, the Rangers organization believes Garand still has some developing to do and needs to be getting No. 1 goalie reps at the American Hockey League Level with the Hartford Wolf Pack.
The Rangers signed Taylor Raddysh to a two-year, $3 million contract in the 2025 offseason.
The 28-year-old forward recorded nine goals, 10 assists, and 19 points in 68 games for the Blueshirts last season.
With Garand and Raddysh waived, Matt Rempe, Jaroslav Chmelař, Alberts Šmits, and Scott Morrow will likely make the Rangers’ opening-night roster.
Alex Bregman stood in the box at Tropicana Field on Sunday, Sept. 27 with a week-old set of facial fractures and sent a message. He had said he would not miss the playoffs despite the devastating injuries and Sunday, showed he's ready. The Chicago Cubs third baseman hit a Tanner Houck sinker for a 417-foot home run in his first at-bat of the day.
Two innings later, he drove another homer 402 feet. In the fifth, he hit one almost as far that went just foul, and he settled for a single.
On Sept. 20 in Cincinnati, Bregman, 32, was standing near the on-deck circle when Michael Busch checked his swing and fouled a pitch his way. The ball caught Bregman just below the left eye and left multiple fractures in his face.
He insisted he could play and the Cubs never put him on the injured list. He sat three games. By Wednesday, Bregman was tracking pitches off a machine. He came back Friday at Fenway as the designated hitter, with a C-flap on his helmet covering the left-side of his face. He went 0-for-4 with a strikeout in a 4-3 loss.
Sunday, when he got on base, he switched his batting helmet for one with double C-flaps.
Bregman came into the finale with 26 homers, 32 doubles, 89 RBI and a .799 OPS in 154 games this season.
The Cubs head to San Diego after Sunday's game to face the Padres in the National League wild card game.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Alex Bregman returns from facial fractures with two homers
Well, that was dumb.
About three hours after the scheduled first pitch, and about an hour after the original time before it was moved up earlier this weekend, the Yankees and Orioles’ season finale in the Bronx was officially cancelled. The nor’easter affecting the East Coast this weekend already caused Saturday’s game to be moved to Friday, and now it has officially led to Sunday’s planned season-ending clash to be cancelled. With this being the final day of the regular season and the playoffs beginning on Tuesday, as you might expect, this game will not be rescheduled, as it didn’t have any impact on possible playoff position.
You could kind of sense that there was not actually going to be any baseball played, as the Yankees never formally released a lineup for the game, other than that Elmer Rodríguez—who was technically never on the active roster today—as the probable starting pitcher. However, the three-hour wait between the “this game will not start on time” and “it’s cancelled” seemed unnecessary, but hey, we don’t get paid the big bucks to make these decision.
With that, the Yankees’ 2026 regular season is officially in the books. They will finish with a 93-68 record in their 161 games, a half-game shy of the 94-68 record with which they ended 2025. Like that year, they will have to settle for second place behind a surprising team, with the Rays being the culprit this time around instead of the Blue Jays.
With there being nothing to play for standings-wise for most of the last week, a lot of the attention has already been on the postseason, but now we can move our full focus to Tuesday and Game 1 of the Wild Card Series against the Red Sox, who are now confirmed to face nemesis Cam Schlitter at 8pm ET. See you then.
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If the Philadelphia Phillies clinch the National League's third and final wild card spot on the final day of the season, the team would face the Atlanta Braves in wild card series beginning on Tuesday, Sept. 29 in Atlanta.
The Braves won nine of the 13 regular season meetings in 2026. Philadelphia beat Atlanta in the 2022 and 2023 National League Division Series.
The Phillies last won the World Series in 2008, but have reached the Fall Classic twice since then, losing to the New York Yankees in 2009 and Houston Astros in 2022.
Philadelphia got off to a miserable start to the 2026 season and fired manager Rob Thomson but turned things around over the summer with interim manager Don Mattingly to stake their claim on a wild card spot.
*If Philadelphia clinches wild card. Game 3 time subject to change
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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Who will Phillies play in MLB playoffs? Wild card series schedule
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The Yankees' 2026 regular season is in the books. Sunday's 1:05 p.m. game at Yankee Stadium between New York and the Baltimore Orioles, which was originally moved up from 3:20 p.m., is canceled due to inclement weather.
"The game will not be rescheduled," the Yankees said in part of a release.
Thirty-three minutes before the game's original start time, the Yankees announced on social media, "Please be advised today’s game will not start on time."
After more than three hours without an update, the game was called.
New York enters the postseason with a 93-68 record, which secured the American League Wild Card's first spot.
The Yankees start a best-of-three AL Wild Card Series against the Boston Red Sox this week at Yankee Stadium with starting pitchers and game times set.
The Washington Wizards have signed four players to Exhibit 10 contracts, the team announced Sunday.
The team also announced it waived KeShawn Murphy, who recently signed an Exhibit 10 deal. He’s a candidate to sign back with the Capital City Go-Go.
Beekman, 24, spent four seasons at Virginia before going undrafted in 2024. He spent his rookie season with the Golden State Warriors and later the Brooklyn Nets. The 6-foot-3 guard played last season with the Osceola Magic — the Orlando Magic’s G League affiliate. He averaged 8.8 points, 4.6 assists and 1.9 steals per game.
Beekman and Livingston excelled with Washington’s Summer League team in July. Beekman capped his showing with a 13-point, 15-assist performance against the Atlanta Hawks’ Summer League squad.
Keels, 23, will spend training camp with the Wizards and likely join the Capital City Go-Go following the preseason. It’s a homecoming for the Duke product, who is from Clinton, Maryland, and played high school basketball at Paul VI Catholic.
The 6-foot-3 guard averaged 15.6 PPG on 40.4% 3PT in the G League last year. His best showing was a 46-point outburst in which he made all 12 of his 3-point attempts with the Sioux Falls Skyforce — the Miami Heat’s G-League affiliate.
Settle played five collegiate seasons, his first three at Howard before transferring to Temple for the final two. He spent last season in the G League with the Skyforce, averaging 8.2 points across 14 games.
Teams can offer an ~$85k bonus to players who sign an Exhibit-10 contract and spend at least 60 days with their G League affiliate. It’s essentially an incentive for the players to sign with the Go-Go, which these players could likely do following training camp and preseason.
Our photographer, Tom Jenkins, was at the O2 in London where some of the world’s best players produced an entertaining battle
Continue reading...The St. Louis Blues' opening-night roster is becoming clearer, with the organization placing a pair of players on waivers.
Among those placed on waivers are goaltender Georgii Romanov and defenseman Calle Rosen.
Romanov is a 26-year-old netminder who is entering his second season with the Blues organization. He played 28 games for the Springfield Thunderbirds last season, posting an .898 save percentage and a 3.29 goals-against average.
He'll split starts with Will Cranley, who is expected to be a full-time AHLer this season.
As for Rosen, he's an experienced AHL defenseman entering his fifth year with the Blues organization. He's spent time in the NHL with the Blues, but has mainly been a reliable defenseman for the Springfield Thunderbirds.
The Blues reacquired him from the Washington Capitals, and in his return, the 32-year-old scored eight goals and added 31 points.
In addition to placing Romanov and Rosen on waivers, the Blues have recalled 2024 first-round pick Adam Jiricek and claimed defenseman Justin Barron from the Nashville Predators.
With Barron and Jiricek up in the NHL, the Blues are over the limit, so expect Tyler Tucker to be placed on the injured reserve and one of Barron or Jiricek to be sent to the AHL.
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Training camp is nearly upon us. Now is the time for Mitch Johnson and the rest of the San Antonio Spurs coaching staff to see how roster plans will come to life. That means experimenting with lineups in practice and the preseason before the season starts on October 20th.
This season should be a lot of fun from a lineup-combination perspective. San Antonio has a lot of diverse talent, giving them versatility and depth they can lean on. The team will eventually settle into the rotation and lineup that will lead to the most success in a postseason run, but to start the season, there should be some tinkering here and there that will lead to some interesting 5-man groups.
Guessing what those lineups will be is easier for San Antonio than for many other teams. The Spurs have more roster continuity than most of the league. We should expect to see a lot of the same units as last year, but with Tobias Harris and Tarris Reed Jr. sprinkled in. It’s just enough of a change to look forward to the lineups that will define San Antonio’s 2026-27 season.
De’Aaron Fox, Stephon Castle, Devin Vassell, Tobias Harris, Victor Wembanyama
I have banged the drum all offseason that Julian Champagnie should keep his starting spot heading into the regular season, despite the signing of Harris. However, the writing seems to be on the wall for Harris to take the four-man spot for San Antonio this season.
It makes sense; Harris is a veteran with a skill set the Spurs desperately needed last year. He’s a true forward with a big body who can defend decently well, hit threes (shot 36.8% from deep last year), and create his own shot when the offense stalls. He’s not quite the sharpshooter that Champagnie is, but makes up for it with those other skills
The rest of the group is exactly what you’d expect. This group (with Champagnie) had a +17.3 net rating last season and was San Antonio’s most effective lineup. A healthy and motivated De’Aaron Fox and a year-three leap from Stephon Castle could take this group to an even greater level.
We’ll see if this is indeed the closing group. If Champagnie is hot, it will be hard to keep him off the floor. If Dylan Harper takes another leap in year two, he will almost certainly need to be on the floor when the game is on the line.
Dylan Harper, Julian Champagnie, Keldon Johnson, Carter Bryant, Luke Kornet
Go figure: San Antonio was at its worst last season when Victor Wembanyama was on the bench. That was especially noticeable in the playoffs, where teams picked on Luke Kornet when Wembanyama went to the bench. That is now an established strategy this team will have to deal with. They can make Kornet’s life easier by improving the rest of the defense around him.
Harper and Bryant are two of the Spurs’ best perimeter defenders, and Champagnie has shown the ability to play in passing lanes and hold his own on defense. This bench lineup is much better defensively, which should help them maintain leads when the starters exit.
This group should have some offensive juice, too. Harper is one of the best sixth men in the NBA, Keldon Johnson is the reigning Sixth Man of the Year, Champagnie was a starter during the finals, and Bryant could make a leap.
De’Aaron Fox, Dylan Harper, Stephon Castle, Tobias Harris, Victor Wembanyama
This is the group the Spurs have to make work. Fox, Harper, and Castle are too good to not find a way to play them all together. Those three only played 25 minutes together in the regular season, with a net rating of -26.9. Not great. San Antonio just never found a way to make the offense click with the three of them together.
Finding a way to make this work had to have been one of the coaching staff’s top priorities this offseason. This unit probably needs two major things to work: continued improvement in shooting from Castle and Harper, and more time on the court together. Harper shot 47.9% from three after the All-Star break last season, while Castle hit 41.7% of his threes in the same time frame. If that improvement carries over into the regular season, this lineup could sing. More than anything, this group just needs time to play together and figure out how to coexist.
Harris is a great add for this group, too. He helps them maintain size on the interior while not sacrificing shooting and playmaking. With Wembanyama on the floor, the team can maintain defensive dominance while maximizing playmaking and perimeter speed. On paper, it’s a lineup that makes a lot of sense; it just needs time to become one of the team’s go-to groups.
A couple of standouts emerged at the Montreal Canadiens’ camp. Up front, Florian Xhekaj has raised more than a few eyebrows with his consistent play, intense effort, and forecheck. On the blueline, David Reinbacher turned heads. The fifth overall pick in the 2023 draft may have seen his development slowed by a slew of injuries, but he’s fully healthy now and has shown what he can do in three preseason games.
Kaiden Guhle’s injury couldn’t have come at a better time for Reinbacher. It opened the door for him, and he didn’t just step into the space; he opened it with authority. So much so that he even got an audition to play alongside Lane Hutson in the Kraft Hockeyville game in Trois-Rivières. The Canadiens’ top defenseman was impressed with the youngster's play and had nothing but positive comments about his young partner after the game.
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Yet, on Sunday, after putting a first group of players on waivers, the Canadiens reassigned 10 players to the Laval Rocket, including Reinbacher. He was joined by Owen Beck, Jacob Fowler, Dillan Bentley, Laurent Dauphin, Jared Davidson, Filip Mesar, Luke Mittelstadt, Owen Protz, and Tyler Thorpe. In other words, Florian Xhekaj and Adam Engstrom are the only two players who aren't on NHL contracts and are still with the team. Unless Kaiden Guhle is put on injured reserve, the Canadiens would have 24 players on their roster rather than the 23 permitted. Meaning there's still a move to make before Monday at 5:00 PM.
Meanwhile, Alex Belzile and Kaapo Kahkonen highlighted the group placed on waivers, along with Brett Berard, Hunter McKown, Sasha Pastujov, Samuel Poulin, Ethan Samson, Maksymillian Szuber, and Reilly Walsh.
Seeing Xhekaj stay up is surprising, given how many forwards are under contract, and Reinbacher heading to Laval is just as surprising. Throughout camp, he appeared to have the inside lane on Engstrom. Perhaps the organization would rather Engstrom sit as their seventh defenseman than Reinbacher if they decided to play Jayden Struble and Arber Xhekaj?
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Kevin Cheveldayoff has never been afraid to revisit the past.
Throughout his tenure as general manager of the Winnipeg Jets, Cheveldayoff has regularly circled back to players already familiar with the organization. But Winnipeg passed on one such opportunity Saturday when former Jets goaltender Eric Comrie cleared waivers after being placed on the wire by the San Jose Sharks.
One day later, several more familiar names are available.
Former Jets Laurent Brossoit, David Rittich, Dominic Toninato and Ville Heinola were among the players placed on waivers Sunday as teams continued trimming their rosters ahead of Monday's deadline.
The Jets made two moves of their own, placing forward Danny Zhilkin and defenceman Henry Thrun on waivers for the purpose of assignment to the Manitoba Moose. Should both clear Monday, Winnipeg would be down to 24 healthy players and require one more move to reach its opening roster.
It comes one day after defenceman Isaak Phillips and forwards Nikita Chibrikov, Noah Gregor and Parker Ford all cleared waivers. The quartet can now be assigned to Manitoba after being placed on the wire Friday, while goaltender Thomas Milic was assigned directly to the Moose.
While the Jets continue sorting through their own roster, Sunday's waiver wire presents some interesting possibilities.
Brossoit is perhaps the most obvious example of Cheveldayoff returning to a familiar player in the past. The goaltender spent three seasons with Winnipeg from 2018-21 before leaving for Vegas, only to return to the Jets two years later.
Rittich spent the 2022-23 season in Winnipeg, while Toninato became a familiar face between the Jets and Moose after originally joining the organization in 2020.
Then there is Heinola.
Winnipeg selected the Finnish defenceman 20th overall in the 2019 NHL Draft and spent years waiting for him to establish himself as a full-time NHL player. Heinola's time with the organization finally came to an end this summer when he joined the Vegas Golden Knights, only for the 25-year-old to land on waivers before the regular season.
Whether any of those reunions would actually interest Winnipeg is another question.
The Jets' decision not to claim Comrie is a timely reminder that familiarity alone isn't enough. The 31-year-old netminder had one of the more unusual relationships with the organization, having been drafted by Winnipeg, lost on waivers and eventually returned to the Jets before leaving for San Jose this summer. Despite Winnipeg's current uncertainty in goal behind Stuart Skinner, Comrie went unclaimed and is now eligible to report to the AHL's San Jose Barracuda.
There are plenty of intriguing names beyond the former Jets, too.
Forwards Sammy Blais, Philip Tomasino, Jakob Pelletier and Alexander Holtz were among those exposed Sunday, as were defencemen Henri Jokiharju, Juuso Välimäki and Ilya Lyubushkin.
Former Brandon Wheat Kings forward Cole Reinhardt was placed on waivers by the Florida Panthers, adding another Manitoba connection to the list.
The goaltending market is particularly crowded. Along with Brossoit and Rittich, Ilya Samsonov, Vitek Vanecek, Kaapo Kähkönen and Mads Søgaard were all made available.
For Cheveldayoff, the timing is intriguing.
Winnipeg has spent the weekend moving closer to its final roster, going from 26 healthy players Friday to 24 following Sunday's moves. The Jets have one final decision of their own to make before Monday's deadline.
At the same time, 31 other teams have provided them with plenty more to consider.