The Trail Blazers got 36 points from their reserves and beat the Knicks 85-77 on Sunday for their second NBA summer league title since 2017. Trendon Watford had 19 points and seven rebounds en route to earning game MVP honors.
The Trail Blazers got 36 points from their reserves and beat the Knicks 85-77 on Sunday for their second NBA Summer League title since 2017. Trendon Watford had 19 points and seven rebounds en route to earning game MVP honors.
The Jazz have agreed to a two-year, $6.25 million guaranteed deal with Italian forward Simone Fontecchio, according to his agent. Sources also told ESPN that Utah has agreed to a deal to hire Nuggets G League coach Jason Terry to the staff.
ST. ANDREWS, Scotland – Cameron Smith had just given up his 36-hole lead at The 150th Open. It was time for his caddie, Sam Pinfold, to give a pep talk and help turn the tide. When Pinfold was finished, Smith smiled at his good friend and, without skipping a beat, replied, “Three or four back, … don’t worry. … We needed to give them a head start anyway.” RELATED: What’s in Smith’s bag? | Final leaderboard This is the confidence of the young Australian who produced a stunning 64 on Sunday to win The Open, becoming just the fifth Australian to win the Claret Jug and first since 1993. His first major triumph added to wins earlier this year at THE PLAYERS and Sentry Tournament of Champions. He’s moved to No. 2 in both the FedExCup and world ranking in a year that saw him become the only player other than Jack Nicklaus in 1978 to win THE PLAYERS and The Open in the same year. In his Sentry win in January, Smith set the TOUR record for lowest score in relation to par, shooting 34 under. At St. Andrews, he matched that mark for majors and recorded the lowest score ever shot in an Open at St. Andrews, a 20-under 268. And he closed with a remarkable 30 on the back nine, the lowest ever shot by an Open champion. But back to Smith’s joke. It was a light-hearted response. But there was some wisdom hidden inside it. Smith is – with all due respect – like a mongrel dog fighting over the first bone he’s seen in a month. He’s the ultimate underdog, determined to prove doubters wrong. Starting Sunday four shots off the lead was enough of a challenge. The fact one of the leaders was Rory McIlroy, Great Britain’s great hope who the crowds were eager to coronate, was a red rag to a bull. Smith is from Queensland – the northeastern state in Australia known for its beautiful beaches, the Great Barrier Reef, and an ethos of never-say-die toughness. That determination is born out of Smith’s favorite sport other than golf – rugby league – where the Queensland Maroons face the powerhouse New South Wales Blues three times a year in an epic and brutal series of games called State of Origin. It’s tribal. Queensland is known for often winning against the odds. It has a smaller talent pool to draw from, yet somehow rises above itself when putting on the jersey. One State of Origin game fell on The Open’s eve, and Smith insisted on playing his last nine-hole practice round early in the morning so he could stream the match on his phone at St. Andrews. The Maroons, missing three key players because of COVID and injuries, were underdogs. Then, in a frenetic opening few minutes of the game they lost two more to concussion. Despite the obstacles, they won 22-12. Pinfold confirmed Smith “drew a lot from that.” “Never a doubt,” Smith joked about the match at his pre-tournament press conference afterwards. “It’s just another example of the Queensland spirit. I’ll be thinking of that this week for sure.” The underdog emerged on Sunday at the Old Course. Smith scripted a maroon shirt ahead of his attempt to chase down the local favorite. After a solid 34 on the front nine, Smith looked up to see he’d only clawed back one shot on McIlroy. The time had come to put up or shut up. “You’ve got to try and win. That’s what we’re all here to do. I really needed to make something happen,” said Smith, whose gallery included former tennis star Ash Barty and two-time Moto GP champion Casey Stoner. And so Smith went to work. He nearly drove the par-4 10th to make the first of five straight birdies that put him one ahead of McIlroy. The best one came at the 13th – a hole that had nearly ended his chances a day earlier. “Those guys are great players. They weren’t going to give it to me. I had to take it,” Smith added. “It was a good thing that I was behind. My mindset would have been a touch different coming in, especially on that back nine, if I was ahead.” “My second shot into 13 was really when I thought that we can win this thing.” Pinfold also caught some flak about Saturday’s double bogey on 13. Many suggested he should have called Smith off a risky shot where he attempted to hit his ball while standing in a bunker with the ball above his feet. That shot sailed into a gorse bush, resulting in a double-bogey. “You don’t mess with a confident player with his skill level,” Pinfold explained. “I’m just so proud of him. His game plan was awesome; he was just really confident and he’s got so much belief it makes my job easy. “I don’t have to think about a second option, it’s just what’s the best shot, what’s the best option, then point, shoot and go. He just has the balls and courage to stand up and do it.” Another of those moments came Sunday at the infamous Road Hole, which ranks as the TOUR’s toughest each time The Open comes to St. Andrews. Smith’s approach came up short, and the hole’s famous greenside bunker stood between his ball and his target. Smith calmly putted his ball up the slope against the edge of the trap, then buried the 10-foot par putt. When he calmly birdied the last to post 20 under, one shot better than playing partner Cameron Young, only a McIlroy eagle could beat him. But the four-time major winner failed to chip in from just short of the green and victory was secured. “I feel like I can’t breathe,” he said. “These last four or five holes aren’t easy around here, especially with the wind up off the left. I’m just really proud of how I knuckled down today and managed to get it done.” “To win an Open Championship in itself is probably going to be a golfer’s highlight in their career. To do it around St. Andrews, I think is just unbelievable. This place is so cool.” Making birdie on the first five holes of the back nine was parallel to how he won THE PLAYERS earlier this year. He birdied the first four holes of TPC Sawgrass’ back nine en route to that win. “He loves to fight,” Pinfold said. “Put him in a fight, three or four back, and he’s going to step up his game and go for it.” Another celebration, like the one that followed his PLAYERS win, is expected. “I’m definitely going to find out how many beers fit in this thing,” he said about the Claret Jug. “I’m going to guess two, two cans of beer. … I’ll probably have about 20 Claret Jugs.” He certainly earned it.
ST. ANDREWS, Scotland (AP) — The stage at St. Andrews was all set for Rory McIlroy. The show belonged to Cameron Smith, and so did that silver Claret Jug he won in a Sunday stunner at The Open Championship with the best closing round the Old Course had ever seen. RELATED: What’s in his bag? Smith was four shots behind at the start as a record crowd was eager to see McIlroy cap off a week of celebrations at the 150th Open in style. He was three behind when he made the turn. And then the plucky Australian with his magical putter ran off five straight birdies to take the lead, stared down a nervy putt around the edge of the nefarious Road Hole bunker to save par and finished with two putts from 80 feet for birdie for an 8-under 64. “To win an Open Championship in itself is probably going to be a golfer’s highlight in their career,” Smith said. “To do it around St. Andrews I think is just unbelievable.” So was his golf. In the 29 previous times golf’s oldest championship was held at St. Andrews, no winner had ever closed with a 64. Smith finished at 20-under 268, a record score for the Old Course and matching the lowest score to par in any major. “I got beaten by the better player this week. To go out and shoot 64 to win the Open Championship at St. Andrews is a hell of a showing. Hats off to Cam,” McIlroy said. McIlroy hit every green in regulation and two-putted all of them — two were birdies, the rest were pars — for a 70 that left him in third place and having to wait nearly nine months before he can try to end his drought in the majors that now is at eight full years. Smith won by one shot over Cameron Young, who holed a 15-foot eagle putt on the final hole to ever-so-briefly tie for the lead. It wasn’t enough, and neither was anything McIlroy could muster. McIlroy couldn’t make a putt early. He couldn’t hit it close enough late. His last good chance was a 15-foot birdie attempt on the dangerous Road Hole at No. 17, and it narrowly missed to the left. McIlroy needed eagle to tie him, and his chip through the Valley of Sin had no chance. Smith won for the third time this year, all on entirely different courses — the generous fairways of Kapalua, the visual intimidation of water on the TPC Sawgrass and the oldest links in the world with its double greens and pot bunkers. He beat the No. 1 player in the world (Jon Rahm) at Kapalua. He beat the best field in golf at THE PLAYERS Championship. And he had to overcome a four-shot deficit against a heavy crowd favorite to capture his first major. Even with the silver Claret Jug in his hands, it was hard to believe. “All the names on there, every player that’s been at the top of their game has won this championship,” Smith said. “It’s pretty cool to be on there. It really hasn’t sunk in yet. I don’t think it will for a few weeks. Yeah, it’s just unreal.” Smith is the first Australian to win at St. Andrews since Kel Nagle in 1960, when he topped a rising American star named Arnold Palmer, the people’s choice. That’s what McIlroy is now. He moved into the void left when Tiger Woods missed the cut in what might be his final Open at St. Andrews. He had support that carried him to the cusp of winning at the home of golf. “The Holy Grail,” McIlroy had called it earlier in the week. All day there was an energy along the humps and hollows of the Old Course, all of them waiting to celebrate McIlroy as an Open champion at St. Andrews. He gave them little to cheer. “The putter went cold on me,” McIlroy said. “When both Camerons — especially Smith — went on that run on the back nine, I had to dig deep to make birdies. And I just couldn’t.” That left Smith, the 28-year-old Aussie known for his grit and his putting stroke, on the 18th green to be introduced as the “champion golfer of the year.” McIlroy was playing controlled golf, his only birdie a two-putt from 18 feet on the par-5 fifth. Viktor Hovland, who started the final round tied with McIlroy, was never a factor. He didn’t make his first birdie until the 12th hole and closed with a 74. That run by Smith on the back nine is now part of Open lore. He hit a nifty pitch to 5 feet for birdie on the short 10th. He was bold to a back pin on the par-3 11th and holed a 15-foot birdie, and he birdied the next two holes from about that length. His fifth in a row was a putt from 90 feet on the par-5 14th, over a huge mound and down the slope to tap-in range that gave him the lead for the first time. McIlroy couldn’t catch up. His lag putting was terrific. That wasn’t what he needed. And he got no help from Smith, whose one missed shot set up his biggest challenge. The Road Hole bunker was between him and the flag on the 17th. He used his putter to ride over the right edge of the bunker and onto the green, 10 feet away, and he poured in another putt, this one for par to stay in front. Young had his chances in his Open debut. He left short a 6-foot putt with about a foot of break on the 15th. He came up short with a wedge on the next hole. He drilled his drive and approach to the 17th, only to leave another birdie chance short. He finally delivered, but all that got him was a 65 and the silver medal. In two majors this year, the PGA TOUR rookie missed a playoff by one shot at the PGA Championship and made his best putt too late at St. Andrews. Smith made his last birdie and the engraver went to work on the Claret Jug, a prize first awarded to the 1873 champion at St. Andrews. There’s a lot of history around this gray, old town, and Smith became part of it in a big way.
Jackson Holliday has had a firsthand view of what it takes to be a pro baseball player his whole life.
Los Angeles Angels outfielder Mike Trout, sidelined the last four games with back spasms, will not play in Tuesday’s All-Star Game in Los Angeles, and will be replaced on the roster by Ty France of the Seattle Mariners.
All of Scotland was rooting for Rory McIlroy. Then Cameron Smith went on a tear at the home of golf that will live on for generations.
Cameron Smith got hot, Rory McIlroy’s putter got cold and St. Andrews played easy. A look at what mattered most at the 150th playing of The Open.
Australia’s Cameron Smith rode a hot final nine holes at St. Andrews to win the 150th Open Championship and his first major title.
