NFL’s turf guru preps Levi’s Stadium field for Super Bowl
SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Nick Pappas’ process for preparing the Super Bowl field got underway long before the Seattle Seahawks and New England Patriots started getting ready for the season. The NFL’s turf guru picked the sod farm that began growing the field for the game about 16 months ago...
Ben Roethlisberger on Steelers’ choice of Mike McCarthy: ‘I like the hire. I really do’
Big Ben is a big fan of the Mike McCarthy hire. Longtime Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger on Wednesday weighed in on the choice of McCarthy to serve as the franchise’s 17th coach. “I think it’s a great hire,” Roethlisberger said during a guest appearance on the “In the Locker...
Pitt announces resizing of Acrisure Stadium capacity for football starting this fall
Pitt announced a strategy Wednesday that will significantly alter the atmosphere and capacity for football games at Acrisure Stadium. Starting this fall, the stadium’s upper east and west sides will be unavailable, reducing capacity from 68,400 to 51,416. The announcement corresponded with the launch of football season ticket sales Wednesday....
Former Steelers Pro Bowl defensive back Clendon Thomas dies at 90
Clendon Thomas, a College Football Hall of Fame inductee who was named to an NFL Pro Bowl as a member of the Pittsburgh Steelers, died Monday. He was 90 years old. Thomas was an All-America running back for the University of Oklahoma in the 1950s, a member of two consensus...
Report: Steelers to hire former Mike McCarthy assistant as wide receivers coach
Mike McCarthy will reunite with one of his former assistant coaches. Adam Henry, who served as McCarthy’s wide receivers coach in Dallas for two seasons, will take the same role with the Pittsburgh Steelers, according to an NFL Network report. McCarthy said Tuesday he’d already begun to assemble his coaching...
Reputation as offensive guru aside, Mike McCarthy emphasizes defense in building Steelers
For the better part of a quarter century, Mike McCarthy fostered a reputation as one of the NFL’s foremost offensive minds. The production speaks for itself. Over McCarthy’s 18 seasons as a head coach, his offenses have ranked among the top five in the NFL in points scored 10 times,...
Browns hire former Ravens offensive coordinator Todd Monken as head coach
CLEVELAND — The Cleveland Browns hired one of their former coordinators to be the team’s head coach. However, it is not the one some people expected. The Browns hired Todd Monken on Wednesday as the franchise’s 19th full-time head coach, wrapping up a three-week search. He replaces Kevin Stefanski, who...
30 after 30: After 3 decades, Larry Brown recalls how his ‘scissorhands’ sliced the Steelers’ Super Bowl XXX dreams
Dallas Cowboys defensive back Larry Brown was so bad at catching footballs as a rookie, his teammates called him “Edward Scissorhands.” “Emmitt Smith gave me that name,” Brown said through a chuckle from his home in Texas last week. “They throw that ball very hard. I think people underestimate the...
Despite a returning coach, West Virginia lost dozens of players to the transfer portal
West Virginia coach Rich Rodriguez didn’t mince words about what areas of his roster needed help from college football’s transfer portal. “Every one,” he said. Rodriguez didn’t have a stellar start to his second stint, going 4-8 and finishing 14th out of 16 teams in the Big 12. And though...
Honor Huff, Treysen Eaglestaff help lift West Virginia past Kansas State
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Honor Huff scored 17 points and Treysen Eaglestaff scored 12 points and grabbed nine rebounds and West Virginia beat Kansas State, 59-54, on Tuesday night. Brenen Lorient scored 10 points for West Virginia (14-7, 5-3 Big 12), which has won three of four and six of its...
Joe Starkey: Which Hall of Fame is a bigger joke — baseball or football?
STARK RAVING Just when it didn’t seem possible any Hall of Fame could be a bigger farce than baseball’s, the Pro Football Hall of Fame stepped up and said, “Hold my Belichick.” Bill Belichick reportedly won’t be a first-ballot Hall of Famer? Hahahahahahahahahahahaha. Oh well, at least Shedeur Sanders made...
First Call: Offensive coordinator prospect emerges for Mike McCarthy’s staff, ex-Steeler in defensive coordinator mix
Wednesday’s “First Call” has names to watch for both of the Pittsburgh Steelers’ open coordinator positions. We also look at a busy night of local college basketball for both Robert Morris and Duquesne. Plus, RMU’s hockey team gets some well-earned recognition after an important series sweep over the weekend. Looking...
Darian Mensah joins Miami Hurricanes after legal battle with Duke
CORAL GABLES, Fla. — Darian Mensah has enrolled at Miami, giving the Hurricanes another standout transfer at quarterback as they come off a season when they went to the national championship game and got into the College Football Playoff for the first time. Mensah transferred to Miami from ACC rival...
Omari Witherspoon’s jumper goes for game-winner as Pitt prevails in overtime to top Wake Forest
More often than not this season, Pitt has been a team adept at finding ways to lose basketball games. Falling behind early, missing free throws, sputtering offense — the list goes on as to how the Panthers endured a rocky nonconference schedule before dropping six of their seven ACC games...
Devils trade Ondrej Palat and picks to the Islanders for Maxim Tsyplakov
NEWARK, N.J. — The New Jersey Devils traded Ondrej Palat to the division-rival New York Islanders on Tuesday night, moving on from the veteran winger they had been trying to deal for quite some time. The Devils sent a third-round pick in the draft this year and 2027 sixth-rounder with...
‘Pittsburgh is my world’: Mike McCarthy basks in taking over hometown SteelersVideo
Mike McCarthy smiled as he briskly rubbed the palms of his hands together. It was as much of an attempt to keep from crying as he was psyching himself up. The effort failed. McCarthy made it all of five public words into his tenure as Pittsburgh Steelers coach before he...
New coach Mike McCarthy reveals plans for Steelers’ offensive, defensive schemes
Playcalling won’t be a job requirement for whomever Mike McCarthy hires as offensive coordinator. As the Pittsburgh Steelers’ new head coach, McCarthy will call plays for the offense, a responsibility he kept for himself during his final two seasons in Dallas and most of his 13 years in Green Bay....
After offseason flies by, Riverhounds return to practice to prepare for title defense
There was a chill inside the AHN Montour Sports Complex on Tuesday when the defending champions of the USL’s top league gathered for practice after the winter storm broke Monday. With a little more than half of the players returning from last season’s stunning victory over FC Tulsa in penalties...
Penn State’s 2026 football schedule revealed, starts with Marshall
The Matt Campbell era at Penn State kicks off Sept. 5 at Beaver Stadium when the Nittany Lions face Marshall. After a road trip to Temple on Sept. 12 and another home game versus Buffalo on Sept. 19, the schedule will gets serious for Campbell, his assistant coaches and the...
Bill Belichick snubbed by Pro Football Hall of Fame in first year of eligibility, report says
Six-time Super Bowl champion head coach Bill Belichick didn’t get voted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility, according to a report from ESPN. Citing four unidentified sources, ESPN reported Tuesday that Belichick didn’t receive the necessary 40 votes from the 50-person panel of...
Tough coaching helped Patriots’ Drake Maye flourish in 2nd season
Drake Maye got the tough coaching he wanted and thrived. The 23-year-old is one victory away from being the youngest quarterback in NFL history to win a Super Bowl. He is grateful to have coach Mike Vrabel and offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels in New England. The Patriots went from 4-13...
Mark Madden: Mike McCarthy won the press conference, but it’s still a bad hire
Pittsburgh Steelers owner Art Rooney II said it wasn’t important for new coach Mike McCarthy to win the initial press conference. But McCarthy did exactly that. Rooney said McCarthy wasn’t hired because, having coached Aaron Rodgers in Green Bay, he’s the best bet to lure Rodgers back to Pittsburgh for...
Tim Benz: Mike McCarthy’s first step with Steelers shouldn’t be backward with Aaron RodgersVideo
Many in Pittsburgh have been critical of the Steelers’ process en route to hiring Mike McCarthy as the new coach of the franchise. A seemingly rushed decision to give McCarthy the job prevented the front office from conducting in-person interviews with any of the candidates employed by teams that were...
Steelers coach Mike McCarthy: ‘Real excited about Will Howard’
The quarterback Mike McCarthy probably praised most Tuesday wasn’t the four-time league MVP that won a Super Bowl with him in Green Bay. Instead, it was Will Howard, the Pittsburgh Steelers’ sixth-round pick in last year’s draft. Sure, McCarthy answered questions about Aaron Rodgers’ future, but McCarthy also offered unsolicited...
Penguins prospect Emil Pieniniemi promoted to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton following suspensionVideo
Pittsburgh Penguins defensive prospect Emil Pieniniemi was promoted to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton of the American Hockey League (AHL) from Wheeling of the ECHL on Tuesday. This transaction comes a little more than one month after the team lifted a suspension of Pieniniemi after he failed to report to Wheeling at the start...
