The University of Southern California and the University of California at Los Angeles will leave the Pac-12 conference and join the Big Ten at the start of the 2024-25 season, the schools announced on Thursday.
The big picture: It's another seismic shift in college sports. USC and UCLA, two of the biggest schools in the Pac-12, are the largest and most successful athletics departments on the West Coast, USA Today writes.
The NFL is teaming up with Ice Cube's Contract with Black America Institute to bolster its partnerships with Black-owned businesses, the league announced Thursday.
Driving the news: The partnership aims to help close the racial wealth gap by finding league-wide "opportunities in the financial, tech, and production sectors" with a focus on increasing spending toward national Black businesses.
Luis Arráez has always been an excellent hitter, but what he's doing this season — with league-wide batting average at its lowest since 1967 — is turning heads around the league.
By the numbers: The Twins infielder leads the AL in AVG (.337) and OBP (.418), which are 43% and 38% better than league average, respectively. That success didn't come out of nowhere.
Brittney Griner's wife said Wednesday in an interview with the Rev. Al Sharpton that the WNBA star is "struggling" and feeling "terrified" as she remains held in Russian custody.
What she's saying: "Every second that goes by, BG is struggling," her wife, Cherelle Griner, told Sharpton on his SiriusXM radio show Wednesday. "She's struggling. She's there, terrified. She's there, alone."
The NFL hosted 49 athletes last week in Ghana at its inaugural Africa Camp, the league's first foray into a continent that represents a major growth opportunity.
Why it matters: Africa has 1.4 billion people but is still a largely untapped resource for the NFL.
Former MLS player Scott Vermillion, who died in 2020 at age 44 of alcohol and prescription drug poisoning, was posthumously diagnosed with CTE.
Why it matters: He's the first American professional soccer player with a public case of CTE, a disease far more common — at least publicly — in former football players.
