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Good morning and happy Thursday, sports fans! It’s Austin Nivison welcoming you to Week 11 of the NFL season as the Patriots and Jets get set for a rivalry clash this evening. Even before kickoff, there is plenty of news from around the league with the Giants starting a new quarterback and the Cardinals losing a key offensive weapon to illness. Elsewhere, the Anthony Davis trade rumors have already picked up, MLB handed out some more hardware and the Warriors and Spurs treated basketball fans in San Antonio to some rare performances.
Let’s get right to the biggest stories in sports.
π Five things to know Thursday
- Stephen Curry and Victor Wembanyama put on a spectacular show. Curry erupted for 22 of his game-high 46 points in the third quarter to lead the Warriors to a 125-120 victory over the Spurs. It’s wild considering that host San Antonio had a 16-point lead. Even wilder? Golden State picked up the victory despite the Spurs achieving something the franchise had never done: have two players — Wembanyama and Stephon Castle — notch triple-doubles.Β
- Jameis Winston will start for the Giants against the Packers.Β With Jaxson Dart in concussion protocol, interim coach Mike KafkaΒ named Winston the starter on Wednesday, electing to keep Russell Wilson on the bench. If there’s one guarantee with Winston under center, it’s that he won’t be boring. In seven starts with the Browns last season, Winston threw for 2,121 yards, 13 touchdowns and 12 interceptions.
- The Clippers have lost Bradley Beal for the season due to a hip fracture. Beal’s first season with the Clippers is over after just six games. He will have season-ending surgery to repair a hip injury he suffered on Nov. 8, and this type of thing has been an unfortunate theme for much of Beal’s career. This began as a hopeful season for the Clips, but they’ve hit the rocks quickly between a 2-8 start and the loss of Beal.
- Paul Skenes and Tarik Skubal are your 2025 Cy Young award winners.Β In just his second MLB season, Skenes won his first NL Cy Young award, and the Pirates ace did so in unanimous fashion. In the AL, Skubal captured his second AL Cy Young award in a row. The Tigers star is the first player since Jacob deGrom to win the award in back-to-back years (2018-19) and the first back-to-back winner in the AL since Pedro Martinez (1999-00).
- Michigan State must vacate 14 wins due to recruiting violations during Mel Tucker’s tenure.Β Following an NCAA investigation, it was determined that Spartans staff members provided impermissible benefits to recruits while Tucker was coach. As part of the punishment, Michigan State must vacate 14 wins over the last three seasons, including all five from Jonathan Smith’s first year on the job in 2024. Tucker received a three-year show-cause order, and former staff members Saeed Khalif and Brandon Jordan received six- and five-year orders, respectively.
π Do not miss this: Hannah Hidalgo smashes records
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Notre Dame star Hannah Hidalgo was red-hot in her team’s 85-58 win over Akron last night. Hidalgo nearly outscored the Zips on her own with 44 points, which broke the program record for single-game scoring.
As good as Hidalgo was offensively, she was an absolute menace on the defensive end, and she now stands alone atop the record books. Hidalgo recorded 16 steals, which is a new Division I single-game record. Isabel Gonzalez highlighted the rarity of Hidalgo’s performance at any level of basketball.
- Gonzalez: “There are not many players at any level who can do what Hidalgo achieved on Wednesday. No NBA or WNBA player has ever registered 40+ points and 10+ steals in a single game. The last college basketball player to do so was Amy Patton for Northern Arizona in 2012.”
Hidalgo made sure it was a long night for Akron, but at least the Zips can hold their heads high knowing they didn’t allow an NCAA record 172 points like one NAIA program.
π Ranking Anthony Davis trade destinations
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With Nico Harrison out in Dallas, his biggest “get” could be on the move soon too. The Mavericks can try to recoup some of what they lost in acquiring Anthony Davis — even they don’t get Luka DonΔiΔ back — by flipping big man for more assets.
Sam Quinn took on the Herculean task of ranking all 31 other teams as a potential trade destination for Davis. Some teams, like the Warriors, make more sense than others (Heat). For at least one team — the Cavaliers — it’s financially impossible.
One of the more interesting teams in this equation is the Knicks. They have a choice to make: Keep Karl-Anthony Towns or roll the dice with Davis. Quinn lays out that quandary nicely in his piece.
- Quinn: “You couldn’t play five-out with Davis, but you could quite easily put three shooters around the Brunson-Davis pick-and-roll, and when they go double-big with Davis and Robinson, they’d rival Houston’s incredible offensive rebounding. Towns gives the Knicks a higher floor. Davis gives them a higher ceiling. Usually you take the ceiling. But the Knicks might be so close as is that they don’t believe they need to. There’s not a clear answer here.”
The case for the Mavs trading Davis is relatively easy to understand. Their timeline is much different than that of the 32-year-old Davis, and Dallas is far from being a contender, which is clear from glancing at our latest NBA Power Rankings.
ππ NFL QB Power Rankings
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Between Lamar Jackson, Josh Allen, Patrick Mahomes and Justin Herbert, among others, the NFL is full of quarterbacks in their prime playing the game at a high level. So, naturally, 37-year-old Matthew Stafford looks like the best player of the bunch.
What Stafford is doing this season is nothing short of awe-inspiring. He battled a back injury all throughout training camp, and not only has Stafford held up physically, but he could be the MVP and has the Rams looking like Super Bowl contenders. All of that has Stafford as the new No. 1 in our NFL QB Power Rankings, and Cody Benjamin is just as floored as everyone else.
- Benjamin: “You thought he was good during his first season with the Rams? Try Year 5, which has the 37-year-old playing with backyard-level freedom to the tune of a whopping 25 touchdown passes after nine games.”
One quarterback trending in the opposite direction of Stafford isΒ Kyler Murray. Now on injured reserve, Murray, 28, was struggling even when he was healthy, and that has left his future with the Cardinals in doubt.
ππ The best (and not-so-best) of the rest
πΊ What we’re watching Thursday
π SJSU at No. 17 Michigan State (M), 6:30 p.m. on Big Ten Network
π No. 2 Purdue at No. 8 Alabama (M), 7 p.m. on ESPN2
π Belmont at No. 12 Tennessee (W), 7 p.m. on SEC Network
π Raptors at Cavaliers, 7 p.m. on NBA TV
π Oilers at Blue Jackets, 7:30 p.m. on Hulu
π Troy at Old Dominion, 7:30 p.m. on ESPN
π Jets at Patriots, 8:15 p.m. on Prime Video
π No. 11 North Carolina vs. No 3 UCLA (W), 9 p.m. on ESPN2
