Weekly Update December 19, 2022

Merry Christmas everyone! And Happy Hanukkah!

Baseball: Sunday Night Baseball set. Pirates first pick.

Basketball-NBA: AD out for at least month. Morant ejected. Hortford fined.

Basketball-NCAA: Not a lot of upsets this past week.

Football – NCAA: Bowl games have begun. Coaching and portal carousels.

Football- NFL: 9 close games and OT results. Also some teams secured divisions and playoff berths.

Golf: Singh and son finally win PNC.

Hockey: Ovechkin gets 800th goal.

Olympic Sports: Favorites dominate WC runs.

Soccer: World Cup is over. Best World Cup final ever – ARG World Champs!

Baseball:

• The 34^th consecutive season with Sunday Night Baseball scheduled as been announced. The first ever will be April 2^nd between the Rangers and Phillies. Then we will see a World Series rematch on April 30^th (Astros vs Phillies).
• Pirates get the first draft pick.

Basketball-NCAA:

• NCAAM Week 6: There were no upsets of Top 25 until Wednesday. #16 UCLA came out hot against #20 Maryland scoring 49 points in 1H. #2 UVA lost their first game to #5 Houston by 8. #15 Gonzaga had a high scoring 2H to beat #4 Alabama 100-90. In another great ranked vs ranked game, #6 Tennessee lost by 5 at end to #9 Arizona. #8 Kansas put the beat down on #14 Indiana by 22 points. #16 UCLA and #13 Kentucky had a show down in Madison Square Garden. The Bruins won by 10. The next game in the Garden was #23 Ohio St vs now unranked UNC. The game went into OT and the Tar Heels got the W. #19 Auburn lost to USC in a close one on Sunday to close out the week.

Basketball – NBA:

• Lakers C Anthony Davis will miss several weeks due to a foot injury. He injured his foot during Saturdays’ game against the Nuggets. Laker fans are used to him missing games as he has missed more than half of his games in the last 2 seasons.

• Grizzlies Ja Morant was ejected before halftime on Saturday in the game against the Thunder. It took a toll as the Grizzlies lost to the OKC team. Morant was ejected after his 2^nd His 2 technical were in quick succession. The first for a foul to stop play and whine about a no-call, using profanity. The 2^nd was given for questioning the integrity of an official – hot button topic apparently.
• Speaking of bad behavior, Celtics Hortford was fined $25k for elbowing Magic C Moritz Wagner. He was given a flagrant foul and ejected in the 3Q. Celtics lost to Orlando in that game, an upset for the top team in the league. The Magic also beat the Boston team on Sunday as well. The Magic is the first team to beat the Celtics 2xs this season.

Football-NCAA:

• Bowl Games week 1:
  • The only loss in the Top 25 was #25 UTSA who lost to #24 Troy in the Duluth Trading Bowl. #14 Oregon St destroyed the Florida Gators in the Las Vegas Bowl. In fact, Florida has the longest active streak of scoring a point or more for 436 games which goes back to Oct 1988. That was almost snapped this weekend until the final 5 minutes of the game. Those were the only points scored by the Gators.

• • Rice made it a fun game to watch in the LendingTree Bowl against Southern Miss but it wasn’t enough against Frank Gore Jr (yes like NFL legend Frank Gore’s son). Gore Jr had a record setting day with the most rushing yards in a FBS bowl game ever. The Frisco Bowl between UNT and Boise St had a crazy high scoring 3Q with 36 points scored. The Broncos came out on top 35-32.

• HC Carousel:
  • Purdue names new HC. It’s Illinois’ DC Ryan Walters. Oh ya and Drew Brees has signed on to help as an Assistant Coach as well. Sounds like the Boilermakers are in good hands.
  • Navy promoted their own DC Brian Newberry to take the HC job.

• That’s not the only carousel this week. National Signing Day (like named after signing your letter of intent) is Thursday. So get ready to hear a bunch of transfer portal news before that day and then recruit stats on that day. You might want to turn your ESPN alerts off.
  • Jackson St QB Hunter (who was a previous #1 recruit from high school before he committed under Coach Prime) is now in the portal. Not a surprise as we expected him to follow Deion to Colorado.
  • QB prospect Moore has de-committed from Oregon to UCLA now.
  • UCLA also reportedly signed Sklee.
  • ND QB Pyne is going to ASU.
  • Arizona’s WR Singer to USC.
  • Michigan’s QB McNamara entered the portal.
  • Both of Georgia Tech’s QBs are in the portal.
  • South Carolina TE Stogner going back to Oklahoma after just one year.
  • Texas A&M had 16 declare in the first two days. Arkansas had 15. Oklahoma St and Oregon had 13. Top Power 5 schools (as of first two days).
  • Someone who is not: UNC QB Drake Maye. He has said he will be staying. That’s important because he is already a top NFL prospect, it would’ve started a bidding war.
    • For more details and transfers

Football – NFL:

• Week 15: 9 close games including some upsets and OTs.
  • 49ers QB Purdy is on a roll, winning for the 2^nd week in a row against the Seahawks. The Colts were up by 33 points and holding the Vikings scoreless at halftime. Then the MN team scored 36 points to take the game into OT. The Viks then scored a FG to take the huge comeback win and seal the NFC North championship. The Ravens only scored 3 points and thus gave up a loss to the Browns. The Bills sealed their playoff spot with a FG as time expired to beat the Dolphins.

• • The Chiefs won their 7^th AFC West but it wasn’t without its challenges. Despite the game being against the 1-win Texans, the Houston team took them to OT but Mahomes got it done. With the help pf TE Travis Kelcee who became the 2^nd all time in games with 3 or more receptions. The Eagles started out slow with 2 interceptions in the first half before finally putting away the 3-10 Bears by 5. The Saints and Falcons were evenly matched and the game reflected that being close until the end. Saints won by 3. The Lions are on a roll winning 6 of their last 7 games.

• • The Cowboys could seal their playoff berth with a win this weekend and looked to have it in the bag winning by 17 points in thr 3^rd. But the Jags came back in the 4Q to take the game to OT. Dallas threw a pick 6 in OT to give the game away. The Pats got greedy in the final play of the game and threw a lateral that got intercepted. The Raiders ran it all the way back for a game-winning TD. The Chargers beat the Titans by 3. The Bengals scored 31 points in the 2H to get the comeback win against Tom Brady and the Bucs.

Golf:

• This weekend was the PNC Championship and all the headlines were on the Woods father/son combo of Tiger and Charlie. However Charlie and Tiger finished T8. After 16 attempts, Vijay Singh and his son, Qass finally got their win. Their first PNC was when his son was 13 years old. This time, they shot 59s in both rounds, a first for the event. The Singh combo won with a score of 26 under, 2 shots ahead of defending champs, John Daly ad son and Justin Thomas and his dad.

Hockey:

• On Tuesday, Capitals star Alex Ovechkin scored his 800^th goal and a hat trick agains the Blackhawks. This puts him as 3^rd on the all-time NHL goals list behind Wayne Gretzky (894) and Gordie Howe (801).

Olympic Sports:

• Mikaela Shiffrin got WC win #77 in the Super G this past weekend. This puts her just 5 races short of the women’s record set by Lindsay Vonn. It’s her 124^th podium and 4^th this season. It’s a story of success at the top with Olympic champ and reigning WC champion Marco Odermott won the giant slalom for his 15^th WC title.

Soccer:

• The Semifinals were at the beginning of the week.
  • ARG dominated last World Cup runner ups CRO 3-0. Messi scored off a penalty to get things started in the 34^th minute, 5 minutes later Alvarez scored. Alvarez got another in the 2^nd CRO never scored.
  • Reigning World Cup champs, FRA ended MOR Cinderella story. FRA scored in the first 5 minutes and scored another in the 2H.
• It’s being called the best final in World Cup history. Again, Messi scored off a penalty kick in the 23^rd minute to get things started. Then Di Maria scored 13 minutes later to give ARG a 2-0 lead going into halftime. FRA needed 2 to stay alive. Mbappe delivered. ARG got a little complacent and cute, letting FRA have a penalty kick in the 80^th minute which Mbappe capitalizes on. He then ran the ball back to the line. He then scored within 1 minute. The final 5 minutes of play + 9minutes of stoppage time were crazy with multiple yellow cards, shots on goal and saves. But we headed to ET. Messi scored in the 108^th And yet again FRA needed to comeback. Mbappe again listened and scored with just 2 minutes left in ET. So for only the 3^rd time ever in a WC Final, we headed to a PK shootout. This greatly favored ARG who had already won a game in PKs. FRA had not needed it and lost the last one they were in (EURO cup). The teams both started with their stars and both Messi and Mbappe scored their PKs. But then FRA missed their next two while ARG was perfect 4/4. FRA did make their 4^th but it wasn’t enough. ARG wins the World Cup for the first time since 1986.
• CRO beat MOR 2-1 in the 3^rd place match.

• Tomorrow (Tuesday) is a national holiday in Argentina for the World Cup celebration. This was a fitting way to end Messi’s ARG national team career. Messi won the Ballon d’Or, Martinez (ARG goalie) won the Golden Glove and FRA Mbappe won the Golden Boot. Ultimately ARG wins but really we all won as this world cup was one of the most entertaining. It holds the record for the most games to go to PKs ever in WC history with 5. See you in 2026 in North America for the next FIFA World Cup. But don’t worry the women’s World Cup is next year (July 2023).

What to watch this week

Basketball – NBA:

• Tues 12/20
  • Warriors at Knicks @ 6:30pm on TNT
  • Grizzlies at Nuggets @ 9pm on TNT
• Fri 12/23
  • Grizzlies at Suns @ 9pm on ESPN
• Sun 12/25
  • 76ers at Knicks @ 11am on ABC and ESPN
  • Lakers at Mavericks @ 1:30pm on ABC and ESPN
  • Bucks at Celtics @ 4pm on ABC and ESPN
  • Grizzlies at Warriors @ 7pm on ABC and ESPN
  • Suns at Nuggets @ 9:30pm on ABC and ESPN

Basketball – NCAA:

• Tues 12/20
  • Duke at Wake Forest @ 5:30pm on ACC
  • Jackson St at 4. Alabama @ 6pm on SEC
  • UVA at 25. Miami @ 7:30pm on ACC
• Wed 12/21
  • Austin Peay at 6. Tennessee @ 5pm on SEC
  • VTech at Boston College @ 5:30pm on ACC
  • Florida A&M at 13. Kentucky @ 6pm on SEC
  • New Orleans at 1. Purdue @ 8pm on ESPNU
  • UNC Asheville at 10. Arkansas @ 8pm on SEC
• Thurs 12/22
  • Harvard at 8. Kansas @ 6pm on ESPN2
  • Illinois at Mizzou @ 8pm on SEC
• Fri 12/23
  • Diamondhead Classic in HI on Friday and Sunday
    • Iona, SMU, Seattle, Utah St, George Washington, Washington St, Pepperdine and Hawaii

Football-NCAAF:

Bowl Game Schedule
	Bowl	Home	Visitor	Day	Time (CT)	TV	Stadium (State)	Line
	Famous Idaho Potato Bowl	E Michigan	San Jose St	Tues 12/20	2:30 PM	ESPN	Albertsons (ID)	+3.5
	RoofClaim.com Boca Raton Bowl	Liberty	Toledo	Tues 12/20	6:30 PM	ESPN	FAU (FL)	+5
	R+L Carriers New Orleans Bowl	Western Kentucky	South Alabama	Wed 12/21	8:00 PM	ESPN	Caesars Superdome (LA)	+7.5
	Lockheed Martin Armed Forces Bowl	Baylor	Air Force	Thurs 12/22	6:30 PM	ESPN	Amon Carter (TX)	-6.5
	Radiance Technologies Independence Bowl	Louisiana	Houston	Fri 12/23	2:00 PM	ESPN	Independence (LA)	+6.5
	Union Home Mortgage Gasparilla Bowl	Wake Forest	Missouri	Fri 12/23	5:30 PM	ESPN	Raymond James (FL)	-1
	EasyPost Hawaii Bowl	Middle Tennessee	San Diego St	Sat 12/24	7:00 PM	ESPN	Clarence TC Ching (HI)	+7

You can also view the whole bowl list, on the 2022 Bowl Games page.

Football – NFL:

• Mon 12/19
  • Rams at Packers @ 7:15pm on ESPN
• Thurs 12/22
  • Jaguars at Jets @ 7:15pm on Prime
• Sat 12/24
  • 8 games at 12pm on FOX/CBS
    • CBS:
      • Bills at Bears
      • Saints at Browns
      • Texans at Titans
      • Bengals at Patriots
    • FOX:
      • Seahawks at Chiefs
      • Giants at Vikings
      • Lions at Panthers
      • Falcons at Ravens
  • Commanders at 49ers @ 3:05pm on CBS
  • Eagles at Cowboys @ 3:25pm on FOX – maybe without Jalen.
  • Raiders at Steelers @ 7:15pm on NFL
• Sun 12/25
  • Packers at Dolphins @ 12pm on FOX
  • Broncos at Rams @ 3:30pm on CBS
  • Giants at Commanders @ 7:20pm on NBC
• Mon 12/26
  • Chargers at Colts @ 7:15pm on ESPN

Hockey:

• Wed 12/21
  • Devils at Panthers @ 6pm on TNT
  • Oilers at Stars @ 8:30pm on TNT

Olympic Sports:

• Sat 12/24
  • Pickleball @ 3pm on NBC
  • Skiing @ 4pm on NBC