Athletes Fight to Restore Sports in Central Ohio
Outside the Lines (9 a.m. Sunday, ESPN)
In Columbus, Ohio’s South-Western City School District, all interscholastic sports were cut for the fall season. Julie Foudy reports on the campaign of some student-athletes to restore sports and other extracurricular activities to Ohio's sixth-largest school district.
Excerpt:
“Right now, our school has nothing, no sports, no extracurricular activities, no student council. Us as a community, and the people who vote yes, strongly believe that if we have these things then we have a better chance of getting into college, a better education. We feel like we’re missing out on the whole high school experience.” – Jake Green, Grove City High junior basketball and football player
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Hurricane Andrew and the Rebirth of Homestead
NASCAR Countdown (Sunday 2:30 p.m., ABC)
In August 1992, Hurricane Andrew swept through Homestead, Fla., nearly wiping the city of 30,000 off the map. In the wake of the storm -- then the most costly on U.S. soil -- more than a third of Homestead residents moved away. City officials knew that rebuilding was necessary, but where to start? One year later, with hopes of revitalizing the community, ground breaking took place for a race track. In the 17 years since, Homestead-Miami Speedway has hosted season-ending races for all six of America's premiere motorsports championships. Sunday, as Jimmie Johnson heads to Homestead to seek his his fourth-straight NASCAR Sprint Cup championship, Tom Rinaldi revisits the devastation caused by Hurricane Andrew and the rebirth of Homestead through Homestead-Miami Speedway.
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Going for it on Fourth Down
NFL Countdown (Sunday, 11 a.m., ESPN)
This week, New England Patriots coach Bill Belichick received intense scrutiny and criticism for his decision to go for it on 4th-and-2 on his own 28-yard line late in the game. As ESPN's archives show, Belichick has always been aggressive on 4th down, a philosophy he revealed in a 2002 interview. Though it seems irrational, several several mathematical formulas support his approach. ESPN.com's Greg Garber talks to two leading numbers crunchers -- an economics professor at Berkley and a retired Navy pilot turned mathematician -- on why Belichick made the right call despite the loss.
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Flutie’s Hail Mary
College Gameday (Saturday, 10 a.m. ESPN)
The Sporting Life with Jeremy Schaap (Friday 10 p.m. ESPN Radio)
Twenty five years ago next week -- November 23, 1984 -- Doug Flutie authored one of the greatest moments in college football history as his Boston College Eagles took on the defending national champion Miami Hurricanes. With 28 seconds left, Flutie launched a Hail Mary towards the end zone and into the arms of receiver Gerard Phelan. The 48-yard pass lifted Boston College to a 47-45 victory. Brent Musburger, who was in the Orange Bowl TV booth that day, recently spent an afternoon with Flutie reliving that famous play.
Excerpts:
"People can still visually see you (Flutie) drift back, throw it a long, long ways and then there’s this huge pile of humanity and some how, some way, Gerard Phelan makes one of the great catches in the history of college football." -- Brent Musburger
"I saw the ball go over two defender’s heads and the whole pile just fall to the ground. I never saw Gerard catch it. I didn’t know Gerard caught it until 10 minutes later. But I saw the whole pile fall to the ground and the officials' arms near the goal line area go up in the air and I just started chuckling to myself." -- Doug Flutie
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Fishermen Compete for Beach Soccer World Cup
ESPN Deportes SportsCenter (Sunday, 11 p.m.)
Reportajes Especiales piece on ESPNDeportes.com.
Sixteen teams met in Dubai this week to determine who would be the 2009 FIFA Beach Soccer World Cup champion. The El Salvador national team, made up mostly of fishermen, did not make it past the first round, but simply making it to Dubai was a triumph in itself.
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