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They cruise down the dusty, open road, the teacher and the pupil, the making of history only months away. What a pair they are as they roll through the 115-degree heat outside Phoenix on Highway 202, the intense desert sunlight bouncing off the black Mercedes sedan. Together they gaze into the barren landscape dotted with saguaro cacti and mesquite trees, and both see the same vision: a future in which a woman playing Division II football on scholarship is no longer a mirage. "You are like my second father, and you're a huge reason I'm doing this," says Becca Longo,...

Franco, 25, sustained a head injury in a featherweight fight in Iowa Saturday. The fight was stopped in the 8th of 10 rounds. He took a blow to the head from Utah’s Jose Haro. Franco was heavily favored in the televised bout but after that punch in the 8th round, officials saw Franco clearly wobbling and stopped the fight. He was taken to the hospital where doctors discovered several brain bleeds. Before the devastating blow, Franco got knocked down in the ring and that can have an affect on a fighter a fellow boxer says. “That weakens you as a...

As a former lawyer, Garth Lagerwey knows about the value of evidence-based reasoning. Now he's trying to apply that same line of thinking to the professional soccer club he helps manage. Lagerwey spoke about this philosophy at the Sounders Sports Science Weekend in Seattle, an event that focuses on the latest innovations in sports science and analytics. The Sounders have long been pioneers, at least among Major League Soccer teams, in using sports science to help make on-field improvements. The club, which won its first MLS Cup last year, utilizes a variety of gadgets like GPS trackers and heart rate...

Former New York basketball phenomenon Sebastian Telfair was caught early Sunday morning in Brooklyn with a trunk full of contraband. The 32-year-old was arrested with another man, Jami Thomas, 18, in Bed-Stuy around 2.50am with a bulletproof vest and small arsenal of weapons during a routine traffic stop, police told the New York Post. Authorities found three pistols, a gas-operated submachine gun, extended magazines, ammunition and the ballistic vest in the vehicle.

If you believe the media, the National Football League has a duty — an obligation, really — to provide employment for (former) quarterback Colin Kaepernick. It’s been three months since he opted out of his contract (49ers’ version: they were going to cut him anyway). Then he sat down — or took a knee, whatever — and waited for the phone to ring. And waited. And waited. And waited. He’s still waiting. The Seattle Seahawks gave him a sniff recently, but decided to pass. Coach Pete Carroll says it’s because Kaepernick is a starter and the Seahawks already have a...

Zyla St. Onge is one young water skier. She took a recent run in Florida last Friday. With a boost from several adults,

A new book reveals he intercepted secret messages from Russia to pass onto GCHQHe was the coach that led the British and Irish Lions to their only test series victory against the All Blacks – and he was also a spy. Under Carwyn James ’ coaching the Lions secured a historic 3-1 victory in 1971, leaving him with the legacy of being perhaps the greatest coach the game has ever known. But in his new book, Into the Wind: The Life of Carwyn James, writer Alun Gibbard reveals a multilingual literature-lover who spied on the Russians during the Cold War....

Tapwrit won the Belmont Stakes, the third leg of the Triple Crown, on Saturday at Belmont Park in New York. Irish War Cry and Meantime set the pace for much of the race. Tapwrit moved into second in the stretch and jockey Jose Ortiz moved him to the lead deep in the lane.

Today's Belmont

Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve First Grand Prix 1978 Number of Laps 70 Circuit Length 4.361km Race Distance 305.27km Lap Record 1:13.622 by Rubens Barrichello (2004)

Calling Stephen Curry “classless” and “a clown” is sure to draw the ire of Smash Mouth. If the end of that sentence sounds odd, you must have missed the Bay Area band’s previous Twitter posts involving Draymond Green and the Oakland A’s. The guys behind the 1999 hit single “All Star” — or, at least, whoever handles the guys’ official band handle on Twitter — blasted New York City radio host Mike Francesa for his hot take on Curry.

The Golden State Warriors (GSW) were by far the leader in assists and team play in the 2016-2017 season with 30.1 average assists per game, way ahead of second place Boston who had 25.5. In the critical Game 3 of the 2017 Finals between GSW and the Cleveland Cavaliers (Cavs), GSW who won in the closing minutes, had 29 assists versus the Cavs 17. Interestingly, GSW had more assists than the Cavs in each quarter except in the third, the only quarter that ended with the Cavs ahead. I also think I see a pattern with GSW, at least in...

Welcome to Tank Town, USA and the Sweet Sixteen. Jets Nation, this is going to be ugly. The 2017 Jets have a realistic chance of being worse than the 1-15 Rich Kotite atrocity of 1996, a team that actually had a lot of talent, unfortunately none of it in the head coach’s office.

At the outset of the NBA Finals, Commissioner Adam Silver conducted an arithmetic exercise. He added the number of people projected to engage in some fashion with the Golden State Warriors–Cleveland Cavaliers showdown, whether it meant viewing on a television screen, reading a player’s tweet or streaming a highlight over Facebook. The number he arrived at was 1 billion. “So, roughly one out of seven people on this planet will have a direct connection to these Finals,” Silver said. “Which is pretty spectacular.”

LeBron James and the Cavaliers are on the brink of being swept in the NBA Finals against the Warriors. The Golden State Warriors beat the Cleveland Cavaliers 118-113 on Wednesday to take a 3-0 stranglehold on the NBA Finals and move to within one game of an unprecedented perfect run through the playoffs. With their 15th straight win, the Warriors have the longest postseason streak for any team in the four major professional sports.

Ready to purchase a night scope..... Question is ....Thermal or Light Enhancing?

First off, what you’re about to read has zero to do with Colin Kaepernick’s protest of the National Anthem. For proof, here’s an article that I wrote in March 2016, before the protest, saying that Kaepernick would be out of the NFL before he won another 10 games as a starter. That forecast appears to be coming true, because Kaepernick can’t even find work as a backup. And it’s mostly due to the same reason he couldn’t find work as a starter: teams don’t think he’s good enough. Twitter went up in arms earlier today when I tweeted this:

One of the top coaches in college football is retiring.As first reported by the Oklahoman and later confirmed by SoonerScoop.com, Oklahoma head coach Bob Stoops is stepping down from his position with the Sooners after 18 seasons. Both outlets are reporting that offensive coordinator Lincoln Riley will assume the role of head coach.

So what are the New York Jets thinking? Many think they’re thinking about positioning themselves to “earn” the No. 1 overall pick in the draft by tanking for the full season. As noted by Charean Williams on Tuesday, G.M. Mike Maccagnan denies that. But what else is he going to say?

Debra Debard was being driven by her partner, 57-year-old Richard Clarke, in an E-Z-GO golf cart on a private olive orchard in Wallace, a small town southeast of Sacramento. After Clarke made a left turn near the end of the orchard, Debard was unable to "stabilize herself" and was thrown from the cart. The two wine glasses she was holding shattered and Debard fell upon the fragments. She died at the scene, and Clarke was arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence. ... Bedard's son . . . told the Mercury News the couple would, "...often ride through the...