Oct 21, 2019 4 min read

Pitt-GT time set

Pitt’s Nov. 2 football game at Georgia Tech will kick off at 4 p.m., it was announced Monday by the Atlantic Coast Conference.

The game will be locally televised by AT&T SportsNet. Additionally, the game will be available across select Regional Sports Network affiliates.

Michigan State is preseason No. 1

There isn’t much Michigan State has yet to accomplish under Hall of Fame coach Tom Izzo, from Big Ten titles and Final Four trips to winning a national championship.

The Spartans can now add another milestone to the list: They are No. 1 in the Associated Press Top 25 men’s college basketball preseason poll for the first time in program history.

The Spartans were the overwhelming choice with their veteran returnees led by star Cassius Winston. They topped 60 of 65 ballots in voting results released Monday, easily outdistancing No. 2 Kentucky and No. 3 Kansas as the only other teams to receive first-place votes.

Duke was fourth, followed by Louisville, Florida, Maryland, Gonzaga, North Carolina and Villanova to round out the top 10.

Williamson sidelined

Zion Williamson will miss the start of the season after the No. 1 overall draft pick by the New Orleans Pelicans had right knee surgery, sidelining the hyped rookie for nearly two months.

Williamson had his torn right lateral meniscus repaired on Monday. The club says his recovery will last six to eight weeks.

The 6-foot-6, 285-pound former Duke star averaged 23.2 points in four preseason games. He missed New Orleans’ final exhibition game in New York last Friday night.

In the NHL

Kevin Hayes, Michael Raffl, Matt Niskanen and Oskar Lindblom all scored in the second period to lead the Philadelphia Flyers to a 6-2 win over the Vegas Golden Knights on Monday night.

The Flyers snapped a four-game losing streak in front of a tepid crowd that has grown accustomed to a franchise off to another slow start. Of late, the Flyers lost seven of eight to open 2013, went 0-2-2 to start 2014, and went 4-7 last season that led to a housecleaning in the front office and on the bench. It was more of the same this season, with the Flyers standing at 2-3-1 after a rugged trip where they played four of the first five games in four time zones.

There was no need for concern against Vegas.

Travis Konecny scored a power-play goal just 4:15 into the game for the Flyers, and they took off from there, an appetizer for what would be the Flyers first four-goal period since March 15, 2019 against Toronto. Raffl added his second of the night late in the third.

Woods returns

Tiger Woods is returning from another surgical procedure on his left knee – his fifth on the same problem spot.

“Unfortunately, I’ve been down this road with my knee before,” Woods said Monday. “This is my fifth operation on it. I understand what it takes to come back from it. It’s been nice to have movement again and not having it catch and lock up.”

Woods, who had arthroscopic surgery two months ago, played the made-for-television “The Challenge: Japan Skins” event on Monday, and the Zozo Championship beginning on Thursday – the first full PGA Tour event in Japan.

Woods will play with Rory McIlroy, Jason Day, and Hideki Matsuyama in the skins game at the Narashino Country Club, the same venue for Zozo Championship. The course is located about 50 kilometers (30 miles) northeast of central Tokyo.

The course for next year’s Olympics is located nearby at the Kasumigaseki Country Club.

Woods said the knee troubled him all season, becoming more bothersome after he won the Masters in April.

“It progressively got worse and got to where it was affecting even reading putts,” Wood said. “You could see toward the end of the year I wasn’t getting down on my putts well.”

Woods said he had the surgery, wanting to be ready for the two events this week in Japan, followed in December by the Hero Challenge, and the Presidents Cup in Melbourne, Australia.

“It’s been nice to be able to squat down and read putts and start going at it full speed again,” Woods said. “It’s just been wear-and-tear over the years. It’s just been stressed out for a very long time.”