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From Kevin Baxter: Bank of America Stadium rises from the center of Charlotte’s Uptown district like a teal-colored fortress. For Jim Harbaugh, the building brings back memories both good and bad.
It’s where he suited up for his final season as a quarterback, standing on the sidelines for six games without throwing a pass for a team that went 1-15. But that lost season also convinced him to become a coach, and a dozen years later he came back to Carolina to win his last playoff game as an NFL head coach.
Harbaugh made another happy — and historic — homecoming Sunday, this time roaming the sidelines for the Chargers, who routed the Panthers 26-3 before 74,000 mostly empty seats.
The return was historic because just two weeks into the Harbaugh Era, the Chargers already are rewriting their record books.
By running for 131 yards, J.K. Dobbins became the first Chargers’ back — and the first AFC player in a decade — to open a season with back-to-back 100-yard rushing performances.
The team is 2-0 to start a season for the first time since 2012, five years before it left San Diego, and the win was also the Chargers’ first in Carolina and just second in eight meetings against the Panthers.
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RAMS
From Gary Klein: This was bad.
“I’ll just be real,” Rams coach Sean McVay said, “There’s nothing positive about it.”
Really bad.
A 41-10 rout by the Arizona Cardinals on Sunday at State Farm Stadium dropped the Rams’ record to 0-2.
For the first time in McVay’s eight seasons — a run that includes five playoff appearances, two Super Bowl appearances and one Super Bowl title — the Rams are winless after two games.
Even in 2022, the season of their historic Super Bowl hangover, the Rams rebounded from a season-opening rout by the Buffalo Bills and won their next game.
“I’m not even worried about 0-2,” McVay said. “I’m worried about: how do we play better football?
“That was not a good product. … That was not something we’re OK with.”
DODGERS
From Jack Harris: Despite all the injuries to their pitching staff and questions about their roster depth, the Dodgers still believe.
That they can finish off a division title in the National League West.
That they can mount a deep, albeit unconventional, October run.
That, as manager Dave Roberts declared, “the talent we have, the character we have, is plenty to win the World Series.”
If so, they’ll need more performances like Sunday’s 9-2 win over the Atlanta Braves.
Plaschke: Tyler Glasnow done? Dodgers’ annual meltdown begins now
Shaikin: Baseball teams are abandoning cities across California. How some are fighting back
ANGELS
Ronel Blanco threw six scoreless innings, Jason Heyward had a home run among his three hits and the Houston Astros finished off a three-game sweep of the Angels with a 6-4 victory on Sunday.
Jeremy Peña had two hits and two runs scored as the Astros won their fourth consecutive game and remained 4 1/2 games ahead of the Seattle Mariners in the American League West.
Blanco (11-6) issued two walks and had five strikeouts in his return to the starting rotation after pitching two innings of scoreless relief Sept. 7 against Arizona. Blanco was used out of the bullpen for a game to manage his usage in his first full season in the majors.
SATURDAY’S UCLA GAME
From Ben Bolch: This time, there would be no coming back. There would be no shrugging off a bad first half. There would be no plausible excuses.
UCLA was thoroughly outclassed from start to finish of a 42-13 loss to Indiana on Saturday evening at the Rose Bowl, intensifying concerns about the Bruins’ ability to succeed in coach DeShaun Foster’s debut season.
It was a frustrating follow-up to a lousy opener that the Bruins pulled out thanks to a strong second half. Given a bye week to correct the breakdowns they withstood against Hawaii, they only looked worse in their Big Ten Conference opener.
“You can’t make any excuses,” Foster said. “We lined up and got beat.”
There were no positives. UCLA’s defense failed to put up much resistance against Indiana quarterback Kurtis Rourke, who completed one pass after another on the way to piling up 307 yards and four touchdowns. His Bruins counterpart, Ethan Garbers, lost a fumble on his first play and didn’t do much to redeem himself.
SPARKS
Skylar Diggins-Smith scored 19 points, including four free throws in the final minute, and the Seattle Storm edged the Sparks 90-87 on Sunday night.
The Storm (24-14) led by double digits for most of the game until the Sparks (7-31) rallied in the second half.
Dearica Hamby scored 11 points in the third quarter, and the Sparks chipped away at a 14-point halftime deficit to trail 73-65 heading to the fourth.
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THIS DATE IN SPORTS
1927 — Rene Lacoste wins the U.S. Lawn Tennis Association championship, beating Bill Tilden in three sets.
1951 — Betsy Rawls wins the U.S. Women’s Open golf title by edging Louise Suggs.
1955 — The formation of the United States Auto Club is completed and will oversee four major categories of auto races.
1989 — No. 1 Notre Dame beats No. 2 Michigan 24-19 in Ann Arbor, Mich. Fighting Irish wide receiver Raghib Ismail steals the show by returning kickoffs 88 and 92 yards for touchdowns. It’s the second time Ismail has two kickoff returns for touchdowns in the same game, accomplishing the feat against Rice in 1988.
1993 — Dave Winfield of the Minnesota Twins becomes the 19th player in major league history to get 3,000 hits, with a single off Oakland’s Dennis Eckersley.
1996 — Paul Molitor gets his 3,000th career hit, becoming the 21st major leaguer to reach the mark and the first to do it with a triple.
2000 — Zippy Chippy, a 9-year-old gelding, finishes third in the eighth race at the Three-County Fair in Northampton, Mass., extending his record as the losingest horse in American thoroughbred history to 88 races.
2000 — Sammy Sosa becomes the second player to hit 50 or more home runs in three consecutive years, joining Mark McGwire.
2001 — Jason Bohn shoots a 13-under 58 at Huron Oaks Country Club to win the Canadian Tour’s Bayer Championship by two strokes and go one below the best round ever shot in PGA Tour-sanctioned competition.
2007 — Jim Thome is the 23rd player to reach 500 home runs. The slugger hits a two-run shot in the bottom of the ninth inning off reliever Dustin Moseley to give the Chicago White Sox a 9-7 victory over the Angels.
2007 — Bengals QB Carson Palmer passes for six TDs and the Browns’ Derek Anderson has five in Cleveland’s 51-45 win over Cincinnati, making it just the third time in NFL history that two QBs threw five TD passes apiece in the same game.
2010 — The Seattle Storm complete their undefeated march through the postseason, beating the Atlanta Dream 87-84 for a three-game sweep in the WNBA finals.
2012 — NHL locks out its players after the expiry of the collective bargaining agreement.
2018 — Scott Dixon has a steady drive to win his fifth IndyCar championship with ease. Dixon, needing an uneventful finale at Sonoma Raceway, finishes second behind winner Ryan Hunter-Reay. His fifth title moves him into second in IndyCar history, two behind A.J. Foyt.
Compiled by the Associated Press
Until next time…
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