12 Page 22 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

The 16 Fall Movies You Should Be Excited About: A Guide
Labor Day is the signpost every year that the sugary summer junk is behind us and that the nutritious square meal of awards season has finally arrived. That's the theory, anyway: In actuality, summer movies like Before Midnight and Fruitvale Station will be as well-received as any Oscar bait, and th...

Welcome To Johnny Football's Heel Turn: 125 FBS Teams, Ranked
Each week during college football season we put the conventional polls to shame by ranking every FBS team from 1-125, by whatever standard we see fit....

125 College Football Teams, Ranked And Explained
College football kicks off the 2013 season TONIGHT. Here's the absolute minimum you can get away with knowing about each of the 125 teams in the Football Bowl Subdivision, in the order that I, Matt Hinton, personally project them to finish at the end of the season....

Pac-12 Commissioner Combines Good Idea With Dumb Suggestion
Caporegime Larry Scott, who runs the NCAA's west coast crew as the commissioner of the Pac-12, wants to arrange some kind of sit-down with the heads of all of the NCAA's families. He has a beef with basketball's so-called one-and-done rule, which requires athletes to spend one year pretending to be ...

Schools That Profit From Unpaid Labor Upset About For-Profit School
We told you last fall about Grand Canyon University, the for-profit school in Phoenix that began transitioning to NCAA Division I on June 1, with its basketball team (led by new head coach Dan Majerle!) slated to compete this winter as a member of the Western Athletic Conference. Now comes word that...

The Independent Review Into PAC-12 Referee-Bribing Allegations Is In
And it makes no sense. The PAC-12 "engaged" the oddly-named firm Ice Miller, LLP to conduct an independent review into allegations that former head of officiating Ed Rush bribed game officials into T'ing up Sean Miller for disputing a call at the end of Arizona's semifinal loss to UCLA in this year'...

Kevin Na Scored A 10 On A Par 3
It was a performance that earned subtle Happy Gilmore Tin Cup references....

Ed Rush Resigns Following Accusations of Targeting Sean Miller
Ed Rush, head of officials for the Pac-12, has resigned after allegations surfaced that he offered $5,000 and a trip to Cancun to any referee who targeted Arizona coach Sean Miller. ...

Pac-12 Head Of Officials Investigated For Bribing Officials To Make Example Of Sean Miller
Ed Rush—current Pac-12 head of officials, former NBA referee and director of officiating from 1998-2003—reportedly told referees officiating the Pac-12 tournament he would give them money or pay for a trip to Mexico if they "rang up" Arizona head coach Sean Miller....

2012 Deadspin Hall Of Fame Inductees: Virgil And Oddibe McDowell's Water Bill
We are proud to present your 2012 (yeah, we know) Deadspin Hall of Fame class:...

The Old Big East Is Considering A Suitably Bland New Name
With the Big East ceding its name to the breakaway faction of basketball schools known as the Catholic 7, the old, orphaned Big East has until July 1 to come up with something to call itself. And while there's been no official announcement, ESPN's Brett McMurphy is reporting that the a favorite has ...

Local News Anchor Has No Idea Who Mo Farah Is, Asks Him If He's Ever Run Before
You remember Mo Farah, right? He's the Somali-born runner who became the darling of the 2012 Summer Olympics after winning gold in the 10,000 meter and 5,000 meter races. How could you forget the man who gave us this image?...

Huge Australian Olympic Swim Scandal May Have Consisted Of Team Members Taking A Sleeping Pill And Going To Bed By 10:30
Swimming-mad Australia needed someone to blame after their disappointing showing at the London games, and it looks like they've found it. A report commissioned to investigate why the Aussies didn't bring home a single individual gold for the first time since 1976 laid it on a "toxic" team culture th...

When Is It OK For A Coach To Shove A Player?
Early in the second half, with Cal down 12 to USC at home, head coach Mike Montgomery called a timeout. When junior Allen Crabbe, the Golden Bears' leading scorer, reached the bench he was met with a sharp shove in the chest. Crabbe and Montgomery exchanged angry words, and Crabbe had to be separ...

The Small Decisions That Cost The 49ers The Super Bowl
Super Bowl XLVII turned out to be a close game that hinged on a few critical plays at the end—shocking, given the score when the power went out. But it also hinged on decisions that didn't seem very significant at the time but ended up having an enormous effect on the outcome....

Last Night Was Probably The Closest We'll Ever Get To A Super Bowl Fair-Catch Kick, The Rarest Play In The NFL
When the Ravens intentionally took a safety, to give themselves better field position and run a few seconds off the clock, it brought the 49ers to within three points. It was the smart call, but it also raised the possibility of the rarest of all football plays—the fair-catch kick. It's only been at...

Joe Flacco, The Big-Armed Oaf Who Saved Baltimore
Joe Flacco has played five full seasons in the NFL, and in each one, he has thrown for less than 4,000 yards and completed less than 64 percent of his throws. He has never been sacked fewer than 30 times, and he has never thrown more than 25 touchdowns. Flacco turns 28 tomorrow. He'll be a free agen...

National Radio Announcers Just Couldn't Believe The Ravens Let The Clock Expire At The End Of The First OT Period
With all of the changes made to the NFL's overtime rules in recent years, anyone can be forgiven for not understanding some of the basics. But one detail that didn't change is what happens in a playoff game at the conclusion of the first overtime period: the teams move to the other side of the fie...

Fox Gets Conservative: Did The Denver Coach's Risk-Averse Strategy Cost The Broncos A Playoff Victory?
NFL coaches will often refer to "playing the percentages." But if there's one thing I've learned by studying strategic decisions, it's that coaches don't have a firm grasp of those percentages. And when anyone is uncertain of the odds, he'll fall back on the sure thing. That was the case with Bronco...