Today’s Sports Highlight in History:
In 2001, Ashley Martin becomes the first woman to play in a Division I football game, kicking three extra points without a miss to help I-AA Jacksonville State hand Cumberland its 18th straight loss, 71-10.
On this date:
1887 — Seven U.S. men’s national tennis championships and Richard Sears captures his seventh title. Sears beats Henry Slocum, 6-1, 6-3, 6-2 at the Newport Casino in Newport, R.I. Sears retires with an 18-match unbeaten streak over the 1881-1887 championships.
1905 — Ty Cobb makes his MLB debut with the Detroit Tigers doubling off Jack Chesbro in a Tigers 5-3 win over the NY Highlanders.
1926 — Guy McKinney, driven by Nat Ray, wins the first Hambletonian Stakes.
1927 — Helen Wills wins her fourth U.S. women’s tennis singles title, defeating 16-year-old Betty Nuthall of Britain, 6-1, 6-4.
1937 — Joe Louis wins a 15-round unanimous decision over Tommy Farr at Yankee Stadium in the first defense of his heavyweight title.
1961 — Harlan Dean, driven by Jimmy Arthur, wins the Hambletonian Stakes and sets a record for combined time in the two heats at 3:57 2-5.
1979 — Kathy Horvath, five days past her 14th birthday, loses a first round match to Diane Fromholtz, 7-6, 6-2, to become the youngest person to play a match at the U.S. Open. Later in the day, John McEnroe defeats Ilie Nastase, 6-4, 4-6, 6-3, 6-2, in a match that features Nastase being defaulted by chair umpire Frank Hammond. An 18-minute free-for-all ensues in which fans become uncontrollable and Nastase is reinstated by tournament referee Mike Blanchard. Blanchard replaces Hammond in the chair for the remainder of the match.
1981 — Bill Shoemaker becomes the first jockey to win a $1 million race when he rode John Henry to a nose victory over The Bart in the inaugural Arlington Million at Arlington Park.
1986 — Dawn Patrol and Falcon Bret record the fastest dead heat at Roosevelt Raceway at 1:58.1.
1987 — Ben Johnson of Canada sets the world record in the 100 meters bettering Calvin Smith’s 4-year-old mark of 9.93 by 0.10 seconds in the World Track and Field Championships in Rome. Johnson later lost the record because of steroid use.
1991 — Mike Powell smashes Bob Beamon’s world long jump record with a leap of 29 feet, 4½ inches, two inches beyond the record, in the World Track and Field Championships in Tokyo. The leap also ends Carl Lewis’ 10-year, 65-meet winning streak.
2005 — Andy Roddick has a shocking first-round exit from the U.S. Open against Gilles Muller, a player making his debut in the tournament. Roddick, the champion two years earlier and the No. 4 seed this year, falls 7-6 (4), 7-6 (8), 7-6 (1) on his 23rd birthday to the first man from Luxembourg to compete in the Open.
2006 — Curt Schilling becomes the 14th pitcher in major league history to reach 3,000 strikeouts when he fans Oakland’s Nick Swisher in the first inning of the Red Sox’s 7-2 loss to Oakland.
2006 — Greg Mattox wins his 330th career game.
2007 — Tyson Gay completes a sprint double at the world championships when he wins the 200 meters in 19.76 seconds. Gay’s time breaks the meet record of 19.79 set 12 years ago by American Michael Johnson in Goteborg, Sweden. Gay, who beat world record holder Asafa Powell in the 100, joins Maurice Greene (1999) and Justin Gatlin (2005) as the only male athletes to have won sprint doubles at the championships.
2012 — Andy Roddick announces he will retire following the U.S. Open.
2015 — Scott Dixon captures a fourth IndyCar championship by winning the season finale to snatch away the title from Juan Pablo Montoya. Montoya led the points from the season-opening race right until the final lap. But he finishes the race in sixth, which allows Dixon to tie him in the standings. Dixon is awarded the title based on wins (3-2).
