Around the world in 80 seconds

This archived article was written by: Jeremy Jones

Here we go again. The sporting world is always changing, so here are the biggest scoops from the past week.
Baseball: While the Braves and the Giants seem to be locks for the playoffs, there are eight teams still battling for two playoff spots in the American League. The Astros, the Cubs, and the Cardinals are all within one game of each other for the lead in the AL Central. All three teams also remain in the AL Wild Card race along with the Phillies, the Dodgers and the Marlins. Baseball fans, stay tuned. Baseball games might actually start to matter before the playoffs this year.
NFL: The NFL kicked off their season last week with the Washington Redskins knocking off the NY Jets 16-13. Washington’s key to winning was their defense. The ‘Skins held the Jets to a dismal 3-12 on third down and only 158 total yards the whole game. Other scores from the first weekend of regular season play are: Denver 30, Cincinnati 10; Buffalo 31, New England 0; Indianapolis 9, Cleveland 6; Kansas City 27, San Diego 14; Houston 21, Miami 20; NY Giants 23, St. Louis 13; Pittsburgh 34, Baltimore 15; Detroit 42, Arizona 24; Minnesota 30, Green Bay 25; Carolina 24, Jacksonville 23; San Francisco 49, Chicago 7; Seattle 27, New Orleans 10; Atlanta 27, Dallas 13; Tennessee 25, Oakland 20; Tampa Bay 17, Philadelphia 0.
NBA: This past weekend, James Worthy and Robert Parrish became the newest inductees to the NBA Hall of Fame. Worthy played his entire career with the Lakers where he won three championships alongside Magic Johnson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Parrish was a Celtic through much of his career, often competing against Worthy in the NBA Finals. Parrish went onto set a new Celtics’ franchise record for blocked shots and played in more games than anyone in the history of the NBA.
X-Games: X-Games IX wrapped up a few weeks ago and it just keeps getting bigger and better. Here are some of the highlights, in case you missed them. Tony Hawk pulled a 900 in the Best Trick event on his fourth try, then retired. Nate Adams perfectly executed a backflip heel-clicker to a no-hander landing in the Big Air Motocross event, and took second. Surfing was adopted by the X-Games as an event for the first time this year. There were surfing two teams, an East Coast team and a West Coast team. The East Coast team took the gold led by Kelly Slater.
WNBA: The Women’s National Basketball Association are going into the finals right now. During the first round of the playoffs, the Detroit Shock defeated the Cleveland Rockers two games to one and the Connecticut Sun knocked out the Charlotte Sting, two games to zero. In the Western Conference, it was the Los Angeles Sparks over the Minnesota Lynx two games to one and the Houston Comets ousted the Sacramento Monarchs two games to one. So the semifinals match the Shock against the Rockers and the Sparks against the Comets. The winner of each series will go to the finals.
Soccer: In their final preparatory game for the upcoming World Cup, the US Women’s soccer team defeated Mexico 5-0 last Sunday. With the preliminaries out of the way, the women will move on to World Cup play starting September 21 versus Sweden. The United States will be out to defend their World Cup championship from the last tournament where they defeated China in dramatic fashion. Brandi Chastain netted the final penalty kick in overtime to give the United States the win 5-4. As many people will remember, Chastain dropped to her knees, ripped off her shirt, and swung it over her head in celebration. This year’s World Cup is sure to be just as exciting and action-packed, but probably with less stripping.