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Sooners, Huskers were first to open doors

By Cliff Brunt The Associated Press NORMAN, Okla. — Half a century ago, the Nebraska-Oklahoma rivalry games offered a grand stage for the best Black college football players while the South dragged its feet on integration. With Nebraska’s Johnny Rodgers, Rich Glover and Willie Harper and Oklahoma’s Greg Pruitt, Joe Washington, Rod Shoate and brothers Lee Roy, Lucious and Dewey Selmon leading the way, the programs dominated with stars most schools in the South wouldn’t even recruit. After Texas became the last all-white team to win a national title in 1969, Nebraska and ...

Sports helped 9/11 begin recovery

By Jim Caltagirone For the Mirror For those who lived through the nightmare that enveloped the country on September 11, 2001, there may be specific details of the multiple terrorist attacks that have escaped from memory. However, it’s fair to assume that most Americans recall the emotional devastation that they experienced when the first images of the attacks were aired on television. As the country observes the 20th anniversary of 9/11, minds will once again be transported to that horrific morning. Not since the bombing of Pearl Harbor had a coordinated attack of that ...

Rookie NFL coaches tasked with fixing Falcons, Eagles

By Paul Newberry The Associated Press ATLANTA — Call this the Rebuilding Bowl. When the Atlanta Falcons open the season Sunday hosting the Philadelphia Eagles, it will be a matchup of rookie coaches leading the two worst teams in the NFC from a year ago. Former Tennessee Titans offensive coordinator Arthur Smith takes over the Falcons, who finished 4-12 under an interim coach after firing Dan Quinn (and long-time general manager Thomas Dimitroff) when the team lost its first five games of 2020. The Eagles took a similar path on the heels of a 4-11-1 debacle, dumping Super ...

Mailbag

Williams was special talent at Saint Francis Reading the Mirror sports pages on Thursday, Aug. 26 brought back memories from years ago. I was saddened by the news of Sandy Williams’ death, but remembering how his basketball skills impressed me as a 19-20-year-old young man brought back many good memories of Saint Francis basketball in the early 1960s. I hadn’t really seen many basketball games above the high school level in the early ’60s. I had seen Cal Fowler play quite a few games, and I had never seen anyone that could handle the ball, pass or shoot like he ...

Sports spending is out of control

By Bill Contz For the Mirror Back in 1990, a recording artist known as Callaway scored a hit with a song titled “I Wanna Be Rich.” It’s likely this tune was playing nonstop in the front offices of several big market major league teams while being simultaneously hummed by key Southeastern Conference decision makers. The feeding frenzy witnessed as we neared the July 31 MLB trade deadline served to solidify the state of California as the new epicenter of the baseball universe with San Francisco, San Diego and Los Angeles all plucking elite talent from teams going nowhere, ...

Another year of Alabama simply re-loading

By Paul Newberry The Associated Press ATLANTA — In the circle of college football life, Alabama sends another hefty batch of future stars to the NFL and still begins a new season as the top-ranked team. The No. 1 Crimson Tide will get an early read on the latest group of five-star recruits Saturday against No. 14 Miami at the Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game in Atlanta. Alabama is coming off one of the greatest seasons in college football history: 10 straight wins against an SEC-only schedule, a shootout victory over Florida in the league championship game, and blowouts over Notre Dame ...