Recapping The Weekend Of Sports Starting With MLB News

Baseball’s interminable 162-game season just got longer.

Because of ties in the National League’s Central and West divisions, there will be two playoff games on Monday that don’t eliminate anybody. They will determine which teams – in the Central it’s the Chicago Cubs or Milwaukee Brewers, in the West the Los Angeles Dodgers or Colorado Rockies – advance as division champs. The wild-card teams will play one-game playoffs (loser goes home) on Tuesday.

The American League is set with the Boston Red Sox, Cleveland Indians and Houston Astros as division winners and the New York Yankees hosting the Oakland Athletics in the play-in game on Tuesday.

NFL:
Three games went to overtime on Sunday – the Oakland Raiders beat the Cleveland Browns 45-42, the Tennessee Titans beat the Philadelphia Eagles 26-23 and the Houston Texans dropped the Indianapolis Colts 37-34. The NFL has had at least one OT game in each of its first four weeks for the first time since 2002.

Mitchell Trubisky threw six touchdown passes, one short of the both the club and NFL record, to lead the Chicago Bears to a 45-10 victory over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

Blake Bortles passed for a career-high 388 yards to power the Jacksonville Jaguars to a 31-12 win over the New York Jets.

The New England Patriots handed the Miami Dolphins their first loss, pounding them 38-7.

Elsewhere:
Europe dominated the U.S. in the Ryder Cup in Paris, France, winning the event 17 ½ to 10 ½. It was the most lopsided score in the event in 12 years. For the U.S., Tiger Woods went 0-4 and Phil Mickelson lost both of his matches to set a record with 22 career defeats in the Ryder Cup. The U.S. hasn’t won the Ryder Cup overseas in 25 years.

Ryan Blaney has won only one NASCAR race this season, but he won it Sunday in the playoffs at Charlotte Motor Speedway’s road course to earn a spot in the final 12.

College football saw a shakeup at the upper end of the Associated Press poll. Ohio State, by virtue of its 27-26 comeback win over Penn State, moved up from fourth to third (behind Alabama and Georgia).

Clemson slipped to fourth from third after its comeback win over Syracuse. LSU stayed at fifth, but Notre Dame moved ahead of Oklahoma at No. 6 after drubbing Stanford.

 
 
Post By: Larry Weisman, a longtime sportswriter for USA TODAY, blogs for Twistity.com. Follow him on Twitter @MrLarryWeisman