Good Morning, Stumpers!

Happy Labor Day everybody! A holiday today so obviously you would assume no Stump. HA! Anyways we’ve got a lot of football to review, and then a tennis match that may have the best bit of sports on all weekend! Let’s roll!

The Rundown

🎾 Saving 8 Match points in a single SET! Unbelievable! ‼️ 

🏈 We had a MASSIVE Week 1 slate of CFB

🔵 We have a familiar face coaching his first game at a new place tonight

✏️ Saban quote, because why not!

On This Day

🏈 Goodell Becomes Head Honcho

“With the first pick in the NFL Draft…”

You hear that quote, you hear that jingle, there’s one face that comes to mind. Of course none other than NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell. A lot has happened throughout the last 20 years in the league, and one of the only constants has been RG.

On this day in 2006, Roger Goodell began his tenure as the Commissioner of the NFL. 19 years ago! WOW!

Today’s Trivia

Glue Guy of the Day

🎾 Face To Face With 8 Match Points and 14,000 Fans! STOIC!

I just want to get in front of this one. We just had a euphoric Week 1 across the College Football landscape and we here are going to feature a Tennis matchup between two unranked players. Amongst all the football this might have been this best 3 hours of sports on TV this weekend!

You might have seen the name Taylor Townsend on social media this week. She was in the middle on some tennis drama and quickly went from not so well-known to having the backing of an entire country overnight.

Townsend upset multiple ladies en route to her Round of 16 matchup yesterday against fellow unranked Barbora Krejcikova. Despite being unranked, Krejcikova has won two majors, most recently Wimbledon in 2024.

The power of momentum is something we see in all sports, and after the first set and the backing of 18,000 fans, Townsend looked like she was poised to advance to her first Grand Slam Quarterfinals! She cruised in the first set 6-1.

What happened in the second set was other worldly. The first set took 28 minutes. The second took MORE THAN TRIPLE THAT!

They went back and forth and eventually landed on a 6-6 tiebreak. Momemtum, the crowd, the universe, everything seemed to be on the side of Townsend. Krejcikova looked into the heart of that universe and said “Not today!” After going up 6-3 in the tiebreaker (game to 7), Barbora saved three straight match points. The tiebreaker went back and forth, and featured 8 MATCH POINTS for Taylor Townsend!

On those points it seemed as if Krejcikova had a magnetic ball that went from corner to corner on every shot, it was unbelievable. The tiebreaker ended 15-13 in favor of Krejcikova and the match went to a third set.

For refernce, 15-13 in a tennis tiebreaker is like a football or basketball game going to Triple OT. TRIPLE!

The crowd was stunned.

The third set started sloppy, and they each broke each other once before a late break from Krejcikova that gave her the 6-3 third set win, and sent Taylor Townsend home.

All the headlines are on Townsend, but Krejcikova saving 8 match points is one of the wilder things I have ever seen in tennis! Major respect for the poise and stoicism she showed in those moments!

Word of the day to describe Barbora Krejcikova: Stoic

The BIG Moments

🏈 College Football Week 1! Everything to Know!

The Stump Short Story: Let’s go game by game here…

(3) Ohio State def. (1) Texas, 14-7! This one had hype up the wazoo, and for good reason. It’s rare to see a matchup of two teams this highly ranked to start the season. It was a matchup between the reigning National Champs and the hype around Texas QB Arch Manning. All eyes on offense, so naturally this was a defensive showdown! It wasn’t until halfway in the second quarter that we had our first score of the game by OSU RB CJ Donaldson. Arch was facing a star-studded defense, but still he seemed to underperform what the expectations had set up for him. It’s ok, he will just be just fine as the season progresses. The rematch between these two teams in 4 months is going to be phenomenal!

Florida State STUMPSETS (8) Alabama, 31-17. Talk about a rollercoaster last few seasons for Mike Norvell and his FSU squad. Two seasons ago they went 12-0 and were snubbed from the CFP, and then last year went as badly as it could have when they went 2-10 and were the worst team in the ACC. The only natural progression in this series of events would be upsetting Alabama to open up the 2025 season! QB play was ugly last year, this year it looks like BC transfer Tommy Castellanos will be up to the task this year to right the ship. He’s a dynamic runner that gets the job done through the air when need be as well. The defense was ferocious as well and they had Tallahassee rocking with their upset win over Bama, we’ll see where both teams go from here!

Ranked teams do what ranked teams do!

(5) Gerogia def. Marshall, 45-7; (2) Penn State def. Nevada, 46-11; (7) Oregon def. Montana State, 59-13; (15) Florida def. LIU, 55-0!

That’s just what happens in College Football, there’s levels to this!

(9) LSU wins on the road against (4) Clemson, 17-10! As opposed to the 1 vs 3 matchup, this one did not have new QBs. Garrett Nussmeier (LSU) and Cade Klubnik (Clemson) have come into the season as two of the best QBs in the country, but in typical Week 1 fashion this also was a defensive showdown. Neither QB looked bad, but it was the defenses that showed out. Clemson took a 10-3 lead into the half, but it was a TD in the third and fourth quarter for LSU off of good drives led by Nussmeier that led them to the road win! BIG for LSU!

Why it Matters: Silly question. It matters because College Football is back…LFG!

Read More: Takeaways from Week 1 of College Football (NBC Sports)

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🔗 Quick Links

🏈 Lee Corso went 6/6 with his picks in his final ever pick em! UNREAL!

🖐️ It’s Week 1 and we may have had the catch of the year!

🎾 Alcaraz just went BEHIND THE BACK! HA!

What To Watch

🏈 We’ve got a big debut tonight in terms of College Football! One game. One name. One beaten up hoodie. Bill Belichick will be on the sidelines for his first game as UNC Head Coach! TCU is the favorite!!!

• TCU @ UNC (8:00 PM ET)

🎾 If you haven’t seen any U.S. Open yet these last 10 days TUNE IN! Some great matchups have been happening! Today we’ve got…

• (1) Sinner vs (23) Bublik (7:00 PM ET)

• (25) Auger-Aliassime vs (15) Rublev (11:30 AM ET)

• (2) Swiatek vs (13) Alexandrova (1:00 PM ET)

• (3) Gauff vs (23) Osaka (1:10 PM ET)

⚾️ Baseball slate today:

• Mets @ Tigers (1:10 PM ET), Guardians @ Red Sox (1:35 PM ET), Angels @ Astros (2:10 PM ET), Braves @ Cubs (4:05 PM ET), Rangers @ Diamondbacks (8:10 PM ET)

Of! The! Day’s!

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