AP-Sportlight-Week Ahead

Published Oct. 28, 2021 12:02 p.m. ET

Oct. 29

1950 — Detroit’s Wally Triplett gains 294 yards in kickoff returns and ends up with 331 total yards as the Lions pound the Los Angeles Rams 65-24 on 41 third-quarter points.

1961 — Oscar Robertson dishes out a franchise-record 22 assists during Cincinnati’s 139-132 win over visiting Syracuse. The “Big O” goes on to average a triple-double (30.8 ppg, 12.5 rpg and 11.4 apg) for the Royals during the 1961-62 season, becoming the first NBA player to average double figures in assists.

1977 — Boston’s John Havlicek becomes the second player in NBA history to connect on 10,000 career field goals, reaching the milestone in a 103-98 loss at Cleveland.

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1977 — Russell Erxleben of Texas kicks a 60-yard field goal in a 26-0 rout of Texas Tech for his third field goal of the season over 60 yards, an NCAA record.

1983 — Gil Fenerty rushes for 337 yards on a 18 carries and scores six touchdowns to lead Holy Cross to a 77-28 rout of Columbia.

1984 — Orlando Pizzolato wins the New York Marathon in 2:14:53 and Grete Waitz captures the women’s title in 2:29:30.

1994 — Arnold Mickens rushes for more than 200 yards for the eighth consecutive game, breaking the NCAA Division I-AA single-season rushing record as Butler beats Evansville 49-14. Mickens’ 244 yards gives him a total of 2,111, surpassing the record of 2,016 set by Towson State’s Tony Vinson.

2005 — Top-ranked Southern California wins its 30th straight game, routing Washington State 55-13. The Trojans tie Texas for the 11th-longest winning streak in major college football history.

2006 — With a a 34-31 victory over Denver, Indianapolis is the first team to start 7-0 in consecutive seasons since the 1929-31 Green Bay Packers did it three straight times.

2011 — Joe Paterno breaks Eddie Robinson’s record for victories by a Division I coach with No. 409 in Penn State’s sloppy 10-7 win over Illinois.

2014 — Madison Bumgarner and the San Francisco Giants succeed where no team had in 3 1/2 decades, winning Game 7 on the road for their third World Series title in five years. Bumgarner comes out of the bullpen to pitch five scoreless innings on two days’ rest as the Giants held off the Kansas City Royals 3-2.

2017 — Russell Wilson hits Jimmy Graham for an 18-yard touchdown with 21 seconds left, his second TD catch of the fourth quarter, to lead Seattle over Houston 41-38. Wilson finishes 26 of 41 for a career-high 452 yards and four TDs. Deshaun Watson is nearly the equal of Wilson, throwing for 402 yards and four touchdowns and three interceptions.

2017 — Caroline Wozniacki wins the biggest title of her career when she beat Venus Williams 6-4, 6-4 in the WTA Finals.

2017 — Justin Rose mounts the third-largest final-round comeback in PGA TOUR history to win the WGC-HSBC Champions. Rose starts the final round eight shots behind Dustin Johnson, who ties a record for losing the largest lead in the final round. The historic 5-under 67 round by Rose is keyed by a back-nine 31. Rose finishes at 14-under 274 and Johnson who finishes with a 77, ties for second with Henrik Stenson and Brooks Koepka, two strokes back.

Oct. 30

1943 — Gus Bodnar of Toronto scores a goal 15 seconds into his first NHL game as the Maple Leafs beat the New York Rangers 5-2.

1955 — Jim Patton of New York returns a kickoff and a punt for a touchdown as the Giants beat the Washington Redskins 35-7.

1966 — Jim Nance of the Boston Patriots rushes for 208 yards and two touchdowns in a 24-21 victory over the Oakland Raiders.

1971 — Eric Allen of Michigan State rushes for 350 yards in 43-10 rout of Purdue.

1974 — Muhammad Ali knocks out George Foreman in the eighth round in Kinshasa, Zaire, to regain the world heavyweight title.

1975 — John Bucyk of the Boston Bruins scores his 500th career goal in a 3-2 victory over St. Louis.

1977 — Walter Payton of the Chicago Bears rushes for 205 yards and two touchdowns in a 26-0 triumph over the Green Bay Packers.

1993 — Erin Whitten becomes the first woman goalie in professional hockey to be credited with a victory as Toledo beats Dayton 6-5 in the East Coast Hockey League.

1996 — The WNBA announces the eight cities that will compete in the WNBAs inaugural season. Charlotte, Cleveland, Houston and New York will play in the Eastern Conference and Los Angeles, Phoenix, Sacramento and Utah will compete the Western Conference.

1997 — Violet Palmer makes professional sports history by becoming the first woman to officiate an NBA game. There is little reaction by the crowd when her name is announced just before tip-off of the game between the Dallas Mavericks and Vancouver Grizzlies.

1999 — Marques Tuiasosopo becomes the first college player to pass for 300 yards and run for 200, racking up a school-record 509 yards as Washington rallied to beat Stanford 35-30. Tuiasosopo completes 19-of-32 passes for 302 yards and a touchdown and rushes 22 times for 207 yards and two TDs.

2001 — Michael Jordan misses his biggest shot of the night and commits two crucial late turnovers in the Washington Wizards’ 93-91 loss to the New York Knicks, Jordan’s first regular-season game after a 3 1/2-year retirement.

2003 — In the first regular-season game of his NBA career, 18-year-old LeBron James has 25 points, nine assists, six rebounds and four steals, but the Cleveland Cavaliers lose 106-92 to the Sacramento Kings.

2004 — Trainer Bobby Frankel finally breaks through in the Breeders’ Cup Classic, with Ghostzapper blazing to victory in America’s richest race held at Lone Star Park. Frankel, who had just two wins with 62 Breeders’ Cup starters before the $4 million Classic, had saddled the beaten favorite the past three years.

2004 — Dana College’s Tom Lensch sets an all-division college record by attempting 101 passes in a 60-35 loss to Hastings College. Lensch completes 56 passes for a school-record 507 yards with three touchdowns and three interceptions.

2011 — The Baltimore Ravens erase a 24-3 deficit to defeat Arizona 30-27. It marks the fifth time this season a team trailed by at least 20 points and came back to win. That is the most in a single season in NFL history.

2016 — Derek Carr throws a 41-yard touchdown pass to Seth Roberts with 1:45 remaining in overtime, capping a record-breaking day for the Oakland Raiders in a 30-24 victory over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Carr throws for a franchise-record 513 yards — completing 40 of 59 passes without an interception — and the Raiders overcome an NFL-record 23 penalties for 200 yards.

Oct. 31

1948 — Sammy Baugh of Washington passes for 446 yards and four touchdowns and Dan Sandifer has four interceptions including two for touchdowns as the Redskins beat the Boston Yanks 56-21.

1950 — Earl Lloyd of the Washington Capitols becomes the first African-American to play in an NBA game. Washington loses 78-70 on the road to the Rochester Royals.

1964 — Kelso, running in what is billed as his final race in New York, wins his fifth consecutive Jockey Club Gold Cup, surpassing Round Table as the all-time money-winning thoroughbred. Kelso runs the 2-mile distance in 3:19 1/5, breaking the world record he set as a 3-year-old, four years earlier, by 1/5 of a second.

1969 — Lenny Wilkens, the NBA’s all-time winningest coach, gets his first coaching victory as the Seattle SuperSonics beats Cincinnati Royals 129-121.

1981 — Florida State freshman Greg Allen rushes for 322 yards in a 56-31 victory over Western Carolina.

1987 — Eric Dickerson, the NFL’s single-season rushing champion, signs a three-year contract with the Indianapolis Colts to complete a three-way trade that nets the Los Angeles Rams two running backs and six top draft choices over the next two years. The third part of the deal sends linebacker Cornelius Bennett to the Buffalo Bills in exchange for three of the draft picks that went to the Rams.

1987 — Jockey Chris Antley becomes the first rider to win nine races in a single day. He has four winners in six mounts at Aqueduct and five winners from eight tries during The Meadowlands’ evening program.

1998 — Tee Martin of Tennessee, sets NCAA records with 23 straight completions and 24 over two games in the No. 3 Volunteers’ 49-14 victory over South Carolina. Martin is 23-for-24, with a record completion percentage of 95.8, for 315 yards and four touchdowns.

1999 — Tim Couch completes a desperation 56-yard touchdown pass to Kevin Johnson with no time on the clock to give the expansion Cleveland Browns their first victory, a 21-16 win over New Orleans.

2004 — The New England Patriots lose for the first time in more than a year, falling to the Pittsburgh Steelers 34-20. The Patriots had won 21 straight games, including the playoffs, and a league-record 18 in a row in the regular season.

2006 — Miami’s season-opening 108-66 loss to Chicago is the worst loss in NBA history for a defending champion on opening night. 2008 — The North Carolina Tar Heels are No. 1 in The Associated Press’ preseason Top 25, the first unanimous No. 1 since the preseason poll began in 1981-82.

2012 — Jamal Crawford scores 29 points in 30 minutes in his first official game with his new team, and the Los Angeles Clippers convert 21 turnovers into 29 points in a 101-92 victory that extends the Memphis Grizzlies’ NBA-record streak of opening-night losses to 12. The Grizzlies are 0-12 on opening night since the franchise shifted from Vancouver to Memphis in 2001.

2015 — Triple Crown champion American Pharoah wins the $5 million Breeders’ Cup Classic by 6 1/2 lengths in his final race before retirement.

Nov. 1

1913 — Notre Dame meets Army for the first time and comes away with a 35-13 win behind Gus Dorias’ 14-of-17 passing for 243 yards.

1938 — George Woolf, riding for regular jockey Red Pollard, leads Seabiscuit to a four-length victory over the heavily favored U.S. Triple Crown champion, War Admiral, in the Pimlico Special match race at Baltimore. A crowd of 40,000 spectators turn out for the winner-take-all match race with a purse of $15,000.

1946 — The first NBA game (known as the Basketball Association of America), the New York Knickerbocker beat the Toronto Huskies 68-66 at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto.

1959 — Montreal goaltender Jacques Plante revolutionizes his position — and the sport of hockey — by donning a facemask. Plante is struck in the face with a shot by New York Rangers forward Andy Bathgate at 3:06 of the first period. After receiving stitches to close a gash from the corner of his mouth all the way up through his nostril, Plante returns to the ice wearing a mask. The Canadiens win 3-1.

1964 — Cleveland’s Jim Brown rushes for 149 yards and becomes the first player to rush for more than 10,000 yards in a career as the Browns post a 30-17 victory over the Pittsburgh Steelers. Brown with 10,135 yards had 47 games of 100-or-more yards rushing.

1966 — The NFL awards a franchise to New Orleans on All Saints Day.

1970 — Mercury Morris of the Miami Dolphins gains 302 combined yards (89 rushing, 68 receiving and 145 on kickoff returns) in a 35-0 loss to the Baltimore Colts.

1987 — Ibrahin Hussein of Kenya and Priscilla Welch of Britain win the men’s and women’s divisions of the New York Marathon, finishing the 26.2 miles in 2:11:01 and 2:30:17, respectively.

1997 — Tom Osborne reaches 250 wins faster than any coach in college football history as Nebraska beats Oklahoma 69-7, the worst loss in Sooners’ history.

2000 — Pat Riley earns his 1,000th career coaching victory as Miami posts its most lopsided win in an opener with a 105-79 rout of Orlando. Riley reaches the plateau in 1,434 games — fewer than any coach or manager in any sport.

2003 — DeCori Birmingham rushes for 196 yards and two touchdowns, including the winning score in the seventh overtime, in Arkansas’ 71-63 victory over Kentucky. The seven overtimes match the longest game in NCAA history. The Razorbacks also won that game in 2001, beating Mississippi 58-56.

2008 — Texas Tech receiver Michael Crabtree catches the winning 28-yard touchdown pass with 1 second to play, as the seventh-ranked Red Raiders beat No. 1 Texas 39-33.

2008 — Michigan’s 48-42 loss at Purdue drops the Wolverines to 2-7, ending Michigan’s string of 33 straight bowl appearances. Michigan, assured of its first losing season since 1967, also sets a school record for losses.

2008 — Stephen F. Austin quarterback Jeremy Moses sets single-game NCAA records with 57 completions and 85 pass attempts in a 34-31 double-overtime loss to Sam Houston State. Moses passes for 501 yards, four touchdowns and two interceptions, completing passes to 11 different receivers. The sophomore breaks the previous single-game attempts record of 83 set by Drew Brees at Purdue in 1998. The former record for completions was 56, set by Jarrod DeGeorgia at then-Division II Wayne State in 1996.

2009 — Meb Keflezighi, becomes the first U.S. man in 27 years to win the New York City Marathon. Keflezighi, who moved from his native Eritrea to San Diego when he was in the sixth grade, finishes with a time of 2:09:15 for a personal best.

2015 — Simone Biles picks up gold medals number nine and 10 on balance beam and floor exercise as the 2015 World Gymnastics Championships come to a close. Biles breaks the career record for most World Championships gold medals by a female gymnast.

2015 — Drew Brees passes for 505 yards and a career-high seven touchdowns, and Kai Forbath kicks a 50-yard field goal as time ran out, to give the New Orleans Saints a 52-49 victory over the New York Giants. New York’s Eli Manning connects on a career-high six touchdown passes.

2017 — The Houston Astros, led by George Springer, beat the Los Angeles Dodgers 5-1 in Game 7 for first World Series title in franchise history.

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