Free Republic

President Donald Trump was hailed with massive cheers in Philadelphia Saturday, as he attended the NCAA Men’s Division I Wrestling Championship. The crowd rose to its feet and heartily applauded Trump as he entered the Wells Fargo Arena and stood on the event floor for about a minute waving to the onlookers. Broadcaster ESPN even interrupted an interview with national champion Carter Starocci to cut to the president’s grand entrance.

Jimmy Gressier wanted to finish in style. And while he did cross the line in a memorable fashion, it was probably not quite in the way he intended. The French runner had an eight second lead on his nearest challenger, Germany’s Samuel Fitwi, as he headed toward the finish line of the European Cross-Country Championships men’s U-23 race, according to European Athletics, the organization that hosts the event. After grabbing two French flags from the sidelines, Gressier, the defending champion, powered toward a final patch of mud just before the tape. Attempting to slide along the mud and across the...

More than 40 million people watched the NFL’s two preliminaries for the Super Bowl on Sunday, a drop of more than 8 percent compared to last year’s conference championship games. The Nielsen company said an average of 43.2 million people watched the games. While that’s down from the 47.1 million who watched the conference championships last year, it was a more heartening report than the NFL had gotten only a week earlier. This year’s divisional championship round had seen a 16 percent dip in audience size. […] After seeing viewership erosion all year, the NFL will be anxious to see...

NEW YORK -- For Aaron Boone, it's like The Boss is back in town. The expectations for what he needs to accomplish as the next manager of the New York Yankees are straight from the late George Steinbrenner’s merciless ethos: Either win a World Series, or fail. The job is a blessing and a curse. There is so much young talent on the roster and so much more on the way, which makes the Yankees a win-now team. But if Boone doesn’t win over the next couple of years, fingers will be pointed at him and the man who hired...

NEW YORK -- They're the New York Yankees. They're worth billions. They're built on a foundation of championships stretching back more than a century. There is just no way they don’t go for it when another title is possible. This is the mandate any year, but it's even truer when they've only played in one playoff game since 2012. So the Yankees had to acquire Sonny Gray. The Yankees, under Hal Steinbrenner, are a scary organization for the rest of the baseball. Steinbrenner has handed the player personnel keys over to his GM, Brian Cashman, and the results have been...

TIME (ET) MATCHUP TV 12:00 PM No. 11 Oklahoma at TCU 12:00 PM No. 23 Oklahoma State at Baylor FX 12:00 PM UCF at Tulsa 2:30 PM Nicholls State at No. 15 Oregon State Pac-12 Network 2:30 PM Kansas at West Virginia 3:00 PM Middle Tennessee at Arkansas State 3:00 PM Louisiana-Lafayette at Florida Atlantic 3:30 PM No. 20 Boise State at Nevada 3:30 PM Cincinnati at Connecticut 4:00 PM No. 2 Alabama vs. No. 3 Georgia* CBS 4:00 PM New Mexico State at Texas State 7:00 PM Pittsburgh at South Florida 8:00 PM No. 18 Texas at No. 6...

WASHINGTON, Aug. 25, 2006 – The United States men’s and women’s teams emerged victorious in the 3rd Conseil International du Sport Militaire’s World Military Golf Championships Aug. 15 through 17 at Ballinrobe Golf Club in Galway, Ireland. Air Force Staff Sgt. Arnell Garza of Fairchild Air Force Base, Wash., prevailed in a one-hole playoff against South Africa’s Craig Collins to win the individual men’s championship. They were tied at 3-under-par 216 after three rounds. Then they played No. 18 one more time. “His drive went about 70 yards past where we were standing and expecting it to come,” Mangold said...

FORT HUACHUCA, Ariz. – The fort has been selected to host the only Conseil International du Sports Militaire (International Military Sports Council)championship in the United States this year. The 27th World Military Volleyball Championships will take place here June 8-17. Volleyball championships at Fort Huachuca will be one of 20 CISM World Championships conducted this year. This is the second time Fort Huachuca has hosted a CISM event. It hosted the 2004 Boxing Championships. Twenty-two member nations attended that event. “Fort Huachuca has an excellent reputation for hosting military sports competitions and people like visiting this community,” said Col. Jonathan...

FORT HUACHUCA - Many of the top-level All-Army boxers who have become minor local celebrities in recent years are fading away. But a new class of emerging All-Army boxers appears to be filling the void. Chief among them is 1st Lt. Boyd Melson. A year ago, Melson, a West Point grad, surprised a WCAP fighter to win gold in the 152 division. Since then, the sky has been the limit for Melson. He topped the best of the Air Force and the Marines in the Armed Forces championships to qualify for the World Class Athletes Program. Last October at Barnes...

FORT HUACHUCA - With the screams of his fellow soldiers from Fort Huachuca, Nathaniel Hicks used of barrage of punches in the final round to claim a 25-18 decision over Paul Eghareva of Fort Drum, N.Y., on Saturday night at the All Army Boxing Championships at Barnes Field House. "It motivated me when they started to scream my name, and it gave me more power to go out there and do good," Hicks said. Hicks, however, won't be advancing to the Armed Forces Championship, Feb. 17-19 at Fort Huachuca in the 165-weight class, but he did walk away with the...

Shaquille O'Neal scanned the reporters crowded around him, located the questioner and glowered. The question had seemed innocuous enough — "Do you think you'll spend some time chasing Rasheed Wallace around the court?" — but it didn't sit well with O'Neal. "Chase?" O'Neal said. "No. Not at all." It was an answer and an affirmation that O'Neal continues to be the centerpiece of the Lakers, despite a drop in his playoff scoring average. The game will come to him in the NBA Finals, not the other way around.

<p>Dan Knights has about 150 pounds and a few gazillion brain cells on his Rubik's Cube, but it's not always clear who has the upper hand in the relationship.</p> <p>Like some kind of time-traveling ambassador from 1982, the 24-year-old takes his cube everywhere, whether he's visiting a friend or his favorite cafe or just walking down the sidewalk near his North Beach home.</p>