
Dale vs. Dale: A Daytona 500 the Jarretts, NASCAR won’t forget
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adminThe 1993 Daytona 500, run 30 years ago today, is first and foremost a love story.
Yes, it was the Dale and Dale Show. Yes, it was the victory that sparked Dale Jarrett’s climb toward the NASCAR Hall of Fame. Yes, it was the first Cup Series win for second-year team owner Joe Gibbs, also a future Hall of Famer, who has since added 199 more of them. Yes, it was all of that and more. But yes, it was also a love story. After all, it did happen on Valentine’s Day.
To fully appreciate that day, we must put it within the context of the era. This Daytona 500 was the first race run after the retirement of Richard Petty. It marked only the second career start for a kid named Jeff Gordon, hailing from California and driving a rainbow-covered car he might as well have just landed from another planet. His boss, Rick Hendrick, was respected throughout the garage, but he also had yet to win a series championship. This was still the world of Junior Johnson, Darrell Waltrip and above all else, Dale Earnhardt. Alan Kulwicki and Davey Allison were still alive, the defending series champion and the defending Daytona 500 champion. People still believed that having a multicar team would never work.
Gibbs had just retired as Washington’s head coach, his final game on the sideline (for then, at least) had taken place only six weeks earlier, a loss in the first round of the NFL playoffs. The year before, he won his third Super Bowl ring as a head coach. A lifelong hot-rod enthusiast, Gibbs was making his foray into the NASCAR world with the assistance of Hendrick. Among his very first hires was an up-and-coming crew chief named Jimmy Makar, and it was Makar who suggested hiring his brother-in-law as their driver.
“Joe always said what a dummy I was because he didn’t even have an employee, we agreed together to hire Jimmy Makar,” confesses Norm Miller, then the CEO of Interstate Batteries, who had signed on to sponsor the No. 18 Chevy. Their primary corporate color was green. To old-school NASCAR racers, a green car was viewed as being almost as lucky as a black cat walking under a ladder in a room full of broken mirrors. “But Joe is a winner. I don’t know if you know this, but he won a racquetball national championship. And just as we’d signed on, he won a Super Bowl. So, I figured, ‘Well, if racing doesn’t work out, we got to enjoy some football and other stuff. Let’s just take a chance and see what happens.’ Jimmy, he wanted to take a chance on Dale Jarrett.”
The 36-year-old North Carolinian owned one career victory, earned in a nail-biter at Michigan International Speedway with the Wood Brothers in ’91. Even with that trophy, he was still viewed in the garage as little more than a journeyman racer, the well-liked son of an all-time great.
“I was certainly under no illusions that I was in demand, or that people were fighting over hiring me,” Jarrett explained with a laugh last fall. “But I also was taught at a very young age that even when others might not bet on me, then I should still have the confidence to bet on myself. I learned that from my parents, though I don’t think they ever thought those lessons would apply to me becoming a race car driver.”
Ah yes, Mom and Dad. And that brings us to our love story.
Ned Jarrett first met Martha Ruth Bowman at a small town dance in the 1950s. Ned was the son of a sawmill owner, and as a kid, he would sit at the local general store and eavesdrop on the local farmers as they excitedly chattered about a racetrack that was being plowed into a hillside in nearby Hickory. They bragged about how they were going to take their vehicle over to the oval and prove just how fast it was. Little Ned was immediately enamored. When his father took him to brand-new Hickory Motor Speedway, it marked the beginning of a lifelong obsession with stock car racing.
Ned and Martha married on Feb. 18, 1956, and the early years of their marriage were punctuated by Ned’s success in NASCAR’s Sportsman Division, the precursor to today’s Xfinity Series. His chief rival and best racing pal was Ralph Earnhardt. Martha Jarrett and Earnhardt’s wife, also named Martha, became inseparable.
The Jarretts and Earnhardts travelled together, ate together, helped each other through numerous pregnancies, and even hosted baby showers for each other. At one of those showers, Ned drove Martha to the event but refused to go inside. A few days earlier, Ralph had put the bumper to Ned on the final lap to take away a sure victory, and Ned refused to look Earnhardt in the eye. The shower was being thrown for Ned’s second child, a boy they would name Dale. The Earnhardts had a 5-year-old boy of their own in tow, also named Dale.
The reality of the racing life was that Martha Jarrett enjoyed her friends, but she hated Ned putting his life on the line multiple nights per week. That anxiety only increased when Ned moved up to the Grand National Series, what we now know as the Cup Series, where the racetracks were bigger, the cars were faster and deaths were entirely too common. This was the 1960s.
During the ’64 World 600 at Charlotte, Ned burned his hands pulling Fireball Roberts out of the inferno that ultimately killed his friend. Dale and older brother Glenn were watching from the infield. The following season, Jarrett suffered a broken back at Greenville-Pickens Speedway, asking the ambulance driver to turn off the siren and take it slow to the hospital when he looked out the window from his stretcher and saw Martha was following, behind the wheel of the family station wagon with the kids.
“We lived in neighborhoods where people had what you would call normal jobs, lawyers and salesmen, things like that,” Dale Jarrett recalled of his childhood. “Everything that we did as a family was very normal. We went to church every Sunday, Mom made sure me, my older brother and my younger sister were where we needed to be. The only part of it that wasn’t like everyone else was that Dad was racing at Daytona and Darlington. And he was good at it.”
Ned Jarrett wasn’t simply good. He was the best. He backed up his two Sportsman titles with Grand National championships in 1961 and ’65. He earned 50 wins, then second only to Lee Petty on NASCAR’s all-time victories list. The only victory that eluded him was Daytona.
“I can remember seeing him drive by in the lead right at the end of the 1963 Daytona 500,” Dale remembered. “He went right by us where we watched from the infield, but then ran out of gas.”
Instead, his signature win came two years later, a Southern 500 victory at Darlington by a stunning 14-lap margin and essentially clinching the ’65 title. The images of his sleek, dark blue No. 11 Ford Galaxie streaking around the Track Too Tough To Tame are iconic to this day, as are the photos of Ned and Martha’s embrace and kiss in Victory Lane.
Then, he retired.
“Ford was pulling out of NASCAR and that seemed like the right time to exit with them,” Ned recalled in 2021. “Plus, I had made a promise to Martha.”
That promise was that if and when he won a second Grand National championship, he would hang up his helmet. He did. Martha was so relieved. Her nerves would no longer be frayed from having to watch a loved one hurtle around ovals at 150 mph.
Ned tried to be a coffee salesman. That didn’t work, so he helped manage his father’s lumber business. Then he became the promoter of Hickory Motor Speedway and Metrolina Speedway in Charlotte. Martha sold tickets and ran the front office while the kids sold programs and hot dogs. She settled into motherhood, watching Dale become a three-sport athlete, so good that he received offers to attend college as a quarterback and a full scholarship to South Carolina to play golf. Older brother Glenn went to UNC as a catcher. Younger sister Patti met Makar.
Ned kept his racing bug fed first through his short tracks and then via a broadcasting career that moved from public address announcing at Hickory to MRN Radio to the TV booths of ESPN and CBS Sports. Glenn ended up on TV, too, as a pit reporter.
Life was good. It was safe.
“Then I kind of went and threw a wrench into that, didn’t I?” Dale admits. “I didn’t go to college to play golf. I decided, at 20 years old, that I wanted to be a racecar driver. I don’t think my mom was super happy about that. But she also never tried to stop me.”
Dale battled his way through the short tracks of the Carolinas and then became a charter member of the NASCAR Busch Series, the revised version of Ned’s Sportsman Division. He won a handful of races and by the late-1980s was a midpack Cup Series driver. Over his first 168 starts, he earned the one win and seven top-5 finishes. But he also scored only one DNF. He was a smart racer. Still, no one saw coming what happened on Feb. 14, 1993.
No one except for the Jarretts.
“I remember when we got to the garage for Speedweeks there at Daytona, we had been assigned garage No. 11, Dad’s number,” remembered Dale. “We had been so fast in testing during January, I remember calling Dad and saying, ‘Dad, I really think we can win this thing.'”
When CBS held its Daytona 500 production meetings and producer Bob Stenner asked his broadcasters what they expected to happen on Sunday, Ned told the room to keep an eye on his son.
“I told them, this is not me playing favorites, this is based on what I had seen and if they had really been paying attention to what they had seen, that Dale was really fast,” Ned explained nearly 30 years later. What he didn’t know that day was that Stenner later went to Ken Squier and Neil Bonnett, who were in the broadcast booth with Jarrett, and told them that if Dale Jarrett was in the lead or had a chance to win on the final lap that they should be quiet and let his father do the talking.
Sure enough, as the leaders crossed the start-finish line with two laps remaining, the green No. 18 Chevy carried enough momentum off the fourth turn to slide by Gordon into second place behind, of course, the black No. 3 Chevy Lumina of the other Dale. Earnhardt was at the height of his almost-mythical struggle to win NASCAR’s biggest race.
As Dale Jarrett moved into second, the CBS cameras showed Martha, her head thrown into her hands, unable to watch. She was sitting in a passenger van, seeking some solitude to ease her nerves. Those old feelings were back. The anxiety from decades earlier, only now it wasn’t watching her husband at some dirt track on a Wednesday night. This was her little boy, in the Great American Race. CBS had a TV monitor set up for her. Now they had a camera pointed at her.
From the booth, speaking to his wife but also to the millions watching at home, Ned said, “Hold on, Martha, he’s going to be OK, dear…”
Over the last round of pit stops, most everyone in the field had taken only two new tires, including Earnhardt. Makar, however, had decided to give Jarrett four. As a result, Earnhardt’s car was slipping and sliding, on the constant edge of being out of control. Jarrett’s ride looked like it was on rails as he rode up to back of the other Dale’s machine and used the push of the air to shake his opponent loose.
They flashed under the white flag nose-to-nose, Jarrett on the inside. As Jarrett led the pack onto the backstretch, Stenner’s voice crackled in the earpieces of the three men in the broadcast booth.
“Take it, Ned.”
“Come on, Dale! Go, baby, go! All right, come on. I know he’s got it to the floorboard. He can’t do any more. Come on, hang it to the inside, don’t let him get to the inside of you coming around this turn … here he comes, Earnhardt … it’s the Dale and Dale show as they come off of Turn 4 … you know who I’m pulling for, it’s Dale Jarrett … bring her to the inside, Dale, don’t let him get down there…”
As Ned said it, Dale did it.
“Ever since that day, people have asked me if Dale could hear me, like I was in his headset like a spotter or a crew chief would be,” Ned explained. “When I tell them that he didn’t, I don’t think they believe me. He just knew what to do. He certainly has never needed my coaching at Daytona, I can tell you that.”
“He’s going to make it! Dale Jarrett is going to win the Daytona 500! All right!”
CBS once again cut to the exasperated woman in the van. The mother who used to make sandwiches on the tailgate of her station wagon for her kids during races. The wife who tore tickets. The heartbroken friend who attended the funerals of her friends’ husbands who had died in the same races that her husband had run. She threw her hands above her head, then went down into a position of prayerful thanks.
“Look at Martha, oh dear!”
CBS pit report David Hobbs sprinted out to the van from the pits. As the cameraman reached out and congratulated her, the quiet woman said, “Thank you,” as tears streamed down her face.
“Oh, that poor girl, she needs help!”
In Victory Lane, Dale was handed an earpiece so that Ned could talk to him on live TV.
“I tell you, your mama was watching, and you can’t believe the way she broke down when this race was over,” Ned said. “Of course, you had to expect that. Proud of you.”
“You came so close, I believe it was in ’63 when you ran out of fuel,” Dale replied. “I thought we’d get this one for the whole family.”
Everything was still so new for Gibbs and Miller they didn’t realize they were supposed to stay for a post-victory news conference. Miller and his family went back to their beach condo. Gibbs went across International Speedway Boulevard to eat at Steak and Shake. That’s why the entire Joe Gibbs Racing team still goes there after every Daytona 500 win. So far, they’ve done it four times.
The Jarretts spent their evening in the racetrack infield. Because that’s what they’d always done. The following weekend at Rockingham, Ned found Earnhardt and apologized for showing so much favoritism over the final lap of the Daytona 500 broadcast. The Intimidator thanked him, but said there was no need, explaining, “I’m a father, too.”
Ned retired from broadcasting more than a decade later and was inducted into the NASCAR Hall of Fame in 2011. Dale won 32 races in all, became a broadcaster himself in 2009, and went into the Hall of Fame five years later.
During a visit to Ned and Martha’s home in Newton, North Carolina, in 2018, Martha expressed relief that her six grandchildren chose to excel in a lot of different sports, but none became full-time racers — although the oldest, Jason, did try before becoming a spotter.
“I miss my friends at the racetrack,” she admitted. “But I don’t miss being a nervous wreck all the time.”
On Feb. 6, 2023, Martha Jarrett passed away at the age of 91. Today is Ned’s first Valentine’s Day without his beloved in nearly seven decades. But as sad as that might be, as sad it will always be until he takes his place by her side once again, this day will also never fail to bring a smile to his face. Or ours. A family’s most memorable moment together, also one of the greatest moments in NASCAR’s 75-year history.
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Sports
Need an ace to win big? Here’s why the Mets won’t overpay for one
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17 hours agoon
August 6, 2025By
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Jorge CastilloAug 6, 2025, 07:00 AM ET
Close- ESPN baseball reporter. Covered the Washington Wizards from 2014 to 2016 and the Washington Nationals from 2016 to 2018 for The Washington Post before covering the Los Angeles Dodgers and MLB for the Los Angeles Times from 2018 to 2024.
NEW YORK — David Stearns was about to disappear into the New York Mets‘ clubhouse Monday afternoon when he stopped to answer questions about the one potentially prominent flaw remaining on his roster after the trade deadline: the starting rotation.
The glaring inability of Mets starters to pitch deep into games over the past two months — David Peterson is the only one to log at least six innings in an outing during that span — prompted fans to plead for the Mets’ president of baseball operations to fortify the rotation. After he elected not to acquire a starting pitcher at the trade deadline, the talk has turned to potentially improving from within by promoting Brandon Sproat or Nolan McLean, two standout pitching prospects excelling in Triple-A.
“I think it’s always a combination of when, developmentally, those guys are ready,” Stearns said. “And also when there’s the need and how to fit it on the roster. And so we may get to the point where we decide that it’s the best thing to do to bring one or both of them here. But we’re not at that point right now.”
The Mets’ front office acted aggressively ahead of last Thursday’s deadline, acquiring three top-tier relievers (Ryan Helsley, Tyler Rogers and Gregory Soto) to strengthen a taxed bullpen, and a veteran center fielder (Cedric Mullins) to improve the lineup. But while Stearns said he “engaged” teams on starting pitchers — including Washington Nationals All-Star left-hander MacKenzie Gore, sources told ESPN — he determined the costs were too high.
The Mets were far from the only World Series contender to not bolster their starting rotation in a deadline with an exorbitant trade demand for the few available. But the difference between most of those clubs and the Mets is that refusing to pay the going rate for elite major league starting pitchers — whether in free agency or via the trade market — has been a fundamental principle in Stearns’ roster-building.
One of the mysteries surrounding Stearns’ move to New York after a hugely successful seven-year run leading the small-market Milwaukee Brewers was how he would use owner Steve Cohen’s deep pockets. The Mets have spent large sums of money — they gave Juan Soto the richest contract in North American sports history in December — but Stearns has remained disciplined and methodical in building his pitching staff, preferring starting pitchers he says he believes have untapped potential.
After an unexpected run to the National League Championship Series without a true ace last fall, the Mets head into the stretch run this season with the same missing ingredient.
“I think there are multiple ways to build a pitching staff and we focused on the back end of the pitching staff, the bullpen,” Stearns said. “We’re really happy with the arms we were able to acquire who are going to pitch out of our pen and we have confidence, not only in the stars who are here who we think are going to keep us competitive and help us win games, we are also pleased with the development of how some of the guys in Triple-A are progressing. And we understand that they could … be part of the mix going forward if needed.”
The Mets strongly pursued Yoshinobu Yamamoto before last season and offered him a contract similar to the 12-year, $325 million deal — the largest ever for a pitcher — Yamamoto signed with the Los Angeles Dodgers. But Yamamoto was an outlier — not just an already highly accomplished pitcher in Japan, but, just as importantly, only 25 years old. That rare combination of age and talent met Stearns’ criteria to offer an expensive long-term contract.
Ultimately, the Mets signed Sean Manaea to a one-year deal with an option and Luis Severino to a one-year contract for the rotation, then opted for a similar blueprint this past winter, choosing not to strongly pursue any of the top three starting pitchers (Corbin Burnes, Max Fried and Blake Snell) on the free agent market.
Stearns instead re-signed Manaea to a three-year, $75 million deal (the biggest contract Stearns has given to a starting pitcher), inked Clay Holmes to a three-year, $38 million deal (with an opt-out after 2026) to convert him from a reliever to a starter, gave Frankie Montas a two-year, $34 million contract (with an opt-out after this season), and added Griffin Canning on a one-year deal.
“I still think it’s really valuable and there have been teams that I’ve been around in my career that have had one or multiple ace-level starters on their staff and got bounced early in the playoffs and that can be tough to figure out sometimes too,” Stearns said last month. “So, you’d always like to have the horse at the front of the rotation, there’s no question. But it’s not the only way to build a rotation, it’s not the only way to win a playoff series, it’s not the only way to win a World Series.”
The moves have so far yielded mixed results.
The Mets’ rotation led the majors with a 2.84 ERA and ranked 14th in innings pitched through June 7, when they were 41-24 and led the NL East by 3½ games. Since then, Mets starters rank 24th in ERA (4.74) and 28th in innings pitched. The club has a 22-27 record during the stretch and now trails the Philadelphia Phillies by 2½ games in the division.
Injuries have played a factor in the drop-off, with four starters landing on the injured list in June. Kodai Senga, who signed a five-year, $75 million deal in 2022 — a year before Stearns’ arrival in Queens — strained his hamstring and sat out nearly a month. Canning had been a strong contributor until a ruptured left Achilles tendon ended his season, and Tylor Megill (elbow) and Paul Blackburn (shoulder) are still working their way back.
Manaea, who began the season on the IL, has made only five starts since his return last month, the most recent Monday against the Cleveland Guardians, when he dominated for five innings before surrendering five runs in the sixth. Montas, who has posted a ghastly 6.68 ERA in seven starts, is in danger of losing his rotation spot when Blackburn and Megill are activated.
Holmes, meanwhile, hasn’t logged more than 5⅓ innings in a start since June 7 against the Colorado Rockies, and has already doubled his previous career high for innings in a season. And Senga yielded four runs over four innings Saturday, marking the fourth straight start he has failed to pitch into the sixth.
“We haven’t gotten consistency out of the starting pitching,” Mets manager Carlos Mendoza said Monday. “I think that’s where it starts every night. It starts on the mound, and we haven’t been able to get some quality starts.”
One of Sproat and McLean, if not both, could soon get the call to help. McLean has a 2.81 ERA in 15 games (12 starts) for Triple-A Syracuse after posting a 1.37 ERA in five games for Double-A Binghamton to begin the season. Sproat has emerged from early-season struggles with a dominant stretch for Syracuse, holding opponents to two earned runs in 33 innings over his past six starts.
The two 24-year-old right-handers, both drafted and developed by the Mets, have seemingly checked the necessary boxes in the minors. They could give the big league rotation the push it needs for the final stretch. For now, they and the Mets’ fan base wait.
Said Stearns: “I think they’re getting close.”
Sports
2025 SEC football preview: Power Rankings, top players, must-see games
Published
20 hours agoon
August 6, 2025By
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In the past six years, four of the College Football Playoff national champions have been SEC teams. Will 2025 be the season that yet another SEC team claims the title?
Texas, Georgia and Alabama all enter the season with new starting quarterbacks. Texas’ Arch Manning is under some very bright lights as we wait to see whether he lives up to the hype in his new starting role. Georgia’s Gunner Stockton got a taste at starting quarterback, stepping up in the 2025 Sugar Bowl after now-Miami quarterback Carson Beck got injured in the 2024 SEC championship game. And Alabama’s Ty Simpson has a big season ahead as Alabama looks to make a run at the CFP after just missing it last season.
Former Washington State quarterback John Mateer joins Oklahoma this fall after ranking No. 1 in the top 100 transfers list from the 2024-25 transfer cycle. Could Oklahoma bounce back after a seven-loss season last year?
We’re here to get you caught up on the SEC by breaking down the conference’s CFP outlook, Power Rankings, must-see games, top freshmen, key transfers and numbers to know.
Jump to:
CFP outlook | Must-see games
Freshmen | Transfers
Numbers to know
Power rankings
CFB outlook
Should be in: The SEC will attempt to restore its dominance after its teams failed to win each of the past two national championships. The league claimed four in a row from 2019 to ’22 and sent three teams (Georgia, Texas and Tennessee) to the CFP in 2024. Alabama was the first team left out of the 12-team bracket. The Longhorns should be right back in the mix, especially if former five-star quarterback Arch Manning is as good as advertised. Texas returns three potential All-Americans — edge rusher Colin Simmons, linebacker Anthony Hill Jr. and safety Michael Taaffe — from a defense that ranked No. 3 in the FBS in scoring defense (15.3 points) last season. Georgia will also be breaking in a new starting quarterback, as Gunner Stockton is replacing Carson Beck, who left for Miami. The Bulldogs will have four new starting offensive linemen, and they’re counting on Zachariah Branch (USC) and Noah Thomas (Texas A&M) to upgrade their receiver corps. The Crimson Tide will be looking to bounce back from a four-loss campaign in coach Kalen DeBoer’s first season, and their defense, led by an imposing front seven, should be good enough to get them back into the race for an SEC title. Ty Simpson is another first-year starting quarterback, and he’ll have plenty of weapons and a stout offensive line supporting him. — Mark Schlabach
In the running: LSU brings back the SEC’s most accomplished quarterback in Garrett Nussmeier, who threw for 4,052 yards with 29 touchdowns in 2024. With tailback Caden Durham and receiver Aaron Anderson returning, the Tigers should again be as explosive as any offense in the league. The question, of course, is whether LSU’s defense will be able to slow down opponents. The Tigers should be better after adding a plethora of defenders from the transfer portal, especially if Harold Perkins Jr. can stay healthy. Texas A&M is one of the few SEC contenders that won’t be breaking in a new quarterback. Marcel Reed was solid as a freshman, and if he can cut down on mistakes in his second season, the Aggies might be a big surprise. With tailbacks Amari Daniels and Le’Veon Moss running behind an offensive line that brings back five seniors, Reed won’t have to do too much. Ole Miss was in the running for a CFP bid until losing at Florida late in the 2024 season, and coach Lane Kiffin has used the transfer portal again to reload his roster. The Rebels will be breaking in a new quarterback, Austin Simmons, and they’re going to be relying on myriad transfers to rebuild their defense. They’ll play at Georgia and Oklahoma and get LSU, South Carolina and Florida at home. — Chris Low
Long shots: In what figures to be a big season for Oklahoma coach Brent Venables, the Sooners added former Washington State quarterback John Mateer and running back Jaydn Ott from Cal. The defense should be solid, and if new offensive coordinator Ben Arbuckle can turn things around, the Sooners might be a sleeper. The Sooners play Texas in Dallas and South Carolina, Tennessee and Alabama on the road. South Carolina brings back one of the league’s best players in quarterback LaNorris Sellers, but it will have to replace its entire offensive line, leading rusher and most of its top playmakers on defense. Tennessee will be looking for a return to the playoff. Nico Iamaleava is out as quarterback, and Joey Aguilar comes in after spending the spring at UCLA. The Vols will again need Tim Banks’ defense to carry the load. Missouri has the most manageable schedule in the league, and this may be Eliah Drinkwitz’s best defense. The Tigers play eight of their 12 games at home and avoid Georgia, LSU and Texas. Florida will also be improved and has the quarterback and defense to make a run. But, whew, that schedule. — Schlabach
Must-see games
From Bill Connelly’s SEC conference preview
Here are the 10 games — eight in conference play, plus two of the biggest nonconference games of 2025 — that feature (A) the highest combined SP+ ratings for both teams and (B) a projected scoring margin under 10 points.
Texas at Ohio State (Aug. 30) and LSU at Clemson (Aug. 30). I have so many questions about each of these four teams, and I’m so happy that they’ve basically paired off with each other to help answer them. Toss in Alabama at Florida State in between the noon ET kickoff in Columbus and the evening kickoff in Clemson and you’ve got yourself a solid SEC headliner for each time slot on the first Saturday of the season.
Georgia at Tennessee (Sept. 13). The Bulldogs and Volunteers meet in September for the first time since 2018. Good. I like my UGA-Tennessee games early, when they can spark the largest possible existential crises.
Alabama at Georgia (Sept. 27). A rematch of the second-best game of 2024*. Aside from Ohio State-Michigan, no game did a better job of reminding us that huge college football games will still be huge and delightful even if the national title stakes are dampened by a bigger playoff.
(* Bama gets a rematch of the best game of 2024 the next week when Vandy comes to town.)
LSU at Ole Miss (Sept. 27). Is it too late to redraw the schedules? Between the Bama-Georgia and Oregon-Penn State main events and an undercard of LSU-Ole Miss, Indiana-Iowa, TCU-Arizona State and USC-Illinois (and, on top of everything else, South Dakota at North Dakota State), Week 5 might actually be too big! Goodness.
Texas at Florida (Oct. 4). Texas benefited from an easier slate (relatively speaking) in 2024, with just three regular-season opponents finishing in the SP+ top 20. But if Florida and Oklahoma improve as projected this fall, the Horns are looking at five such games, only one of which is in Austin. That’s the opposite of easy.
Ole Miss at Georgia (Oct. 18). Ole Miss might have enjoyed the single best performance of the regular season in last year’s 28-10 walloping of the Dawgs. That the Rebels turned right around and lost to Florida, eventually eliminating them from CFP contention, has to be one of the biggest on-field regrets of the past 50 years in Oxford.
Alabama at South Carolina (Oct. 25). South Carolina began turning its season around with a near-comeback win over Bama in 2024. This will be the Gamecocks’ third straight game against a projected top-20 team, so the season might have already gone in a couple different directions by the time Bama gets to town.
LSU at Alabama (Nov. 8). Bama crushed LSU in Baton Rouge last season, then pulled an Ole Miss and fell victim to a devastating upset two weeks later. Considering the expectations and pressure both of these teams are dealing with, this game could have playoff stakes and/or hot seat stakes. Or both?
Texas at Georgia (Nov. 15). Georgia was the only SEC hurdle Texas couldn’t clear last season. There’s obviously a chance this will be the first of two UGA-UT matchups in a four-week span.
Three freshmen to watch
Dallas Wilson, WR, Florida
Wilson showed up instantly by catching 10 passes for almost 200 yards and two touchdowns in Florida’s spring game. No matter who starts at quarterback on Week 1 for the Gators, there’s a good chance they’ll develop a quick connection with Wilson. The 6-foot-4 Florida native has a massive catch radius, 10-inch hands and surprising breakaway speed given his frame. He runs a legitimate 4.5 40-yard dash and has the shiftiness to pick up yards after the catch, making him a nightmare matchup who should see the field early in The Swamp.
David Sanders Jr., OT, Tennessee
Rarely does Tennessee turn a starting offensive line spot over to a freshman, but Sanders has all the developmental markers of an impactful tackle right out of the gate in Rocky Top. He was named North Carolina’s Gatorade Player of the Year as a junior, a rare accolade for an offensive lineman, and was the No. 7 recruit in the Class of 2025. Tennessee coaches challenged Sanders to put on weight after he enrolled early and he answered the call. The freshman now checks in at 6-6, 305 pounds with an exceptional combination of athleticism, lower body flexibility and reaction skills. Sanders will have every opportunity to win the starting right tackle spot on a Volunteers line that needs to replace four starters from last year as they retool in search of a national championship.
DJ Pickett, CB, LSU
At 6-4, Pickett has a monster frame and legitimate speed after recording a 10.7 100-meter time in high school, where he was a district sprinting champion. If he can carry over his momentum from spring practice into fall camp, Pickett has a shot to earn a starting job in Brian Kelly’s overhauled secondary. Pickett impressed LSU coaches with his combination of elite athleticism and playmaking. The five-star corner has a high ceiling and his combination of size and speed rarely seen on the boundaries in the SEC. — Billy Tucker
Three top transfers
These selections are based on Max Olson’s ranking of the top 100 transfers from the 2024-25 transfer cycle.
Transferring from: Washington State | Top 100 rank: 1
HT: 6-1 | WT: 219 | Class: Redshirt sophomore
Background: After spending two years behind Cam Ward, Mateer put together an impressive breakout season in 2024 that has made him one of the most coveted starting QBs in the country. Mateer threw for 3,139 yards and 29 touchdowns on 65% passing and ranked sixth among FBS starters with 1,032 rushing yards (excluding sacks) while scoring 15 rushing TDs. He’s explosive and fearless when he’s on the run, forcing 58 missed tackles according to ESPN Research (most among FBS QBs) with 22 rushes of 15 or more yards. The Little Elm, Texas, native went 8-4 as a starter, leading the Cougars as high as No. 18 in the College Football Playoff rankings, with a top-five expected points added (EPA) per dropback among FBS starters. Washington State put together a strong offer to bring Mateer back in 2025, but he chose to move on via the portal and has an opportunity to be the most impactful player in this portal cycle for 2025. — Max Olson
Scout’s take: Mateer is a true Air Raid guy in the passing game. He excels in rhythm and timing throws and is very decisive. He’s a very tough player to rush because he gets the ball out of his hand. He’s a solid runner who can get out of trouble and extend plays. He plays with a high confidence level and raises the play of the people around him. — Tom Luginbill
What he brings to Oklahoma: Much-needed swagger. Oklahoma hired Washington State offensive coordinator Ben Arbuckle on Dec. 2, which made Mateer-to-OU the worst-kept secret in portal recruiting. Miami and others made a strong push, but Mateer couldn’t turn down a chance to join his coaches in Norman and play on a big stage next season. The Sooners have added a lot of talent via the portal to try to get things fixed, but Mateer will inject a ton of playmaking ability and confidence into their offense. — Max Olson
Transferring from: Georgia Tech | Top 100 rank: 6
HT: 5-11 | WT: 190 | Class: Sophomore
Background: Singleton was an instant difference-maker for Georgia Tech’s offense when he arrived, earning Freshman All-America honors in 2023 and finishing second for the ACC’s Offensive Rookie of the Year honor. The three-star signee from Douglasville, Georgia, caught 104 passes for 1,468 yards and scored 10 offensive touchdowns over the past two seasons. Singleton also ran track for the Yellow Jackets with a personal record of 10.32 in the 100-meter dash this spring. He has the talent to become an early-round draft pick and was one of the most coveted players in the portal. — Olson
Scout’s take: Singleton might be one of the best route runners and fastest overall players to enter the transfer portal. He’s really good in the underneath passing game, where he can turn screens and 5-yard catches into big chunk gains. He also has elite straight-line speed to get behind the defense and plucks most balls thrown in his vicinity. What made him such a high commodity in the portal are the intangibles. He’s a great blocker and tough player. — Billy Tucker
What he brings to Auburn: After the program’s fourth consecutive losing season, coach Hugh Freeze and the Tigers assembled an impressive transfer recruiting class that they hope will flip their fortunes in 2025. This is a significant win over Texas, Ole Miss and several other SEC foes; Singleton should play a high-target role for the Tigers as they replace talented pass catchers KeAndre Lambert-Smith and Rivaldo Fairweather. — Olson
Transferring from: USC | Top 100 rank: 8
HT: 5-10 | WT: 175 | Class: Sophomore
Background: Branch lived up to five-star hype right away with the Trojans and was one of the most dangerous all-purpose playmakers in the country in 2023. The No. 7 overall recruit became the first USC freshman to earn first-team All-America honors in program history. He was dominant in the return game (774 yards, two TDs) during his debut season and turned 89 touches on offense into 910 yards and four TDs over his two years at USC. He entered the portal along with his older brother, USC safety Zion Branch. — Olson
Scout’s take: One of the fastest players in the 2023 class, Branch quickly transitioned into one of college football’s most electrifying players as a true freshman at USC. He ran a verified 4.41 40 and had 100-meter track times in the 10.3 range coming out of national power Bishop Gorman in Las Vegas. That speed transferred to the field immediately as a returner in 2023. His special teams production dipped as a sophomore, but that might be more related to opponent scheme than any diminishing skill. In the passing game, he’s what you’d expect: a big-play weapon in the screen game, jet sweeps and on quick slants and crossers that get him the ball in space. He’s an underneath mismatch and a great YAC target. — Tucker
What he brings to Georgia: Branch is a big-time upgrade for a Georgia offense that must replace leading receivers Arian Smith and Dominic Lovett. The Bulldogs led all FBS teams with 36 receiver drops last season, according to ESPN Research, and will need Branch to be a reliable difference-maker for new starting QB Gunner Stockton. — Olson
Numbers to know
3: According to the Allstate Playoff Predictor, three of the four teams with at least a 10% chance of winning the national championship are in the SEC: Texas at 24%, Georgia at 18% and Alabama at 11%. (The fourth team is Ohio State of the Big Ten at 11%.)
0: The number of new head coaches in the SEC this season, marking just the fourth time that has happened since the league expanded to 12 teams in 1992. There also were only four coordinator changes this offseason after more than half of the SEC’s coordinators were replaced following the 2023-24 season.
+250: The odds of Texas winning the SEC championship, according to ESPN BET, which are the longest odds for an SEC favorite in at least 15 years. The preseason favorite has gone on to win the SEC title in six of the last 10 seasons. — ESPN Research
Power Rankings
Steve Sarkisian loves his roster, and he has plenty of reason to be excited with Manning, receivers DeAndre Moore Jr. and Ryan Wingo, and tailbacks Quintrevion Wisner and CJ Baxter returning. The Longhorns will have to replace four starting offensive linemen and fill some holes on the defensive front.
Stockton got a taste of being the starting quarterback in the second half of last season’s SEC championship game and a CFP quarterfinal and did an admirable job. If Georgia’s offensive line plays better and his receivers are more dependable, Stockton should be fine running the offense.
DeBoer’s first season didn’t go as planned, but replacing Nick Saban at Alabama would have been a nightmare for any coach. DeBoer’s track record of success is too good for the Crimson Tide not to bounce back in Year 2.
4. LSU Tigers
The Tigers are probably going to score a lot of points, and if Brian Kelly can figure out how to turn around his defense, they might be a legitimate SEC title and CFP contender. LSU has dropped five straight season openers, three under Kelly, and it plays at Clemson on Aug. 30.
The Aggies went 8-5 in Mike Elko’s first season after starting 7-1, and if the longtime defensive coordinator can figure out how to improve a unit that allowed 5.5 yards per play in 2024, they might be a CFP dark horse. The offense might be spectacular and pound teams in the running game if quarterback Marcel Reed continues to grow as a passer.
Lane Kiffin loves to score points, but the Rebels were in the CFP hunt in 2024 because of their defense, which ranked No. 2 in the FBS in scoring defense (14.4 points), behind only national champion Ohio State. If Austin Simmons takes care of the ball, the Rebels might be better than anticipated.
The SEC schedule gets a little harder for the Vols this season, with the Alabama and Florida games both being on the road. The Georgia game on Sept. 13 is also earlier than usual, albeit at home, as Tennessee breaks in a new quarterback. The defense should again be very good and keep the Vols in games, but they’re going to need more explosive plays on offense if they’re going to make the playoff again.
Mateer was a massive get in the transfer portal for the Sooners, who simply couldn’t score a year ago. They were held to 20 or fewer points in seven of their 13 games. Oklahoma addressed several other needs on offense in the portal, and Venables is taking over the play-calling duties on defense. A four-game stretch from Oct. 11-Nov. 1 against Texas in Dallas, South Carolina on the road, Ole Miss at home and Tennessee on the road will define OU’s season.
The two lingering questions with the Gators, who came back from the dead a year ago, are whether or not ultra-talented quarterback DJ Lagway can stay healthy for the season and how they navigate a killer schedule again. Florida plays six teams ranked nationally in the preseason polls.
The Gamecocks might have a bona fide star in Sellers, but they’re having to replace many of the key pieces around him, as well as several difference-makers on defense. South Carolina plays a five-game stretch against LSU (road), Oklahoma (home), Alabama (home), Ole Miss (road) and Texas A&M (road) in October and November.
11. Missouri Tigers
If the Tigers were more proven at quarterback, they’d probably be ranked a lot higher. Even so, don’t be surprised if Drinkwitz’s club makes a serious run at double-digit wins for the third straight season, which has never happened in school history. Penn State transfer Beau Pribula and Sam Horn, who missed all of last season after undergoing Tommy John surgery, are competing for the starting quarterback job.
12. Auburn Tigers
This should be Hugh Freeze’s best team on the Plains, and the Tigers could be one of those teams that makes a lot more noise during the season than some outside of the program are expecting. So much will depend on quarterback Jackson Arnold, who’s getting a reset after transferring from Oklahoma. He has a deep and talented receiving corps, and edge rusher Keldric Faulk leads a defense that needs to be better at getting off the field in key situations.
Arkansas is another team that has a chance to be much improved, although the final record might not reflect it. The Hogs have one of the trickier schedules in the league, and some new faces need to step up on defense. But returning quarterback Taylen Green is dynamic as both a passer and runner and should be even better in his second season under offensive coordinator Bobby Petrino.
This is no diss to Clark Lea and the Commodores to be ranked this low. They reveled in proving people wrong a year and may do the same again this year, especially if they can stay healthy. Quality depth has always been a problem for Vanderbilt. What’s not a problem is its quarterback. Diego Pavia returns after a terrific debut season on West End. His teammates feed off his energy and toughness.
Mark Stoops, in his 13th season at Kentucky, is the dean of SEC coaches. He has built the Wildcats’ program from the ground up, but they dipped to 4-8 a year ago and 1-7 in the SEC. That’s after winning 10 games in 2018 and 2021 and going to eight straight bowl games. The Wildcats need to regain their tough, blue-collar approach and get consistent play from transfer quarterback Zach Calzada (on his fourth different team) if they’re going to bounce back in 2025.
16. Mississippi State Bulldogs
It has been a whirlwind for second-year Mississippi State coach Jeff Lebby, who has had to completely overhaul the roster, 80% consisting of players in their first or second year in the program. Lebby is excited by what he has seen from quarterback Blake Shapen, who missed most of last season with a shoulder injury. The home schedule for the Bulldogs is one of the toughest in the country. Four playoff teams from a year ago (Arizona State, Tennessee, Texas and Georgia) visit Starkville. — Schlabach, Low
Sports
Goals king Ovechkin finds partner for movie rights
Published
20 hours agoon
August 6, 2025By
admin
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Associated Press
Aug 5, 2025, 11:38 AM ET
Washington Capitals star Alex Ovechkin has partnered with a Russian technology company to produce a movie, series or documentary about his NHL career.
Yandex and its streaming platform, Kinopoisk, announced the agreement Tuesday.
Ovechkin this past spring broke Wayne Gretzky’s career goals record and has scored 897 going into the final season of his contract with the Capitals. Ovechkin, who turns 40 next month, has along with his representatives granted the rights to adapt his career to Yandex’s production label, Plus Studio.
The Moscow native began his professional career in the Russian league, now the KHL. He is expected to take part in commercials and serve as a Yandex ambassador as part of the deal.
Ovechkin has played his entire NHL career with Washington since the Capitals drafted him with the first pick in 2004, and he debuted in 2005. He has been the face of the franchise since, served as its captain since January 2010. He was playoffs MVP in 2018 when he led the Capitals to their first Stanley Cup championship.
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