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Sweetest Sound | News, Sports, Jobs Jamestown Post Journal
Travis Etienne and the Clemson Tigers defeated Ohio State in last year’s College Football Playoff semifinals, and they’ll try to do it again Friday at the Sugar Bowl in New Orleans. Ross D. Franklin/Associated Press
NEW ORLEANS — Everybody loves a comeback story, and both No. 2 Clemson and No. 3 Ohio State arrive at the Sugar Bowl looking for redemption of sorts.
For Trevor Lawrence and the Tigers, this College Football Playoff semifinal brings them back to the site of last season’s national championship game loss to LSU.
For Justin Fields and the Buckeyes, the Sugar Bowl is a chance to avenge their last defeat, a thrilling semifinal against Clemson last year that effectively ended with Ohio State’s star quarterback being intercepted in the end zone.
“You’ve got to face a little bit of adversity and sometimes you’re a little bit blinded by success if you don’t have any hiccups along the way,” Lawrence said this week.
Clemson (10-1) and Ohio State (6-0) meet in the playoffs for the third time on Friday night, with the winner moving on to the national championship game against No. 1 Alabama or No. 4 Notre Dame on Jan. 11 in suburban Miami.
Clemson has won both previous CFP meetings. Throw in an Orange Bowl against the Buckeyes that the Tigers also won in 2014, and Ohio State-Clemson feels like a budding rivalry.
It certainly sounded like one at times leading up the game, starting with Clemson Coach Dabo Swinney’s insisting that Ohio State’s six-game schedule in this pandemic-altered season should not have been enough to earn a playoff spot.
Swinney slotted Ohio State 11th in his final coaches’ poll ballot, explaining he didn’t put any team with fewer than nine games in the top 10 – while also showering praise on the Buckeyes and Coach Ryan Day.
“So people take it personal, but it’s nothing personal at all,” Swinney said.
Day admitted with a grin on a Zoom news conference with Swinney this week that he was glad his counterpart wasn’t on the College Football Playoff selection committee.
The Buckeyes have heard the complaints about their path to the playoff.
“We’re going into this game not respected at all,” Ohio State All-America offensive lineman Wyatt Davis said.
Rivalry? The Tigers do not seem to have really bought into the idea.
“They have more beef with us than we have with them,” Clemson receiver Amari Rodgers said.
It has all made for an interesting subplot to a game that will almost certainly be the final one in college for the losing junior quarterback. Lawrence and Fields, both Georgia natives and former five-star recruits in the same freshman class, are expected to be among the first few players selected in the 2021 NFL draft.
Lawrence is a Heisman Trophy finalist and the presumptive No. 1 overall pick. He led the Tigers to a national championship as a freshman and got them back to the title game last season. Clemson is 34-1 with Lawrence as the starter.
“He’s as good as there’s ever been,” Swinney said. “I’ll let other people argue if he’s the best ever.”
Fields was a Heisman finalist last year and followed that up with a mostly excellent performance in the semifinal, passing for 320 yards. His final throw was picked off in the end zone after the intended receiver slipped.
Clemson won 29-23 in a game Ohio State led 16-0 that featured a couple of critical close calls by officials that went in favor of the Tigers.
“So that has kind of been our whole motivation this offseason. Just getting the chance to play those guys again is a great opportunity,” Fields said. “Of course, we know Clemson is a great team. Great coaching staff, great players. So we’re just excited to be on the same stage as them and getting another chance to play those guys.”
Clemson will be without offensive coordinator and play-caller Tony Elliott, who is in COVID-19 protocol and did not make the trip to New Orleans.
Swinney said quarterbacks coach Brandon Streeter will fill Elliott’s role in the coach’s box. Former Clemson star C.J. Spiller, who has been working as an intern under Elliott, will be elevated to running backs coach and will be on the sideline.
Ohio State has been without numerous players its last two games because of virus protocols, though star receiver Chris Olave is expected back in the lineup.
“Full strength is a floating target right now,” Day said.
ROSE BOWL: Playing a Rose Bowl deep in the heart of Texas is anything but normal. Top-ranked Alabama being in a College Football Playoff semifinal is nothing new.
The Southeastern Conference champion Crimson Tide (11-0) are in a familiar position despite the chaos of playing during the pandemic. No. 4 Notre Dame, which finished runner-up in the Atlantic Coas Conference after temporarily giving up its cherished independent status, gets another playoff chance two years after a big thud in the same stadium.
“We’re going to keep knocking at the door. We don’t listen to the narratives about what Notre Dame can and can’t do,” Fighting Irish Coach Brian Kelly said Thursday. “We’re just excited that we’re going to keep banging at this door and we’re going to get through.”
These Irish (10-1) go into the relocated Rose Bowl on New Year’s Day as three-touchdown underdogs against Alabama and the Tide’s Heisman Trophy finalists, quarterback Mac Jones and receiver DeVonta Smith. The game was moved to AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, from its traditional home in Pasadena because of COVID-19 restrictions in California that would have kept family – and any other fans – from attending.
When the Cotton Bowl at AT&T Stadium was a semifinal two years ago, Notre Dame lost 30-3 to eventual national champion Clemson in its only previous CFP appearance.
The semifinal winners are scheduled to play Jan. 11 in suburban Miami, where eight seasons ago in the BCS national championship game Alabama trounced Notre Dame 42-14 in the last meeting between the storied programs.
“Even after going undefeated that year, we lost in the national championship game, and we were looked at as not a very good football team,” Kelly said. “We needed to look at the things that could help us grow. And we’ve been doing that each and every year.”
Notre Dame is still trying to catch up with Alabama, which is in a CFP semifinal for the sixth time after missing the final four for the only time last year. The Tide are 4-0 at the home of the NFL’s Dallas Cowboys, including a 38-0 win over Michigan State five seasons ago on the way to a national championship. They won another title, their fifth under Coach Nick Saban, three seasons ago.
“It means a lot to come back here reach our destination, to keep on building the standard here,” All-American cornerback Patrick Surtain II said.
“We just want to take advantage of where we’re at,” said Jones, the junior who has thrown for 3,739 yards and 32 touchdowns with four interceptions in his first full season as the starter. “We’re finally where we want to be.”
Alabama will be without All-America center Landon Dickerson, a team captain who is recovering from surgery after injuring his knee late in the SEC title game.
“He’s been a great leader on our team and will certainly be missed,” Saban said.
Chris Owens, a senior from Arlington, Texas, will be the starting center against the Irish.
Alabama’s offense has Heisman finalists Jones and Smith, plus a big-scoring, dual-threat tailback in Najee Harris, who has rushed for 1,262 yards and 24 touchdowns, and caught 32 passes for 316 yards and three more scores.
Smith has 98 catches for 1,511 yards and 17 TDs. Jones has completed 76.5% of his passes for 3,739 yards with 32 touchdowns and four interceptions.
Ian Book, a fifth-year senior and two-time captain, is Notre Dame’s winningest starting quarterback at 30-4. He has thrown for 2,601 yards and 15 TDs, with 430 yards rushing and eight touchdowns. Sophomore running back Kyren Williams has 1,061 yards rushing and 12 TDs, and Javon McKinley has four 100-yard receiving games.
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Sound Off for Friday, Jan. 1 The Delaware County Daily Times
Billy Donovan was just getting comfortable with his rotation.
Thursday, however, was a stark reminder for the Bulls coach that this season takes comfortable, crumbles it up, and throws it out the window.
Hours before the Bulls tipped off against the Wizards, the coach came out in his pre-game Zoom media session with an opening statement concerning the latest group of his players affected by the NBA’s coronavirus protocol.
This was no small group either.
Missing the game was Lauri Markkanen, Tomas Satoransky, Ryan Arcidiacono and Chandler Hutchison. Markkanen, who was also dealing with a calf contusion, was the only starter and was a question mark to play anyway, but Hutchison and Satoransky had been key members of the second unit, while Arcidiacono was a second point guard – Satoransky the other – sidelined.
“We’ve said this all along and I think the league has said this, we want to keep everybody as safe and as healthy as we possibly can,’’ Donovan said. “I think we’re trying to take the necessary precautions to do things that enforce the guidelines that have been asked of us to follow. But you’ve got situations where the NBA, you know, makes decisions and has to look at the safety of the players, and the teams, and the organizations, and I understand that, so the only thing I can really comment on is these are decisions that are being made at the NBA level.
“The only thing I can comment on are these are kind of the health and safety protocols that the league has put in place that they’re following, so that’s all I can get into and say about because I think the league wants it that way because of the laws, privacy, those types of things. But that’s where it’s at and that’s what is going on.’’
Don’t expect much more information than that in the next few days, either.
The league has handcuffed teams into being very vague concerning the details that put players in the protocol. The four players could have all tested negative, but through contact tracing need to pass consecutive tests, or they could all be positive and instantly put in quarantine. Only the individual players are allowed to make their details public.
Veteran love
As Garrett Temple’s minutes have gone up in the wake of the positive coronavirus test that sidelined him for weeks, the Bulls have played better. Coincidence? Not according to Otto Porter Jr., who played with Temple in their Washington days.
“He has just been here for a long time,’’ Porter said of the combo guard. “He knows how to play the game the way it’s supposed to be played. He brings energy, especially on both sides of the ball, especially defensively. Veteran guy. He’s very vocal, talking to the younger point guards and just talking to the team about what he sees out there and just being a leader.’’
Shout out
Becky Hammon is now the first woman to become the acting head coach of an NBA team, taking over for the Spurs in their loss to the Lakers on Wednesday, and Donovan had nothing but praise for her.
“Great person, obviously a terrific coach and you know it was great to see her get that opportunity,’’ Donovan said. “And I know that probably, whenever it is, there’s only 30 NBA jobs, it’s hard to be a head coach in this league. I understand that and respect that. But certainly she’s gonna be someone that is always going to be considered for a head coaching position.’’
The San Francisco 49ers are set to close out their 2020 season in a divisional rematch against the Seattle Seahawks. Seattle is looking to fight their way to the top of the NFC with a win in Week 17, which requires some assistance from around the league. Meanwhile, the 49ers aim to close out the season on a high note and finish the year with the best divisional record with a win on Sunday.
For this week's Four Downs, we are joined by Seahawks.com reporter John Boyle to get an insider's look ahead of Sunday's divisional rematch. Here's what Boyle has to say about the Week 17 matchup:
FIRST DOWN: Seattle has seen a defensive turnaround over the second half of the season. The unit went from allowing the most passing yards through nine games in league history to holding their opponents to a league-low 13.7 points per game over the last six weeks. Who or what is responsible for the defense's late-season resurgence?
Boyle: A big part of it was just the result of getting healthier, and with that, some continuity for the defense—and the secondary in particular—which began playing as a more cohesive unit starting in Week 10. Offseason trade acquisition Jamal Adams missed four games early on, their top three cornerbacks, or at least top three at the time (more on that below) Shaquill Griffin, Tre Flowers and Quinton Dunbar, all missed time at various points of the season, and nickel corner Marquise Blair was lost for the season in Week 2. All of that led to some of the pass coverage issues that led to the big numbers in the first half of the season.
The emergence of former 49ers DB D.J. Reed, who will likely start a fifth-straight game at right cornerback, even if Flowers returns from IR this week, has also helped bolster the secondary. Up front,x the addition of Carlos Dunlap has helped upgrade the pass rush, not just with his production (5.0 sacks in seven games), but with how he has created opportunities for other linemen. The result has been the Seahawks going from nine sacks through their first six games to recording a league-high 37 sacks dating back to Week 8 when these teams last met.
Lastly, the coaching staff, led by Pete Carroll and defensive coordinator Ken Norton Jr. deserve a lot of credit for helping make the subtle but necessary adjustments, starting in Week 10, to help the defense perform better.
SECOND DOWN: Seattle currently holds the third seed in the conference and has an outside chance to secure the No. 1 seed in the NFC, which would take some help from a few teams around the league. Nonetheless, Pete Carroll said the team is "going for it." What's the team's mindset heading into Sunday's game?
Boyle: Just as Carroll said, they're treating this game like any other knowing that, if things fall their way, there's still a chance, albeit not a great one, of getting the bye. The other factor Carroll outlined on Monday is that as well as the team, and the defense in particular, has been playing of late, he doesn't want to do anything to lose that momentum.
"The other side of this is maintaining the consistency and maintaining the regimen that we have and the mentality that we have, I don't want to break that thing right now, I don't want to break that mentality at all," Carroll said. "We want to stay right with it and keep pushing, trying to get better. We've got a lot of room to get better, we made a lot of mistakes that we can fix during the course of this week for the next game and leading into the next couple games and all that. So I don't like taking the chance of breaking the mentality. I think we can get up every single week, we can get every freakin' week, it doesn't matter. There are coaches that say, 'Oh you get up four or five times a year, or three or four times a year.' I've never thought that, and we're not going to mess with that right now. We're going to keep on rolling."
THIRD DOWN: Injuries are a common thread among all 32 clubs and teams have seen an uptick in play from some lesser known players. Who is an underrated playmaker that 49ers fans should keep an eye out for?
Boyle: Not to rub salt in the wound, but D.J. Reed has been fantastic since coming off the non-football injury list, playing well enough that he has a good chance of keeping his starting job even when the Seahawks are fully healthy at corner. Reed has started at left and right cornerback, in the nickel role and returned kicks and punts, earning rave reviews from coaches. Sticking with the defense, I'd also point to defensive tackle Poona Ford, who was primarily a run-stopper his first two years but has emerged as a pass-rush threat as well this season.
On offense, DK Metcalf and Tyler Lockett rightly get most of the attention when it comes to receivers, but No. 3 receiver David Moore is always one to watch and seems to have a big play or two in him every week, including a spectacular 45-yard catch last week that set up Seattle's first touchdown. Running back Rashaad Penny could also be one to watch if the Seahawks decide to increase his workload this week. The former first-round pick was hitting his stride late last season when he tore his ACL, and only returned to game action two weeks ago, but perhaps this is the week the Seahawks look to get him more involved heading into the playoffs.
FOURTH DOWN: What do you see as the top matchups to watch on Sunday?
Boyle: With George Kittle coming off another strong outing in his return from injury, I'll be curious to see what the Seahawks do to try to slow him down. Jamal Adams didn't play the last time these teams met, and while he's best known for the pass-rush skills that have produced 9.5 sacks this year, he showed some legit coverage chops last week against Rams tight ends and could spend some time covering Kittle this week.
On the other side of the ball, I'll be curious to see if the Seahawks can successfully run the ball against a good 49ers run defense, or if that's not going well, how the 49ers can contain Russell Wilson, DK Metcalf and a Seahawks passing game that had a lot of success last time around when the Seahawks didn't run the ball much with Chris Carson and Carlos Hyde both unavailable.
In Slate’s annual Movie Club, film critic Dana Stevens emails with fellow critics—this year, Justin Chang, Odie Henderson, and Alison Willmore—about the year in cinema. Read the previous dispatch here.
Fellow Cinematic Nomads,
Like this tumultuous year, the Movie Club is coming to an end. Parting is such sweet sorrow, to quote Kenneth Bran—I mean the Bard. Our impending goodbyes make me feel so bittersweet that I had to cue up Nicholas Britell’s If Beale Street Could Talk score for maximum effect.
Because so much turmoil befell me in 2020, my joys and successes were often pulled into the undertow by my worries, fears, and concerns. I often felt overwhelmed and hopeless. And it wasn’t just me; you could feel that same coexistence of sadness, dread, triumph and rage in this year’s documentaries. These films were so timely that they seemed to predict the hell we were to be plunged into, election-wise, pandemic-wise, and social-unrest-wise. This was due less to prognostication and more to how 2020 represented just a new chapter in the long-running story of injustice and the financial imbalance between rich and poor. Even documentaries thrown together this year, like Alex Gibney’s devastating yet ultimately flawed Totally Under Control, see their subjects’ horrific origins stitched into the great American fabric.
Looking at our Top 10 lists, I see that we were similarly affected by this year’s documentary offerings. Garrett Bradley’s Time, which Justin, Alison, and I had on our lists, is a beautiful encapsulation of all those feelings, a film as lyrical as Nomadland and just as nonjudgmental toward its subjects. Shot in haunting black and white, Time portrays Sibil Richardson’s battles with a system that punishes the guilty far more harshly if they’re not white. In your review, Justin, you described a particular sequence as “teeming with life, pulsing with joy and yet marked by a powerful, palpable absence,” a description that can also be applied to Dick Johnson Is Dead, Kirsten Johnson’s unorthodox yet hauntingly funny meditation on impending parental loss. I wasn’t as high on this one as Dana and Alison, but I admired its daring and its approach. It was also great to see Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets represented on Alison’s list.
I haven’t seen City Hall yet, but I still got my fill of how political machines affected the people they’re supposed to represent. Collective was one of the hardest things I sat through this year. I was so consumed by my own anger that I had to turn it off briefly to compose myself. That same feeling arose while watching the Stacey Abrams documentary, All In: The Fight for Democracy, which ultimately managed to soothe my troubled soul by ending with “Turntables,” a fantastic song by Janelle Monáe. Her video for the song is one of the best short films of the year. The less said about Monáe’s other 2020 contribution, the repugnant Antebellum, the better.
All I can add to Dana’s and Justin’s insightful Nomadland comments is that I’m glad Chloé Zhao’s film was No. 2 on our collective Top 10 list at RogerEbert.com. It embodies what Roger Ebert, Movie Club hall of famer, always said about movies being an empathy machine. I don’t profess to understand Fern and her fellow nomads’ lifestyle, but Zhao unobtrusively allows us to sit with the characters and observe their joys and struggles. Their humanity shines through, so even if we don’t agree with their choices, we see the common bonds we all share as people. It’s a gorgeous, memorable film.
Empathy haunted the cinema this year. I was moved for personal reasons by Sound of Metal, Darius Marder’s beautiful film about a musician slowly coming to terms with his sudden deafness. Riz Ahmed is superb here, never overplaying a scene, going for realism when the overly dramatic would have been easier. It made me relive my own sudden loss of half my vision, and later the loss of enough of my hearing to cause concern. I understood Ahmed’s character pinning his hopes on a possible cure that doesn’t work as expected. Through the powerful performance of Paul Raci, I saw my own ultimate acceptance of things as they are.
You know what else haunted moviedom this year? Stage adaptations! We couldn’t get to the Great White Way, so it came to us. We had the slightly censored Hamilton, which Disney+ brought to folks who couldn’t afford its steep ticket prices or who weren’t able to bribe theater critics so they could go as a plus-one. (Odie stares into the distance, nonchalantly whistling to hide his guilt.) There was also the aforementioned American Utopia; the majestic and superb “what-if” scenario of Kemp Powers and Regina King’s One Night in Miami; and of course, Meryl Streep in Let Them All Sing, I mean, The Prom, the Ryan Murphy production that answered the musical question “What if James Corden were a puppet controlled by Wayland Flowers?”
Another Ryan Murphy thingamabob, The Boys in the Band, will tie in nicely with Justin’s comments about representation. Justin, I really identified with your sense that your voice needs to be heard on significant works by people of color. It’s a bit of a running joke how many Black films I’ve covered over the years, yet part of me feels compelled to put my two cents in on how I feel my people are represented. I fear being pigeonholed, but by that same token (pun intended), I realize there aren’t enough of us out here to achieve any kind of balance yet. Reviewing the second cinematic incarnation of Mart Crowley’s play offered me the rare opportunity to not only represent my Blackness (though I was very hard on its lone Black character) but also my bisexuality. I rarely get that opportunity, so I seized it and wrote a shade-filled, bitchy review that I’m sure Jim Parsons’ Michael would have enjoyed.
My coach is about to turn into a pumpkin, so I’d better wrap up. Alison, thank you for your words on Mank, a movie that is on my 10 worst list this year. I thought it was yet another film in which David Fincher is more occupied with showing you what he can do with technique rather than making a movie that’s not a goddamn bore. Those cigarette burns on the “film”—Lord, hold my tongue!—AARRRRRGGGGHH! At least Mank gave me two things to be happy about: Amanda Seyfried’s performance is one. The other is the opportunity to close out with a song. Join me, won’t you?
They’re Manky and the Brain
Yes Manky and the Brain
One’s a boy genius
The other wrote Kane
Their script ownership rights
Will make critics fight
They’re Manky, they’re Manky and the Brain
Brain Brain Brain Brain Brain Brain Brain!
To give the Mank his due
Dave Fincher’s plan unfurled
With the help of Pauline Kael,
They’ll shatter Orson’s world.
They’re Manky and the Brain
Yes Manky and the Brain
That constant refrain
Will drive you quite insane.
But in the Twitterverse
They’ll prove that we’re all cursed.
They’re Manky, they’re Manky and the Brain
Brain Brain Brain Brain!
Thank you! I love you all!
I tip my fedora and bow out gracefully,
Odie
Four people were shot at a party in Happy Valley early Thursday morning, according to the Clackamas County Sheriff’s Office.
Around 12:30 a.m., deputies responded to reports of gunfire on the 9200 block of Southeast Idleman Road, just east of Interstate 205, officials said.
The sheriff’s office provided few details about the incident, but said that “several people” were attending a party at the location and that four had been injured by gunfire.
They were all taken to nearby hospitals for treatment, but were expected to survive.
Officials did not say whether any suspects had been identified or arrested.
As of 6:30 a.m., Investigators were still working in the area and officials said that local roads around the incident would likely be closed until noon.
-- Kale Williams; kwilliams@oregonian.com; 503-294-4048; @sfkale
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2021 Rose Parade Reimaged – part four/ the wrap up KTLA
Exhale, Vols fans — it’s finally arrived.
No, not the last day of 2020, although Hallelujah that this dumpster fire of a year is almost over, right?
No, what’s arrived is this: the nationwide realization that Tennessee is a Final Four team. If you think any differently, you’re either blind or a Kentucky fan.
Or both.
What we saw last night was not the culture flex that I wrote about a week ago.
Granted, that culture was still very visible against No. 12 Missouri, as players continued to dive headfirst into the sideline after loose balls, and all four other guys on the floor raced to pick up Yves Pons after a charge call.
But what we saw against Missouri was not the goodness of this Tennessee team. ‘Goodness’ is not a word people use to describe a 73-53 win that was never as close as the final score showed.
No, last night’s game was the ultimate effect of sheer talent and depth, as the Vols pummeled a Missouri squad that could very well be the second-best group in the SEC.
First came the 23-4 lead. Then three bone-jarring blocks from Yves Pons, one of which marked his 100th swat as a Tennessee Volunteer.
Then, after all that, a second half that had the Vols leading by almost 40 at one point, before they let off the gas and spread the wealth down the bench.
If last week was a warm and fuzzy reminder of how lovable and refreshing this team is, Wednesday’s win over Missouri was a cold-blooded statement for the damage these Vols can ultimately do.
There will be off nights, sure, and teams like Auburn and Arkansas can stay with the Vols when the timing is right.
But after No. 7 Tennessee left a Yves Pons-sized hole in the floor in CoMo, and John Fulkerson drained an in-your-face jumper after grimacing in pain over the same right wrist mere minutes before?
You can’t tell me Tennessee isn’t one of the best four teams in the nation right now, or that they won’t still be one of them in March.
Heck, when those AP rankings roll out next week, someone deserves to be fired if the Vols aren’t in the top four.
They showed it last night with their largest road win ever over a ranked team.
The last record-breaker? 2005, when first-year coach Bruce Pearl and the Vols downed No. 6 Texas and, you guessed it, Rick Barnes by 17.
Now, though, Barnes wears a different shade of orange.
And last night, in its perfect PMS 151 uniforms, complete with the old-school lettering we’ve seen in that classic home look, Barnes’ team notched its fifth-straight 20-point win.
For you history buffs out there, that hasn’t been done since the 1974-75 season, better known as the Bernie and Ernie Show with Bernard King and Ernie Grunfeld.
Tennessee has had other great teams since then, too.
Like 2008, when the Vols upset Memphis to become No. 1 in the nation.
Like 2010, when Tennessee was achingly close to its first Final Four appearance after getting the Sweet Sixteen monkey off its back to reach an Elite Eight matchup against Michigan State.
Even like 2018, when Purdue and a late foul call on Lamonté Turner provided a screeching halt to what many thought would be the team, with Grant Williams and Admiral Schofield at its nucleus.
But this one is different. It proved that Wednesday night at Mizzou Arena.
Wednesday night, the Vols shoved Missouri’s state motto right in the Tigers’ faces.
Show Me? Sure.
Here are 15 points and several no-look passes from Santiago Vescovi.
Let’s not forget the 11-point, six-rebound effort from Fulkerson, either, or the 13-point outing from freshman Jaden Springer.
Finally, here are 13 more points, six boards, two steals and four blocks from Pons, who, as mentioned, reached his 100th swat as a Vol and rejected another shot so ferociously that the Internet absolutely lost it.
“We’re all just really excited for Yves,” Barnes said. “For a guy that works as hard as he works and does the things that he does, as a team and a staff you just get excited when a guy brings it like he did tonight.”
When asked about his own performance, Pons began his statement with five terrifying words: “This is what I do.”
Side note: anyone else think of Ivan Drago’s “I must break you” when they read that, or see this image?
No, just me? Oh well.
Back to the point, though — yes, the Vols showed their potential against Missouri. But not for us, or you, or even Cuonzo Martin.
“I don’t think it’s about showing people anything, it’s just showing to ourselves what we can really do,” said Vescovi. “We showed it tonight.”
And, if we’re lucky, the Vols will show it again in March of 2021.
By that point, the Kentucky Wildcats could be the only team left in quarantine. After all, they’re just 1-6 right now.
So have a safe and happy New Year, Vols fans.
Cherish this team while you’ve got it, and pray that Rick Barnes and his group don’t go anywhere near the bad juju of the Tennessee football complex.
The Browns are waiting for clearance to practice on Thursday afternoon and they’ll have five players back from the COVID-19 reserve list if they do get the green light.
Wide receivers Jarvis Landry, Rashard Higgins, Donovan Peoples-Jones, and KhaDarel Hodge were all placed on the list last Saturday as high-risk close contacts. They missed last Sunday’s game against the Jets and their absence contributed to a sluggish offensive performance in a 23-16 loss.
All four of those players have been activated from the COVID-19 list on Thursday. Linebacker Jacob Phillips has also returned to the active roster.
The Browns are in a holding pattern on practice because they had two more players test positive for COVID-19 on Thursday. Tight end Harrison Bryant and linebacker Malcolm Smith will reportedly join safety Andrew Sendejo and linebacker B.J. Goodson in missing Sunday’s game against the Steelers.
Raleigh, N.C. — The morning ahead of New Year's Eve, police across the Triangle are sounding the alarm about 'celebratory gunfire.'
This year, innocent bystanders have been hit and killed by celebratory gunfire, especially on holidays when fireworks can mask the sound of gunshots.
While New Year's Eve is different this year – you won't see the streets flooded with thousands of people, and many celebrations are canceled – police are still sending a message about safety while ringing in the new year.
This week, Raleigh Police tweeted this message about celebratory gunfire, reminding people that discharging any type of firearm is illegal.
The Orange County Sheriff's department shared a similar message.
Last December, police also issued a warning against celebratory gunfire. However, at First Night in Raleigh, a UNC student named Kaitlyn Kong was seriously injured when shots were fired into the air.
Tragedy struck again on the Fourth of July, when a Durham grandmother was killed when she was struck by celebratory gunfire while walking home.
Kong survived her injuries and had a message for the community on the anniversary of the day she was struck by that stray bullet.
"I'm not as frustrated as I am just hopeful that they won't do it again," she said.
You can be criminally charged if a bullet hit someone or damages property.
Law enforcement are also warning people about drinking and driving if traveling from one private celebration to another.
Mitch McConnell has represented Kentucky for 35 years, Kentucky is 44th in health care, 48th in health care quality, 38th in education, 43rd in higher education, 39th in economy, 44th in employment, 44th in economic opportunity, and 45th in fiscal stability. Maybe Kentucky needs new leadership.
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WASHINGTON — The number of Americans seeking unemployment benefits fell by 19,000 last week to still historically high 787,000 as a resurgent coronavirus grips the U.S. economy.
While at the lowest level in four weeks, the new figures released Thursday by the Labor Department are nearly four times higher than last year at this point before the coronavirus struck. Employers continue to cut jobs as rising coronavirus infections keep many people at home and state and local governments re-impose restrictions.
Jobless claims were running around 225,000 a week before the pandemic struck with force last March, causing weekly jobless claims to surge to a high of 6.9 million in late March as efforts to contain the virus sent the economy into a deep recession.
The government said that the total number of people receiving traditional unemployment benefits fell by 103,000 to 5.2 million for the week ending Dec. 19, compared with the previous week.
The four-week average for claims which smooths out weekly variations rose last week to 836,750, an increase of 17,750 from the previous week.
Economists believe that the holidays, in addition to broad confusion over the status of a Covid-19 relief package, suppressed applications for benefits last week.
Congress finally passed a $900 billion relief bill that would boost benefit payments and extend two unemployment assistance programs tied to job losses from the pandemic. However, President Donald Trump called the measure a "disgrace" because in his view it did not provide enough in direct payments to individuals.
Trump eventually signed the measure on Sunday but sought to pressure Congress to boost the stimulus payments to individuals from the $600 in the bill to $2,000. The Democratic-controlled House quickly passed legislation to meet Trump's demand, but the Republican-led Senate checked that momentum.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Wednesday that the proposal to boost payments to $2,000 has "no realistic path to quickly pass the Senate."
Meanwhile, the government has begun sending out the smaller payments to millions of Americans. The $600 payment is going to individuals with incomes up to $75,000.
Analysts believe the $900 billion package as it now stands will give the economy a boost, but only as long there are no major problems with the rollout of COVID-19 vaccinations.
Earlier this month, Trump administration officials said they planned to have 20 million doses of the vaccine distributed by the end of the year. But according to data provided by the Centers for Disease Control, just over 11.4 million doses have been distributed and only 2.1 million people have received their first dose.
President Donald Trump deflected criticism about the pace of the vaccine program, saying that it's "up to the States to distribute the vaccines."
Most economists believe the U.S. economy will rebound at some point next year.
"While prospects for the economy later in 2021 are upbeat, the economy and labor market will have to navigate some difficult terrain between now and then and we expect (jobless) claims to remain elevated," said Nancy Vanden Houten, lead U.S. economist at Oxford Economics.
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U.S. Consumer Comfort Gauge Drops to Four-Month Low Bloomberg[unable to retrieve full-text content]
French Exporters Sound Alarm Over US Tit-For-Tat Tariffs U.S. News & World Report[unable to retrieve full-text content]
WPI uses the 'language of sound' to diagnose COVID-19 Worcester Mag
President-elect Joe Biden’s transition team has announced that one of his first acts in office will be to reverse the Muslim ban, a travel and immigration restriction that outgoing President Donald Trump implemented via executive order just one week into his term in January 2017. The measure, which all but eliminated the ability of nationals of seven Muslim-majority nations, as well as Syrian refugees, to travel or emigrate to the U.S., was the logical conclusion of a presidential campaign cut through with Islamophobia.
Particularly at the start of Trump’s term, Muslim Americans and their allies were justifiably fearful of the violent and repressive consequences that his presidency would have on their community. However, instead of adopting a lower profile, a significant contingent of American Muslims decided to organize politically and even undertake campaigns for local, state and national office. Many directly attribute their decision to run for office to the Islamophobic rhetoric of Trump and his supporters. In 2016, there were 23 first-time Muslim political candidates who registered to run for office. That number jumped to 79 in 2017, 143 in 2018 and a record 168 in 2020.
Muslim politicians have become increasingly visible nationally, particularly with the election of Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib to the House of Representatives in 2018. Jetpac, a Massachusetts-based nonprofit that was founded in 2015 with the goal of building “a strong American Muslim political infrastructure and increas[ing] our community’s influence and engagement,” created a public service fellowship with the goal of training a new cadre of Muslim candidates on the ins and outs of running for office. When the call for applications went live a few days after President Trump was inaugurated in January 2017, Jetpac was inundated with more than 100 applications in 24 hours.
Despite the interest in and visibility of Muslim political candidates, the majority of their campaigns have not ended with a win. Even defeats create opportunity, however. Mohammed Missouri, the executive director of Jetpac, said that every campaign, win or lose, is essential for pushing the envelope of Muslim political engagement.
“We don’t define success necessarily just by short-term victories. It’s actually getting people on the ballot and running super solid campaigns, essentially building an infrastructure for future people to run. … It’s not just about winning the election, it’s about pushing the issues, so whoever does end up winning actually cares about our community and engages with us. We are one of the most diverse communities in the country and around the world, so literally every policy affects us,” Missouri said.
Fatema Ahmad, executive director of the Muslim Justice League said, “We’ve moved from just talking about interpersonal Islamophobia … to talking about all of the broad issues that Muslims face.” That includes a wider awareness of and pushback against structural and institutional repression. The Muslim Justice League was formed shortly after the federal Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) effort was introduced as a pilot program in Boston in 2015. Ahmad believes that the public, and particularly progressive organizations, are becoming more receptive to the idea that CVE is harmful rather than helpful, “partially because of the moment we are in, and partially because Muslims have said it again and again.”
In Metro Boston, the two most visible Muslim candidates running for office in the 2020 election cycle were Ihssane Leckey, who was running to be the Democratic candidate for the Massachusetts 4th Congressional District, and Nichole Mossalam, who was running for state representative in the 35th Middlesex District. Both were both ultimately unsuccessful in their bids for office. However, slightly further afield, in Concord, Wakefield and Walpole, three Muslim women were elected to the local school board, town council, and planning board, respectively.
Muslims are not only slowly making inroads in elected office, but in all levels of political participation — from record voter turnouts across the country to positions as advisors and staff members for non-Muslim elected officials and candidates. Afnan Nehela, currently the communications director for state Sen. Jamie Eldridge, was motivated to become involved in politics about a year ago when she heard that there has never been a Muslim elected to the Massachusetts Legislature. She found that there is a lack of diversity in general, not only among elected officials, but among people working at all levels in the Legislature.
“I am seeing more and more how important it is for someone from my community to be involved in this type of work,” Nehela said. “Many times I will be in a meeting or briefing and a question will be asked, and I will be the only one who is able to give feedback based on my experience growing up in America as a Muslim. And if I was not there, that feedback would not be shared. For me, that’s absolutely powerful.”
The election of Joe Biden and the defeat of Trump had many in the Muslim community in particular breathing a sigh of relief. All of the activists we spoke to were interviewed prior to the election, and while none thought that a second Trump administration was equivalent to a Biden victory, they all stressed that no matter what the outcome, their work was far from over.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) Massachusetts branch is currently conducting focus groups with local Muslims to see how the last four years have affected them and what kind of issues they would like to see addressed in the next four.
“Whatever happens four, eight, 16 years from now, it will always be the center of my mission within CAIR to ensure that each individual Muslim’s politics and each individual’s desires and freedoms are respected and heard by their government,” Nazia Ashraful, government affairs director for CAIR-MA, said in an interview.
Ahmad of the Muslim Justice League stressed that “Islamophobia, anti-Muslim rhetoric, anti-Muslim policies are a staple of both the Democratic and Republican parties. So regardless of the outcome, we are not going to be surprised if there is more surveillance and more policing. … CVE in particular is something that is appealing to both sides.”
Missouri of Jetpac added, “As far as the work is concerned, our goal has been from day one, and will continue to be, to increase Muslim representation, no matter who wins. The plan will be the same, which is to make sure in our community to increase voter participation and continue to increase it every single year until it is as high as it possibly can be, in all elections. Not just every four years for presidential elections, but actually getting people engaged in the most local of elections.”
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Four questions with Mark Schwinn of Hawaii Lumber Products Association Pacific Business News (Honolulu)
ELK GROVE (CBS13) – An explosion and massive flash rocked an Elk Grove neighborhood in the middle of the night.
The flash was captured in home surveillance video from Feickert Drive.
The Elk Grove Police Department said the incident is just one example of loud booms people have been reporting for weeks.
“We both jumped out of bed because one of the pictures fell from the wall,” said Amy Mantanane.
Mantanane said one of the explosions rattled her home just this week and the next morning, police were looking at a hole in her lawn for evidence.
“We saw them dig something out of our lawn and put it in a little plastic bag,” she explained.
With so many reports of loud explosions across the city, CBS13 is getting answers on what goes into this type of investigation.
Hannah Gray with the Elk Grove Police Department said in cases like this, it’s about partnering with the community, asking people to check their security cameras and report what they see.
More from CBS Sacramento:
Gray said it’s also imperative to partner with other agencies. In this investigation, the department is working with the Sacramento County Sheriff Department’s Explosive Ordinance Detail.
“Feel like the reason we woke up more is because we felt a little bit of a shaking than anything else,” said Nate Sanchez, who lives in Elk Grove.
Sanchez said he’s heard and felt the blasts and hopes police get to the bottom of what’s behind the booms.
“As long as they find the cause and determine whether it be something that is safe or not, I mean if it’s actually a big issue,” he said.
Anyone with information is encouraged to call the Elk Grove Police Department’s Dispatch Center at 916-714-5115.
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Tampa businesses launch ‘safe and sound’ initiative to curb COVID-19 spread WFLA
Four people were killed in a murder-suicide inside a Texas home Wednesday morning, authorities said.
Officers responded to a home in Houston around 3 a.m. after a woman called 911 saying she had been shot, Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez said during a press conference.
When officers arrived, the suspect, a 49-year-old man, opened fire.
A SWAT team also responded at the scene and tried to negotiate with the suspect for hours to no avail, according to the sheriff.
Officers managed to break in when they heard a final gunshot and discovered the four bodies around 7 a.m.
Authorities believe the suspect was in a relationship with the woman who called 911.
He allegedly gunned her down as well as another man and woman — possibly the woman’s children, according to Gonzales.
A motive for the shootings is being investigated.
A big-box store, a hotel for transgender women and a dinner party gone awry are some of the places your ears will take you to.
When actors can’t gather onstage, they can still make drama with their voices. Our critics review four recent audio plays.
(Through March 7; studiotheatre.org)
I wonder if there’s been a play that channels the discontent and despondency of 2020 as perfectly as Studio Theater’s sharp and satisfyingly foul-mouthed “I Hate It Here: Stories From the End of the Old World.” I’d wager not. Written and directed by Ike Holter, “I Hate It Here” is a collection of vignettes from people who, after a year of disease and death, are done with pleasantries.
A woman who has carried on her mother’s legacy of protesting confronts her friend and his partner for not doing enough; a teacher reflects on the racist parents of a white student in her class; a middle-aged couple who started the pandemic “glamping” realize they’re now homeless in the woods; and a man struggles to accept the fact that his mentor is a sexual harasser. Issues of race, class, accountability and political engagement come up at a catering job, a fast-food restaurant and a pandemic wedding — with 18 characters (performed by a cast of seven) having conversations or speaking monologues to an unknown listener.
Holter has a well-tuned ear for language; his dialogue is sparky and cynical, confrontational and personal, so monologues feel like the casual dinner conversation you’d have with a friend. But just because Holter’s text is fluent in the disillusionment that’s overtaken this year doesn’t mean that it lacks humor or wit. His characters speak in phrases that contort idioms and rhyme and pun and string expletives together like jewels on a necklace — yes, his unprintables are as elegant as that (disciples of the profane would be proud).
“I Hate It Here” gathers great momentum, especially early in the nearly 90-minute production, as shorter vignettes are delivered in quick succession. Later, some longer sequences start to drag and could use snips in the dialogue, but ultimately these deliver the stories with some of the most heft. The intro and outro music, composed and directed by Gabriel Ruiz, who also stars, could be nixed. And occasionally the actors play the text too loud, so to speak, but it’s forgivable, especially given the language’s perverse gambols — who wouldn’t be carried away by these lines?
At the end, a woman, recounting the losses she’s faced, says she’s done pretending things are fine. “I hate it here!” she screeches, culling it from the tips of her toenails. Then she pauses briefly, and is suddenly renewed. That’s the sound of catharsis, and I felt it, too. MAYA PHILLIPS
(Ongoing, audible.com)
Even when the performers have utterly distinct voices, audio plays can be difficult to follow. Absent are the clues of countenance and costuming that usually help viewers track who’s who and what their story is. The best way to approach the genre is often just to succumb to the confusion and listen, turning off the part of your brain that wants instant clarity.
That’s probably also the best way to approach new subjects when they finally hit the stage, or in this case hit your headphones. “Chonburi International Hotel & Butterfly Club,” by Shakina Nayfack, is that kind of play, telling the story of seven transgender women awaiting, recovering from or seeking to improve the results of gender confirmation surgery. As drama, it may be confusing, even if beautifully cast for vocal contrast. But as a bulletin from the front lines of identity, it’s ear-opening.
The “butterflies” emerging from their cocoons at the (fictional) title hotel, in Thailand, are drawn with heavy outlines to emphasize the diversity of transgender life. Sivan (Kate Bornstein) is an astronomer from Hawaii, joined in Chonburi by her cisgender wife. Jerri (Bianca Leigh), from Australia, also brings her wife, as well as their surprisingly chill 15-year-old son. Dinah (Dana Aliya Levinson) is a retired racecar driver; Van (Angelica Ross), a video game designer; Yael (Ita Segev), a former soldier in the Israeli army. You could imagine them in a lifeboat story, and in a way they are.
Needing rescuing most is the newcomer Kina, played by Nayfack (“Difficult People”) and based to some degree on her own experiences as a transgender woman who crowdfunded her surgery in Thailand with what she calls a “kickstart her” campaign. At first standoffish, and later in pain and anguish, she finds solace in the sisterly ministrations of the butterflies and in the care of a nurse and a bellhop whose back stories conveniently dovetail the main plot. Kina even gets an ambiguous romantic arc, with a Thai sex worker she hires for one last pre-op fling.
“Chonburi,” a coproduction of Audible and the Williamstown Theater Festival, is not one of those plays that’s about too little. Though its director, Laura Savia, gives it a fast-talking sitcom spin, with jaunty interstitial music, its origins in autobiography make it difficult to shape. Discussions of spirituality, parental rights and the occupation of Palestine, let alone the Thai coup d’état of 2014, quickly come to feel like tangents.
Other scenes, like the one in which Jerri gives Kina (and us) an explicit post-surgery anatomy lesson, are riveting. It’s here, in the central story of transformation — how each woman puts her “body on the altar” to free herself — that “Chonburi” achieves the kind of focus it needs to do the same. JESSE GREEN
(Ongoing, audible.com)
Two couples — one a bit more seasoned, the other still fresh — get together for a night, and amid too many drinks and dredged-up histories, they turn to a feast of insults to sate their appetites. Everyone’s bitter. Everyone’s unhappy. And it’s pretty clear none of these people should be within 50 miles of one another. They are, as the young girlfriend in the new couple observes, animals.
No, this isn’t an Edward Albee play, though that’s an understandable assumption to make. “Animals,” written by Stacy Osei-Kuffour and directed by Whitney White, has much of the same DNA — lust, longing and resentment among lovers and friends, as well as alcohol — but instead of improving the formula, it ends up feeling like a rote reconstruction.
There is one notable divergence: “Animals,” also on Audible as part of the Williamstown Theatre Festival, brings in the matter of race. Henry (Jason Butler Harner), who’s white, proposes to his longtime girlfriend, Lydia (Aja Naomi King), who’s Black, before a dinner they’re hosting — but the timing is suspicious: The occasion for the event is Lydia’s “anniversary” with her old friend and amour Jason (William Jackson Harper), who’s also Black. With Jason is his latest young white girlfriend, Coleen (Madeline Brewer).
Henry notes Lydia’s code-switching and resents her inappropriate familiarity with Jason, who has renamed himself Yaw in an Alex Haley-esque a-wokening after a trip to Africa. Jason, a pedantic New York University professor, judges Henry, especially when the topic of race comes up, as Lydia attacks Coleen and moons over Jason. This is a therapist’s nightmare: There are more deflections and projections than in a carnival house of mirrors.
But “Animals” feels burdened with effort; it’s too quick to get to the worst of its characters, giving the roughly 90-minute production nowhere deeper to go. No foreplay of nuanced chitchat here, just a relentless barrage of aspersions, which led me to the thought: Do I really believe these people sneering their way through this evening? Not for a second. The interlocking links of insecurity and codependence that supposedly chain these characters to this truly horrendous gathering are less apparent than the play seems to believe.
Even during the characters’ most bitter invectives, the cast’s performances similarly skate over the surface, more ornamental than immersed. It feels like a symptom of the play’s inability to extricate itself from the clichés of its genre and successfully surface its more novel elements. Lydia and Jason are connected not just through their history but by their racial experience, and simultaneously want to keep that but also shelter within the privilege and status of their white partners.
Interracial sexual politics is a vast McDonald’s-style playground for a writer to explore (just ask Jeremy O. Harris, whose characters certainly play in his “Slave Play”). But “Animals” struggles to parse out how its characters’ racial identities connect to their desires and shames in and out of the bedroom. For large swaths of the play, the white partners feel like afterthoughts, but it also doesn’t fully commit to investigating the Blackness of Lydia and Jason and how much of their intimacy is tied to that. When the play reaches its conclusion, it’s unclear of its upshot.
Proposals and retractions, propositions and rejections, someone breaking something and someone storming off: “Animals” plays the standards but this cover of the theme “misery loves dinner company” doesn’t chart. MAYA PHILLIPS
(Through Aug. 31; steppenwolf.org)
Inside Wally World, it’s one of the most frantic times of the year — and that’s saying something for a big-box store so vast that thousands of customers prowl its aisles each day. Chaos comes with the territory, especially on Christmas Eve.
So it’s a bit of a mystery that Isaac Gómez’s audio play, “Wally World,” is such a pleasantly relaxing experience, even as it thrives on workplace tensions. From the first notes of holiday music at the top of the show (the Vince Guaraldi Trio’s jazzy “O Tannenbaum,” from “A Charlie Brown Christmas”) and the first static off the walkie-talkies that keep the store’s management team connected, we sense that we’re in good hands.
Like many a Christmas tale, this sprawling ensemble dramedy — directed by Gómez and Lili-Anne Brown for Steppenwolf Theater Company — has at its center someone who has lost her way. Andy (Sandra Marquez) has spent 23 Christmas Eves at this Wally World in El Paso, Tex., working her way up to store manager, fearsomely bossing a whole team of deputies. Trouble is, the rigor that helped her rise now clouds her vision and stunts her sympathy.
A cousin of sorts to the sitcom “Superstore,” “Wally World” hits its mark much better than the Off Broadway musical “Walmartopia” did. This play is a fiction, yet for Gómez (“the way she spoke”), a very personal one: His mother, too, worked her way up from cashier to manager at a Walmart in El Paso. “Wally World” is a portrait of a place he knows — so well that he neglects to explain some of its jargon.
On this Christmas Eve, Andy’s store is short-handed. You might think the added pressure would send everyone scrambling, but that’s consistently true only of the no-nonsense Estelle. In a standout performance by Jacqueline Williams, she is the character we root for hardest — especially when she reports “actual velociraptors destroying our store.”
A close second is Jax (the terrific Kevin Curtis), an assistant manager who begins his workday with aplomb by insulting the higher-ranking Mark (Cliff Chamberlain), who is a sexual-harassment lawsuit waiting to happen.
Spiked with sociopolitical point-making and rather a lot of day drinking, “Wally World” (which runs two hours and 20 minutes) has a cast of 10, which might have threatened to overwhelm the medium: so many voices to learn. But the performances are almost uniformly strong, and Aaron Stephenson’s sound design is remarkably thoughtful.
So it’s easy to follow along, though Janie (Karen Rodriguez) isn’t credibly written as the barely functioning alcoholic of the bunch, while Karla (Leslie Sophia Perez), the sole sales associate we meet, seems more plot device than person. There is, however, a charming romantic subplot, and the ending is satisfying without being too sweet.
Warning: You can’t buy single tickets to “Wally World.” It’s only available as part of a virtual membership. Essential workers, however, are among those who can get a hefty discount. Well done on that, Steppenwolf. LAURA COLLINS-HUGHES
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