J-Rod 2B gives M’s 1st home playoff win since ’01
-
Alden Gonzalez
SEATTLE — Another sold-out crowd went into its customary “Ju-lio!” chant in Sunday’s eighth inning, but this one felt louder, deeper, more desperate, almost as if you could feel the anticipation that comes from 24 years without a playoff home win in his city. Julio Rodriguez, the Seattle Mariners‘ beloved center fielder and one of the sport’s best producers over these last three months, responded by hitting the line drive that drove in Cal Raleigh for the go-ahead run, then arrived at second base, punched the frigid October air, flexed for 47,371 T-Mobile Park fans and, mostly, fed off their energy.
“I kind of looked around a little bit,” Rodriguez said after powering a nail-biting, 3-2 victory over the Detroit Tigers. “I could see everybody jumping around, and that made me feel really good. It was an awesome moment.”
Facing Tigers ace Tarik Skubal with the possibility of going to Detroit down two-games-to-none in this best-of-five American League Division Series, the Mariners rode an impressive pitching performance and two Jorge Polanco home runs to take a two-run lead heading into the eighth inning. And after Josh Naylor’s error paved the way for Spencer Torkelson’s game-tying double, the Mariners, one of baseball’s hottest teams since reaching their nadir in early September, responded yet again. Raleigh hit a one-out double off Kyle Finnegan, Rodriguez did the same, and Andres Munoz, asked to take down two innings for the first time in six years a night earlier, closed it out in the ninth.
For the first time since Oct. 15, 2001, site of the decisive game of that year’s ALDS, the people of Seattle could witness a playoff win first-hand.
“For us, it means a lot to give the fans what they deserve,” Munoz said. “I’ve been here for a little bit, and they deserve this.”
Skubal knows the Mariners’ struggle well. Long before solidifying himself as the AL’s greatest pitcher, Skubal pitched at nearby Seattle University, the only Division-I school that would offer him a scholarship. As a way to help pay it forward, and inspire kids hoping to follow his path of going from a ninth-round pick to a Cy Young, Skubal invited the entire Seattle University baseball team to watch him pitch.
The Tigers were coming off a gritty effort in which they utilized seven pitchers in 11 innings to practically steal Game 1. Skubal, five days removed from a 14-strikeout masterpiece in the wild-card round, hoped to put his Tigers on the brink. But Polanco got in his way. In the fourth, Skubal left a 2-0 slider out over the plate and Polanco lined it into the Mariners’ left-center-field bullpen, resulting in the first home run Skubal had allowed on that pitch since May 20. In the sixth, Skubal got ahead into the count, 1-2, but Polanco worked it full, then got a middle-middle sinker at 99 mph and sent it 369 feet.
“It’s a good at-bat,” Skubal said. “Two good swings on baseballs, and that’s how I five up runs tonight. I thought my stuff was really, really good. I thought my execution was great. But that’s the game of baseball.”
Polanco navigated the worst season of his career in 2024, putting up a .651 OPS after the Mariners acquired him from the Minnesota Twins. He spent a lot of that year playing hurt, ultimately undergoing surgery on his left knee shortly after the team’s season ended. The Mariners, scrambling for infield help in February, brought him back on a deal that would pay him $7 million in 2025 and saw him morph into one of their best performers down the stretch.
From the start of July to the end of September, Polanco slashed .282/.348/.551, ranking 11th in the majors in OPS. And when the Mariners needed a win most, he became the first player in four years — Paul Goldschmidt on Aug. 25, 2021 — to hit two home runs in one game against Skubal.
“He’s such a good baseball player,” Rodriguez said. “He’s a grinder. All year long he’s been having great at-bats, coming clutch in so many situations. And today, to have hit two homers against the best pitcher in the game right now — it’s awesome. There is not enough words to describe what he means to the team.”
Luis Castillo, a man known to feed off the home crowd in Seattle, got the Game 2 assignment and needed 51 pitches to record the game’s first six outs. A short start, coming off a night in which the Mariners taxed their bullpen, seemed likely. But Castillo completed the third and fourth innings with just 18 pitches. In the fifth, Mariners manager Dan Wilson confronted the same situation that presented itself the prior night: fifth inning, traffic on the bases, left-handed hitter Kerry Carpenter up, lefty reliever Gabe Speier warming in the bullpen.
“Déjà vu all over again,” Wilson said.
Twenty-four hours earlier, Wilson entrusted George Kirby to face Carpenter a third time and watched him surrender a two-run homer. This time, he turned to Speier, who struck out Carpenter to end the fifth, then cruised through the middle of the Mariners’ lineup in the sixth. Eduard Bazardo followed by stranding a runner in the seventh. Matt Brash seemed primed to do the same in the top of the eighth, but Riley Greene’s grounder, a potential inning-ending double play, ricocheted off Naylor’s glove at first base. Five pitches later, Torkelson deflated an entire city with a game-tying double down the right-field line.
“Just keep going,” Raleigh recalled thinking. “In the playoffs, you have to have a short memory.”
Raleigh, the franchise catcher coming off a historic 60-homer season, responded by turning on a splitter out over the plate and drove it toward the right-field wall. Rodriguez, arguably the game’s best player since the All-Star break, followed by turning on another splitter in almost the exact location and lining it down the left-field line, bringing Seattle back to life.
“It was awesome,” Rodriguez said. “These are things I dreamed of as a kid.”
Mariners fans waited 21 years after that 116-win 2001 season for their baseball team to get back into the playoffs. When they finally did, in 2022, the Mariners won back-to-back wild-card games in Toronto but suffered two brutal ALDS losses in Houston, came back home, played 18 innings and lost 1-0, ending a promising season. The next few years were mired by late-season collapses that left them out of the playoffs, which only added more pressure on a 2025 team widely considered the most talented of this generation. Raleigh called getting that first home playoff win “a nice weight to get off the guy’s shoulders.”
They hope for several more.
-
David Hale
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Duke defensive end Wesley Williams said he heard the refrain throughout the run-up to Saturday’s ACC championship game: A Blue Devils win would be “a doomsday scenario.”
At 7-5 and unranked, Duke arrived in Charlotte with a chance to win the conference and, in doing so, knock the ACC out of the College Football Playoff entirely, with two teams from the Group of 5 — Tulane and James Madison — potentially making it instead.
Well, doomsday has arrived, thanks to a series of fourth-down calls by Duke coach Manny Diaz, including one in overtime that resulted in the game-deciding touchdown in a 27-20 Blue Devils victory over No. 17 Virginia.
“Coach Diaz said this week, ‘If you think people hate Duke now, just wait until we win the ACC,'” Williams said.
The ACC’s fifth tiebreaker — combined win percentage of conference opponents — sent Duke to the league’s title game from among five teams tied for second place in the standings, including No. 12 Miami, a team on the fringe of an at-large CFP bid that could have benefited significantly from an extra game to wow the selection committee.
Instead, it was Duke that got the chance to avenge a Nov. 15 loss to Virginia and make its own case for playoff inclusion.
“I’m not going to take anything away from James Madison,” Diaz said. “They had a really great season. … The Sun Belt has been a really good conference in years past, but most of their top teams are having a down year. So when you start comparing strength of schedule — you can’t just look at wins and losses. It’s who you play against. That’s the whole point of playing a Power 4 schedule. There’s a reason all these coaches are all leaving for Power 4 jobs. There’s recognition that’s where the best competition is.
“The ACC champion should go to the College Football Playoff this year and every year. And we’ll be very excited to see how they rule on that tomorrow.”
James Madison coach Bob Chesney has accepted the head coaching position at UCLA, but he is expected to stay with the Dukes through any potential playoff run.
The Dukes finished the season 12-1 but lost their lone game against a Power 4 foe, Louisville, in September. James Madison beat Troy 31-14 on Friday to win the Sun Belt championship.
James Madison athletic director Matt Roan offered a counterpoint, noting that Dukes quarterback Alonza Barnett III was just coming back after a long-term injury and the Dukes still played Louisville close before losing 28-14.
“The next week, we started what is now the second-longest winning streak in the country,” Roan said. “This team is clicking since that time and separated itself as one of the five best conference champions in the country after winning the Sun Belt. JMU led the nation in wins over bowl-eligible teams with seven, matching Indiana and Ohio State. We can score points and stop points with anyone in the country. Our second halves, and fourth quarter in particular, have been untouchable. Who you play matters, but more important is how you play. Our players and our coaches have been elite all season and are deserving of this opportunity.”
James Madison was No. 25 in the most recent CFP rankings. Duke was unranked.
Diaz said after Saturday’s win, however, that the committee now has a more complete body of work to consider.
According to ESPN’s metrics, James Madison has the No. 18 strength of record but the No. 123 strength of schedule. Duke entered Saturday’s game with the No. 59 strength of record and No. 74 strength of schedule. Two of the Blue Devils’ losses were to teams outside the Power 4: playoff hopeful Tulane and 9-3 UConn.
“Having been on the selection committee, I understand it’s complicated,” Duke athletic director Nina King said. “I think we’re deserving when you look at some of these numbers like strength of schedule, number of Power 4 teams we’ve played and won. I think we’re deserving, but I fully appreciate the challenge [for the committee].”
The ACC’s doomsday scenario was in some ways more of a “Mission: Impossible.” After Duke lost to Virginia in Week 11, the Blue Devils were +1800 to win the conference and, according to ESPN’s FPI, had a 3.8% chance of winning the ACC.
Now, the conference will wait for the committee to deliver a verdict on both Duke and Miami on Sunday. The Hurricanes are 10-2 but have consistently been ranked behind several other two-loss teams, including Notre Dame, a team they beat in Week 1.
“Miami should get in,” Diaz said after Saturday’s win. “The head-to-head should matter. And so should we, because we’re the conference champion.”
ACC commissioner Jim Phillips argued the same before Saturday’s kickoff, but he declined to comment after Duke’s win over Virginia that might have left the conference with no playoff bids.
The doomsday scenario for the ACC, however, could just as easily turn into a boon with two teams in, should the committee buy into Duke’s sales pitch. Blue Devils linebacker Luke Mergott, who hauled in the championship-clinching interception in overtime, believes it will.
“We represent the ACC, and the ACC is a respected conference,” Mergott said. “I think we’ll be in, and I’m confident our name will be called.”
-
Adam Rittenberg
INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana assistant coach Ola Adams put his hands on his head in disbelief as confetti fell and the crowd roared at Lucas Oil Stadium.
But the scene unfolding before Adams on Saturday night was very believable. Since the moment coach Curt Cignetti swaggered onto campus two years earlier and outlined a success plan for the losingest program in college football, Indiana has been climbing.
On a magical night 50 miles from their home stadium, the Hoosiers reached the top, outlasting Ohio State 13-10 in a Big Ten championship game that matched the nation’s top two teams, both undefeated. Indiana beat No. 1 to become No. 1.
“We’re going to go in the playoffs as the No. 1 seed,” Cignetti said. “A lot of people probably thought that wasn’t possible.”
The milestones achieved are seemingly endless. The Hoosiers won their first Big Ten championship since 1967 and their first outright title since 1945. They beat Ohio State for the first time since 1988, ending a 32-game losing streak. And quarterback Fernando Mendoza likely clinched the school’s first Heisman Trophy with several heroic throws, rallying his team from a 10-3 deficit.
“It shows everybody: Why not? Why would you not want to come to Indiana?” linebacker Isaiah Jones said. “For any of the doubters out there, this kind of was the final nail in the coffin for any of the Indiana doubters, the Curt Cignetti doubters, the Hoosier doubters.
“This was the last thing that needed to be proved, and we did it.”
Indiana beat a top-ranked team for the first time in 17 tries, holding Ohio State scoreless for the final 40:08 and twice turning away the Buckeyes inside the 10-yard line.
“As a basketball manager, Keith Smart’s shot that won the national championship [in 1987],” Indiana athletic director Scott Dolson, who worked under coach Bob Knight for that title team, told ESPN. “This is right up there with that. This is a big moment.”
Cignetti guided the Hoosiers to a team-record 11 wins in his debut season, but when Indiana faced Ohio State, the eventual national champion, and Notre Dame, the eventual runner-up, its deficiencies were exposed in double-digit losses. Although Indiana faced a tougher regular-season schedule this fall, recorded a signature road win against Oregon and had shown clear improvement in several areas, it still entered Saturday’s game as the underdog.
But the Hoosiers (13-0) were better at the line of scrimmage, recording five sacks against an Ohio State team (12-1) that had allowed six the entire regular season. Facing Heisman Trophy contenders in quarterback Julian Sayin and wide receiver Jeremiah Smith, Indiana’s defense never yielded, making several memorable plays, including linebacker Rolijah Hardy‘s end zone pass deflection to prevent the go-ahead touchdown with 2:51 to play.
“We envisioned it,” defensive lineman Tyrique Tucker said. “We felt like we needed to handle business, especially due to last year. We felt like we had to finish some things and we had some unfinished business.”
Cignetti and his players thought that if they could keep the game close late, they would have an edge. Indiana rallied late to beat Iowa and Penn State and pulled away from Oregon with the score tied early in the fourth quarter. Ohio State, meanwhile, had not faced a second-half deficit this season until Mendoza found Elijah Sarratt for a 17-yard score with 8:02 to play in the third quarter.
“That’s what we dwell on, like, we come out and we take on a challenge,” said cornerback D’Angelo Ponds, who was matched up against Smith in man coverage throughout the game. “They haven’t been challenged all year. … We challenged them.”
Mendoza’s night began with a massive hit by Ohio State’s Caden Curry that left him writhing on the turf and forced him to miss a play. He also threw an interception that led to Ohio State’s only touchdown. But Mendoza steadied himself, even without top wideout Omar Cooper Jr., and found Charlie Becker for completions of 51 and 33 yards, the latter on third-and-6 in the final minutes.
Indiana fans gathered in the north end of the stadium chanted “Heis-Mendoza!” as Mendoza received game MVP honors.
“I don’t want to go in deep depth with the Heisman, but I remember Coach Cignetti brought me in, I think it was after UCLA, and he told me, ‘Hey, the Heisman’s a team game, it’s a team award. It’s not a player award. And if you win, then you can get nominated for it,'” Mendoza said. “Hopefully, I would love the opportunity to get the invite to New York, which would be fantastic.”
The Heisman ceremony awaits Mendoza next week, and Indiana will prepare for its first trip to the Rose Bowl since the 1967 season. But no one associated with the program will forget what happened Saturday night, just a few dozen miles from campus.
“It was just a dream come true,” Ponds said. “It actually didn’t feel real. We believed in ourselves, and we went out there and executed. It all just came together.”
-
Sports2 years agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports3 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports2 years agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports3 years agoButton battles heat exhaustion in NASCAR debut
-
Sports3 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Environment3 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment1 year agoHere are the best electric bikes you can buy at every price level in October 2024