Sports History This Week

March 17, 2001. Serena Williams is getting booed. She’s trying to prepare to face Kim Clijsters in the finals of the prestigious annual tennis tournament at the Indian Wells Tennis Garden, but when her name is announced before the match, 14,000-plus audience members begin loudly jeering her every move. This angry mob mentality continues throughout the match, while her older sister, Venus, and fath...

March 12, 1996. The Denver Nugget's leading scorer,   Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf, is shooting around before the big game tonight. Strangely, a large crowd of reporters is gathering. It turns out, they’re here to ask him   one big question: what do you think about the American Flag? Today, Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf faces consequences for not standing during the na...

A new History Channel podcast, American Football is the untold tale of the rough-and-tumble origins of the National Football League. Produced and presented by Michael Strahan and narrated by actress and pro football enthusiast Kate Mara, this podcast reaches back into the past to explain the dirty, bloody, and tumultuous beginnings of America's most popular sport. In this first episode, the sport...

March 2, 1962. Wilt Chamberlain, the NBA’s biggest star, makes the long drive out to Hershey, PA. There’s no pro basketball team in Hershey, but tonight, the town made famous for its chocolate is hosting a matchup between the Philadelphia Warriors and the New York Knicks. Chamberlain is Philly’s biggest star and he’s having a great season, but he partied hard the night before. Which makes what hap...

February 20, 1951 (or July 1951). Emmett Ashford is waiting inside the ballpark of the Mexicali Eagles. At 36 years old, he's toiled around the United States, working toward his goal of becoming a professional umpire. Finally, he lands a tryout just south of the border   to make it happen. But there's a problem: the other umpires needed to play the game are white — th...

Feb 13, 1920. For over thirty years, Black baseball players have been locked out of the major leagues. So on this day in Kansas City, Rube Foster, a former pitcher and now a team owner, is trying to make his own league just for Black players. He has gathered owners of other Black baseball teams, who currently play each other in one-off matchups or face independent teams in random games around the...

February 7, 1969. Diane Crump arrives at Hialeah Racetrack in Miami, Florida, and all eyes are on her. She’s a jockey, someone who races horses, but now she’s hoping to become the first woman in American history to ride in an officially sanctioned, professional pari-mutuel horse race. For decades, women have been barred from the sport. And over the last year, as public pressure for horse racing to...

January 31, 1988. Quarterback Doug Williams steps onto the field in San Diego, California for the biggest game of his life. He's moments away from leading Washington into Super Bowl XXII against the John Elway-led Denver Broncos. Today, Doug Williams becomes the first Black quarterback to start a Super Bowl. Can he win it, too? His breakthrough has paved the way for Super Bowl LVII, where two Blac...

January 23rd, 1983. Björn Borg, one of the top tennis players in the world, has become a global icon. But Borg hasn’t played in any of the sport’s major tournaments for the last year, and while on vacation in Nepal with his family, rumors in the media circulate about everything from his health to the status of his marriage. Today, Borg decides that he can’t wait until he returns to New York City t...

Under the harsh lights of Madison Square Garden, the Manhattan College basketball team loses to DePaul University. But this loss means that all is going to plan for law enforcement, as they make their next move. Later that night, police arrest three gamblers and two men affiliated with Manhattan College. These arrests are just the beginning of an enormous scandal. Today, the gambling phenomenon pl...

January 14, 1964. Thousands of basketball fans have braved a massive snowstorm in Boston to watch the biggest names in basketball – from Bill Russell to Oscar Robertson to Elgin Baylor – in the 14th annual NBA All-Star Game. But just ten minutes before the game is supposed to start, the players are nowhere to be found. The court is empty. Fans stomp their feet in frustration. Little do they know t...

January 6, 1925. Cigar smoke thickens the air inside Madison Square Garden. The New York City arena is packed to the brim, ready to watch the greatest runner in the world. 27-year-old Paavo Nurmi exploded onto the scene at the 1920 Olympics, winning three gold medals for Finland. In 1924, he did even better, winning five more. In the process, he became one of the world’s most famous athletes. Toda...

December 26th, 1993. It feels like 20 below zero on the “Frozen Tundra of Lambeau Field”. The Packers stand on the verge of making the playoffs for the first time in years. Though it might surprise fans now, back in the early 90s, this team and its loyal fans are desperate for even a taste of the postseason. But after decades of mishaps, bad luck, and, according to the team’s historian, “terrible...

December 24, 1914. Soldiers are stuck in cold, wet trenches on either side of the conflict across the Western Front. The Great War has just begun and it’s their first Christmas away from home. On the holiday’s eve, one man sees a light coming from the German’s side. A British soldier recalled, “With ears strained, I listened, and then all down our line of trenches, there came to our ears a greetin...

December 19, 1931. Walter Crickmer, the team secretary for a struggling Manchester United, is making the lonely walk up a long driveway to meet with a local businessman by the name of James W. Gibson. Though Gibson has no affiliation with the team and isn't even a fan of the sport, he's been targeted as the man to save Manchester United. But Gibson is not offering the club a simple loan; he's got...

December 9, 1953. In downtown Toronto, the only two Canadian squads in the NHL face off. The Montreal Canadiens and Toronto Maple Leafs have a long and bitter rivalry, and this game is no exception. It’s already testy as players on both sides rack up penalty after penalty in the first two periods. But by the third, all hell breaks loose. Today, Canada’s oldest teams come together for the roughest...

November 29, 1948. Thousands of screaming fans are packed inside New York City’s 69th Regiment Armory, eyes peeled on the wooden oval track, shining under the spotlights. Roller derby is just a few years old, but this new sport already has a huge fan base. And now, for the first time ever, roller derby will be broadcast to the masses – on television. Fans have never seen anything like it: the spee...

November 22, 1965. In downtown Las Vegas, thousands of fans come inside from a rare rainstorm to watch a boxing match   featuring young superstar Muhammad Ali. But the lopsided crowd isn’t cheering for Ali; it’s backing   two-time heavyweight champion Floyd Patterson. The two men have come to symbolize more than boxing, but an entire societal struggle. Today, why was...

November 14, 1970. Dozens of football players, coaches, and local boosters from Marshall University board an airplane to return home after a 17-14 loss to East Carolina. But at 7:36pm, while trying to land at Tri-State Airport in Huntingon, West Virginia, the plane crashes, killing all 75 people on board. It’s still the deadliest tragedy to affect any sports team—amateur or professional—in America...

April 16, 1945. Jackie Robinson is ready. He’s won a tryout with the Boston Red Sox, and if he makes the team, he will become the first player to break baseball’s long-standing racial divide. Robinson puts his supreme athletic skills on full display… but never hears back from the Red Sox. The tryout was just for show. It’s not the first deception or indignity that Robinson has endured because of h...

November 6, 1869. 25 Princeton students hop on the 10 o’clock train to Rutgers. They’re heading to compete in the first-ever intercollegiate football game. This isn’t just a milestone in the history of American sports—it also marks the birth of football culture on the sidelines. Because a group of Princeton students, watching the game, breaks into a cheer known as the “Princeton locomotive.” They’...

October 24, 1992. It's Game 6 of the World Series: Atlanta Braves versus the Toronto Blue Jays. The Canadian Squad is just a few outs from winning their first-ever major sports championship outside of hockey. Can they pull it off? The Toronto Blue Jays have gained a reputation in the past decade as chokers. After its rocky early years, the lovable underdogs from up north have become perpetual divi...

October 17, 2005. The NBA is going through massive changes. Michael Jordan is retired (again), and the league is getting younger. Stars like Allen Iverson represent the rise of hip-hop culture, which David Stern blames for the league’s dwindling viewership. His solution? Today, Stern enacts a dress code, including collared shirts and sports coats – an unprecedented rule in American sports history....

October 13, 1982. The announcement came from Switzerland, across the world from where Jim Thorpe was raised on Indian territory in Oklahoma. In his time, Thorpe was the most popular athlete in the world, winning two gold medals at the 1912 Olympics. But for a variety of reasons—including his Native American heritage—those medals were stripped away. But today, though Thorpe passed away years earlie...

October 6, 1965. For baseball fans, it’s the most sacred time of the year: the World Series. The Dodgers are in Minneapolis to face off against the Minnesota Twins in Game 1. But their star pitcher, Sandy Koufax, isn’t on the mound. Because October 6 is sacred for another reason—it’s Yom Kippur, the Jewish day of atonement. Who is Sandy Koufax? And how did he fundamentally shape baseball and Ameri...