March 12
1937 — The first National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) men’s basketball tournament is won by Central Missouri State. Central Missouri wins the eight-team, single-elimination tournament by defeating Morningside College (Iowa) 35-24.
1966 — In the last race of his 40-year career, John Longden wins the San Juan Capistrano Handicap at Santa Anita, aboard George Royal. He retires with a then-record number of victories, 6,032.
1984 — Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean of Britain become the first ice dancing team to record nine perfect marks of 6.0 during the world championships.
1985 — Larry Bird scores 60 points, including Boston’s last 16, to set a Celtics record and lead them to a 126-115 victory over Atlanta.
1994 — The Arkansas men’s track and field team wins its 11th straight NCAA Indoor Championship with a meet-record 94 points. The 54-point victory margin is the biggest in the meet’s 30-year history.
2002 — Siena (17-18), with an 81-77 victory over Alcorn State in the play-in game, becomes first team in 47 years to win an NCAA men’s basketball tournament game with a losing record.
2003 — Damian Costantino’s NCAA-record hitting streak ends at 60 games, one day after he broke Robin Ventura’s 16-year-old mark. Costantino, an outfielder for Division III Salve Regina of Newport, R.I., fails to get a hit in the first game of a doubleheader against Baldwin-Wallace. It’s the first time he finishes a game hitless since March 25, 2001.
2005 — Bode Miller becomes the first American in 22 years to win skiing’s overall World Cup title. He finishes ahead of his only remaining challenger, Benjamin Raich of Austria, in the season’s final giant slalom to capture the crown.
2008 — The Houston Rockets are the third team in NBA history to win 20 straight games and ties for the second-longest winning streak with an 83-75 victory over the Atlanta Hawks.
2009 — Syracuse outlasts Connecticut in the second-longest Division I game ever played, capping a Big East tournament quarterfinal doubleheader in which the second- and third-ranked teams in the nation both lose. Andy Rautins hits a 3-pointer 10 seconds into the sixth overtime, to give the Orange their first lead since regulation and they go on to a 127-117 victory over the third-ranked Huskies. Much earlier in the evening, West Virginia beats No. 2 Pittsburgh 74-60.
2011 — The No. 21 Connecticut Huskies win their seventh Big East championship by winning five games in as many days. Kemba Walker shatters the tournament scoring record, getting 19 points in the ninth-seeded Huskies’ 69-66 victory over No. 14 Louisville.
2017 — Joakim Jensen finally ends what is believed to be the longest game in hockey history, scoring in the eighth overtime in the Norwegian League playoffs. More than 8 1/2 hours after the game started — and after 217 minutes, 14 seconds of play — Jensen breaks through to give the Storhamar Dragons a 2-1 victory over the Sparta Warriors. Storhamar leads the best-of-seven quarterfinal series 3-2.
2018 — Alex Ovechkin scores twice to reach 600 goals as the Washington Capitals beat the Winnipeg Jets 3-2 in overtime. The Russian winger is the 20th player and fourth-fastest in NHL history to reach 600 goals.
2018 — Marc-Andre Fleury makes 38 saves to become the 13th goalie in NHL history with 400 career wins, and Ryan Carpenter scores the winning goal with 2:40 left to lead the Vegas Golden Knights over the Philadelphia Flyers 3-2.
2020 – 2020 NCAA men’s basketball tournament is cancelled over concerns of the spread of COVID-19; first time ‘March Madness’ not held since it began in 1939; women’s tournament also cancelled.
2020 — NHL announces the pausing of the 2019-20 season due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
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March 13
1894 — J.L. Johnstone of England invents the starting gate for horse racing.
1920 — NYU wins the national amateur basketball championship in Atlanta. The Violets beat Rutgers 49-24 in the final of the AAU tournament.
1961 — Floyd Patterson knocks out Ingemar Johansson in the sixth round to retain the world heavyweight title in Miami Beach.
1982 — Elaine Zayak of the United States wins the world figure skating championship.
1983 — Randy Smith’s consecutive game streak ends at 906 games, the longest in NBA history. Smith played for Buffalo, San Diego (twice), Cleveland and New York during the streak.
1997 — The America’s Cup, the oldest trophy in international sports and yachting’s most coveted prize, is all but destroyed by a Maori protester who struck it repeatedly with a sledgehammer in Auckland, New Zealand.
1998 — Bryce Drew hits a leaning 3-pointer as time expires to give Valparaiso a shocking 70-69 upset of Mississippi in the first round of the NCAA Midwest Regional.
2001 — Philadelphia’s Mark Recchi picks up his 1,000th career point during 5-2 win over St. Louis. He’s the 60th player in NHL history to reach the mark.
2007 — Lance Mackey wins the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, becoming the first musher to win major long-distance North American sled dog races back-to-back. On Feb. 20, Mackey won his third consecutive Yukon Quest International Sled Dog Race, a 1,000 mile race between Fairbanks and Whitehorse, Yukon.
2007 — Dallas’ Mike Modano becomes the 39th player in NHL history and second born in the United States to reach 500 goals, scoring with 10:24 left in the third period of a 3-2 victory over Philadelphia.
2008 — Bode Miller clinches the men’s overall World Cup ski title. Miller earns his second title in four years with a 12th-place finish in the super-G combined, along with Didier Cuche’s announcement that he would not enter the season-ending slalom in Bormio, Italy.
2011 — The NCAA men’s basketball selection committee releases its 68-team draw, which included a record 11 teams from the Big East, the deepest conference in the nation. The tournament adds three more at-large teams that will open the tournament in what the NCAA is calling the “First Four.”
2012 — BYU pulls off the biggest comeback in NCAA tournament history on a wild opening night. Noah Hartsock scores 16 of his 23 points in the second half and the Cougars rally from 25 points down to beat Iona 78-72 in the first round. It marks the biggest comeback in an NCAA tournament game. Previously, the largest deficit overcome was 22 points in 2001 when Duke fought back to beat Maryland 95-84 in the national semifinals. It’s the second incredible turnaround of the night in Dayton. With President Barack Obama and British Prime Minister David Cameron watching, Western Kentucky comes back from a 16-point deficit in the final 5 minutes to beat Mississippi Valley State 59-58.
2018 — Russell Westbrook picks up the 100th triple-double of his career and the Oklahoma City Thunder uses a 16-0 run late in the fourth quarter to pull away from the Atlanta Hawks for a 119-107 victory. Westbrook scores 32 points, dishes out 12 assists and grabs 12 rebounds to become the third-fastest player to reach the milestone.
2020 – Elite football in Britain, including England’s Premier League, EFL, Women’s Super League plus in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, is suspended until at least 3 April because of COVID-19 pandemic.
2022 — After a 40-day retirement, record breaking quarterback Tom Brady announces he will play at least one more season in the NFL with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
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March 14
1933 — The Chicago Black Hawks forfeit a game when players refuse to return to the ice after their coach, Tom Gorman, is ejected from the game. Boston, which leads 3-2 at the time of the incident, receives a 1-0 victory.
1944 — In a tennis match to benefit wartime charities, amateur Jack Kramer beat pro champion Don Budge 6-3, 6-2.
1953 — Seton Hall wins the NIT title with a 58-46 win over St. John’s. Walter Dukes, who led Seton Hall with 21 points and 20 rebounds, finishes as the tournament’s high scorer with 70 points and wins the MVP honors.
1954 — Baltimore loses 65-54 at Milwaukee, giving the Bullets their 20th consecutive road loss for the season, and making them the first team in NBA history to go an entire season without winning a game on the road.
1960 — Rookie Wilt Chamberlain scores a playoff record 53 points in the Philadelphia’s 132-112 triumph over the Syracuse Nationals to send the Warriors to the Eastern Division finals against the Boston Celtics.
1962 — Detroit’s Gordie Howe becomes the second player in NHL history to score 500 career goals during the Red Wings’ 3-2 loss to the New York Rangers.
1963 — Guy Rodgers of the San Francisco Warriors hands out 28 assists in a 114-109 loss to the St. Louis Hawks, tying an NBA record set by Bob Cousy of Boston in 1959.
1976 — Bill Shoemaker posts his 7,000th career victory, aboard Royal Derby II, in the fifth race at Santa Anita Park.
1981 — A date which defines March Madness. The second round of the men’s NCAA basketball tournament features three upsets decided in the late seconds. Saint Joseph’s stuns No. 1 ranked DePaul 49-48 on John Smith’s layup with two seconds left. Arkansas knocks off Louisville 74-73 on U.S. Reed’s half-court shot that beat the buzzer. Moments later, Rolando Blackman of Kansas State hits a fadeaway shot from the corner with two seconds left for 50-48 win over No. 2-ranked Oregon State.
1987 — Jockey Laffit Pincay Jr. becomes the first rider in the history of Santa Anita Park to win seven races in a single afternoon. In his only loss of the day, Pincay finishes third aboard Bob Back in the eighth race.
1996 — Princeton upsets defending national champion UCLA, 43-41, in the first round of the men’s NCAA basketball tournament. Gabe Lewullis scores a backdoor layup off a bounce pass from Steve Goodrich with four seconds left and the Tigers hold on for the win.
1997 — Pittsburgh Penguins forward Joey Mullen becomes the first American-born player to score 500 career goals, with a goal in the second period of a 6-3 loss against the Colorado Avalanche. The New York native is the 25th player in NHL history to reach the milestone.
1998 — Harvard women become the first 16th-seeded team, men or women, to win an NCAA tournament game by defeating top-seeded Stanford 71-67.
2008 — Lindsey Vonn wins the overall World Cup skiing to complete the first American sweep of the men’s (Bode Miller) and women’s titles in 25 years. Vonn secures the title finishing tied for 11th in the giant slalom, the penultimate race of the season. It’s the first time Americans took both titles since Phil Mahre and Tamara McKinney accomplished the feat in 1983.
2012 — Lindsey Vonn ends the women’s World Cup downhill season in style by dominating the final race held in Schladming, Austria. The American overall champion, who had already won the downhill title, beats Marion Rolland of France by 0.92 seconds. It’s Vonn’s 12th win this season. Only Vreni Schneider of Switzerland won more races in one year — 14 in 1988-89.
2017 – World’s oldest golf club Muirfield in Scotland, votes to admit women as members for 1st time in 273 years.
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