AP Sportlight

Posted

May 24

1905 — Harry Payne Whitney’s Tanya becomes the second filly to win the Belmont Stakes. Ruthless was the first filly to win the Belmont, in 1867. Whitney would also win the Kentucky Derby with a filly, Regret, in 1915.

1935 — In the first major league night game, the Reds beat the Philadelphia Phillies 2-1 before 25,000 fans in Cincinnati.

1936 — Tony Lazzeri of the New York Yankees drives in 11 runs with a triple and three home runs — two of them grand slams — in a 25-2 rout of the Philadelphia A’s.

1967 — The AFL grants a franchise to the Cincinnati Bengals.

1980 — Bobby Nystrom’s overtime goal gives the New York Islanders a 5-4 victory over the Philadelphia Flyers in Game 6 for their first Stanley Cup title.

1981 — The Indianapolis 500 ends in controversy when Mario Andretti, who finished second to Bobby Unser, is declared the winner because Unser broke a rule during a slowdown period near the end of the race. The decision is later reversed, giving Unser credit for the victory, but he is fined $40,000.

1986 — The Montreal Canadiens win their 23rd Stanley Cup, beating the Calgary Flames 4-3 in five games.

1988 — The fourth game of the Stanley Cup finals between the Edmonton Oilers and Boston Bruins is postponed with the score tied 3-3 and 3:23 left in the second period when a power failure hits Boston Garden.

1990 — The Edmonton Oilers win their fifth Stanley Cup in seven seasons by beating the Bruins 4-1 in Game 5. Goalie Bill Ranford, who limited Boston to eight goals in the series, wins the Conn Smythe Trophy for most valuable player in the playoffs.

1992 — Al Unser Jr. wins the closest finish at the Indianapolis 500, beating Scott Goodyear by 43-thousandths of a second, barely half a car length. Lyn St. James, the second woman to race at Indy, finishes 11th.

1995 — Oakland’s Dennis Eckersley becomes the sixth pitcher to record 300 saves, in a 5-2 win over the Baltimore Orioles.

2001 — John Lieber of the Chicago Cubs tosses a 79-pitch, one-hit shutout in a 3-0 blanking of the Reds. It’s the first shutout of the Reds in an NL-record 208 games.

2009 — Brazil’s Helio Castroneves becomes the ninth driver to win the Indianapolis 500 three times. Castroneves pulls away over the final laps to beat Dan Wheldon of England and Danica Patrick, who eclipsed her fourth-place finish as a rookie in 2005 by crossing the strip of bricks in third.

2010 — Lukas Lacko of Slovakia beats American Michael Yani in a 71-game match that ties for the most in the French Open since tiebreakers were instituted in 1973. Lacko wins 4-6, 7-6 (5), 7-6 (4), 6-7 (5), 12-10 in a first-round match that takes two days to complete.

2017 — Manchester United defeated Ajax, 2-0, to win the 2017 UEFA League.

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May 25

1948 — Ben Hogan wins the PGA championship, beating Mike Turnesa in the final round, 7 and 6.

1965 — Muhammad Ali knocks out Sonny Liston a minute into the first round in the controversial rematch for Ali’s heavyweight title. Listed as the fastest knockout in a heavyweight title bout, Liston goes down on a short right-hand punch.

1975 — The Golden State Warriors become the third team to sweep the NBA finals, beating the Washington Bullets 96-95 on Butch Beard’s foul shot with 9 seconds remaining.

1978 — The Montreal Canadiens defeat the Boston Bruins 4-1 in Game 6 for their third straight Stanley Cup.

1980 — Johnny Rutherford wins his third Indianapolis 500 in seven years and becomes the first driver to win twice from the pole position.

1987 — Herve Filion becomes the first harness racing driver to win 10,000 races. Filion reaches the milestone driving Commander Bond to victory in the third race at Yonkers Raceway.

1991 — The Pittsburgh Penguins, led by Mario Lemieux, win the Stanley Cup for the first time with an 8-0 rout of the Minnesota North Stars.

1998 — Princeton punctuates its claim as one of college lacrosse’s great programs by beating Maryland 15-5 for its third straight NCAA Division I title and fifth in seven years.

2002 — Boston sets an NBA record, overcoming a 21-point fourth-quarter deficit in a 94-90 win over New Jersey. The Celtics outscore the Nets 41-16 in the quarter.

2003 — Juli Inkster shoots a 10-under 62 — tying the lowest final-round score by a winner in LPGA Tour history — to beat Lorie Kane by four strokes in the LPGA Corning Classic.

2007 — Bjarne Riis is the first Tour de France winner to admit using performance-enhancing drugs to win the sport’s premier race, further eroding cycling’s credibility after a series of doping confessions. His admission means the top three finishers in the 1996 Tour are linked to doping — with two admitting to cheating.

2008 — Seven crashes and spinouts mar the first Indianapolis 500 since the two warring open-wheel series (CART and IRL) came together under the IndyCar banner. Scott Dixon stays ahead of the trouble to win the race.

2009 — Syracuse rallies from a three-goal deficit in the final 3:37 of regulation to beat Cornell 10-9 and win its second straight and unprecedented 11th NCAA lacrosse title.

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May 26

1925 — In Detroit’s 8-1 win over the Chicago White Sox, Ty Cobb becomes the first to collect 1,000 career extra-base hits. He finished his career with 1,139.

1959 — Harvey Haddix of the Pittsburgh Pirates pitches 12 perfect innings before losing to the Milwaukee Braves, 1-0 in the 13th on an error, a sacrifice and Joe Adcock’s double.

1985 — Danny Sullivan misses almost certain disaster and holds off Mario Andretti and the rest of the fastest field in auto racing to win the Indianapolis 500. On the 119th lap, Sullivan spins his racer 360 degrees, narrowly avoiding both the wall and Andretti.

1987 — Boston’s Larry Bird steals an inbounds pass from Detroit’s Isiah Thomas and feeds over his shoulder to a cutting Dennis Johnson for the winning basket as the Celtics pulls out an improbable 108-107 win over Detroit in Game 5 of the Eastern Conference Finals.

1988 — The Edmonton Oilers, with MVP Wayne Gretzky leading the way, beat the Boston Bruins 6-3 to complete a four-game sweep and win their fourth Stanley Cup in five years.

1991 — Rick Mears passes Michael Andretti with 12 laps to go and wins his fourth Indianapolis 500, by 3.1 seconds. Mears joins A.J. Foyt and Al Unser as the only four-time winners.

1994 — Haiti’s Ronald Agenor wins the longest match since the French Open adopted the tiebreaker. Agenor takes the 71st and final game of a second-round match with David Prinosil of Germany. His five-hour, 6-7 (4-7), 6-7 (2-7), 6-3, 6-4, 14-12 victory involves the most games in a French Open match since 1973.

2000 — New Jersey finishes the greatest comeback in a conference final when the Devils win the last three games of the series, beating the Flyers 2-1 in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference final. Patrik Elias scores his second goal of the game with 2:32 to play for the win.

2004 — Andy Roddick loses at the French Open — to Frenchman Olivier Mutis, who is ranked 125th. With the five-set loss, Roddick joins Andre Agassi and eight other compatriots on the way home, making it the first Grand Slam tournament in more than 30 years without a U.S. man in the third round.

2005 — Americans Andy Roddick, James Blake and Vince Spadea fail to make it through the opening week at the French Open. For the second year in a row — and the second time at a Grand Slam event in more than 30 years — no American man makes it out of the second round.

2008 — Syracuse wins its 10th NCAA men’s lacrosse championship, beating defending champion Johns Hopkins 13-10 behind three goals from Dan Hardy. The crowd of 48,970 at Foxborough, Mass., is the largest to see an NCAA championship outdoors in any sport — the BCS football championship game isn’t an NCAA event.

2012 — Toronto FC ends its MLS record nine-game losing streak to open a season with a 1-0 win over the Philadelphia Union on a late goal by Danny Koevermans.

2013 — Tony Kanaan ends years of frustration by finally winning the Indianapolis 500. Kanaan drives past Ryan Hunter-Reay on a restart with three laps to go, then coasts across the finish line under yellow when defending race winner Dario Franchitti crashes far back in the field. The Brazilian finished second in 2004 and twice finished third.

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