Feb. 21
1931 — In the first major league night game, the Chicago White Sox play the New York Giants in a 10-inning exhibition in Houston.
1952 — The Boston Celtics and the Fort Wayne Pistons tip off at midnight in a “Milkman’s Special” following an Ice Follies performance at Boston Garden. Bob Cousy of the Celtics scores 24 points before 2,368 fans in a 88-67 win.
1952 — Dick Button performs the first triple jump in a figure skating competition.
1953 — In college basketball’s longest game, Niagara beats Siena 88-81 in six overtimes.
1960 — Philadelphia Warriors rookie Wilt Chamberlain sets an NBA record with his fourth 50-point game of the season, scoring 58 in a 129-122 victory over the New York Knicks.
1970 — Bobby Hull scores two goals, including the 500th of his career, in the Chicago Blackhawks’ 4-2 win over the New York Rangers.
1970 — Pete Maravich of LSU scores 64 points in a 121-105 loss to Kentucky. Dan Issel scores 51 for the Wildcats.
1976 — New York’s Red Holzman becomes the second NBA coach, after Red Auerbach, to win 500 games with a 102-98 victory over New Orleans.
1992 — Kristi Yamaguchi wins America’s first Olympic gold medal in women’s figure skating since 1976. Midori Ito of Japan takes the silver and Nancy Kerrigan of the United States wins bronze.
1996 — The Philadelphia 76ers have the worst NBA offensive performance in 41 years in their 66-57 loss to Miami. The 76ers tie the record for fewest points, set Feb. 27, 1955, by Milwaukee in a 62-57 loss to Boston during the first season of the 24-second clock.
2002 — In Salt Lake City, U.S. figure skater Sarah Hughes jumps from fourth to first to win the Olympic gold while teammate Michelle Kwan settles for bronze. The powerful U.S. women’s hockey team loses 3-2 in a gold-medal game to a Canadian team it had beaten eight consecutive times.
2003 — Michael Jordan becomes the first 40-year-old in NBA history to score 40 or more points, getting 43 in the Washington Wizards’ 89-86 win over the New Jersey Nets.
2014 — Mikaela Shiffrin becomes the youngest Olympic slalom gold medalist. The 18-year-old American is 0.53 seconds faster than Austria’s Marlies Schild.
2016 – 58th Daytona 500: Denny Hamlin wins closest finish in race history – by just 0.01s from Martin Truex Jr
2018 – Winter Olympics: Jessie Diggins and Kikkan Randall become the first Americans in history to win a cross country gold medal (team sprint)
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Feb. 22
1919 — The first dog race track to use an imitation rabbit opens in Emeryville, Calif.
1936 — Figure skater Sonja Henie wins her 10th straight world championship.
1959 — Lee Petty, driving an Oldsmobile, wins the first Daytona 500.
1969 — Barbara Jo Rubin becomes the first female jockey to win a race at an American thoroughbred track. She rides Cohesian to a neck victory over Reely Beeg in the ninth race at Charles Town in West Virginia.
1975 — Madison Square Garden hosts its first women’s college basketball game. In a rematch of the 1973 national championship game, defending national champion Immaculata beats Queens College 65-31 before a crowd of 11,969.
1980 — The U.S. Olympic hockey team stuns the Soviet Union with a 4-3 victory in the medal round of the Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, N.Y. Captain Mike Eruzione scores the winning goal midway through the final period.
1981 — Rookies Peter and Anton Stastny total eight points apiece, sending the Quebec Nordiques past the Washington Capitals 11-7. Peter has four goals and four assists; Aaron has three goals and five assists.
1988 — Hersey Hawkins scores 63 points to lead Bradley over Detroit 122-107. Archie Tullos scores 49 points for the Titans.
1988 — Bonnie Blair wins America’s second gold medal at the Winter Olympics in world-record time, beating Christa Rothenburger of East Germany by .02 seconds in the 500-meter speed skating.
1990 — Lionel Simmons scores 27 points to move into fourth place of the NCAA Division I scoring list at 3,024 and becomes the fifth player to score 3,000 points as the Explorers beat Manhattan 100-60.
1993 — Glenn Anderson becomes the 36th NHL player with 1,000 points, picking up a goal and two assists to help the Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Vancouver Canucks 8-1.
1998 — Bjorn Dahlie, the Norwegian cross-country skiing great, extends his Winter Olympics record by picking up his 12th medal, and record eighth gold, in the last race of Nagano — the 50-kilometer.
2006 — Gene Bess becomes the first college basketball coach to win 1,000 games when Three Rivers Community College beat Forest Park 77-60.
2008 — Lindsey Vonn clinches the World Cup downhill title, becoming the first American woman to claim the crown since Picabo Street in 1996. Nadia Styger of Switzerland wins the race at Whistler, British Columbia with Vonn finishing 0.01 behind Styger.
2008 — The Indy Racing League and the Champ Car World Series sign a deal to unify the two American open-wheel circuits, bringing them under the umbrella of the IRL.
2010 — Caltech ends its 310-game conference losing streak in men’s basketball beating Occidental College 46-45 in its season finale.
2013 — The Chicago Blackhawks sets an NHL record for the best start to a season, beating the San Jose Sharks 2-1 to give them at least one point in their first 17 games.
2016 — Tennessee’s 31-year run in the AP’s women’s college basketball rankings ends. The Lady Vols had been ranked for 565 consecutive weeks. The streak started Feb. 17, 1985.
2019 – Robert Kraft, owner of NFL team the New England Patriots, charged with soliciting prostitution, as part of human-trafficking sting operation in Jupiter, Florida
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Feb. 23
1935 — George “The Iceman” Woolf makes history, riding Azucar to victory in the inaugural Santa Anita Handicap. Azucar beatS such greats as Equipoise and Twenty Grand in the first $100,000 horse race.
1938 — Joe Louis knocks out Nathan Mann in the third round to defend his world heavyweight title at Madison Square Garden in New York.
1960 — Carol Heiss captures the first gold medal for the United States in the Winter Olympics at Squaw Valley, Calif., winning the figure skating event.
1968 — Wilt Chamberlain becomes first player to score 25,000 points in the NBA.
1980 — Eric Heiden wins his fifth gold medal and shatters the world record by six seconds in 10,000-meter speed skating at the Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, N.Y. His time is 14:28.13.
1985 — Indiana coach Bob Knight is ejected five minutes into the Hoosiers’ 72-63 loss to Purdue when he throws a chair across the court. Knight, after two fouls called on his team, is hit with his first technical. While Purdue was shooting the technical, Knight picks up a chair from the bench area and throws it across the court, earning his second technical.
1987 — Seattle’s Nate McMillan sets an NBA rookie record with 25 assists to lead the SuperSonics over the Los Angeles Clippers 124-112.
1991 — North Carolina becomes the first team in NCAA basketball history to win 1,500 games with a 73-57 victory over Clemson.
2002 — The Americans end nearly a half-century of Olympic frustration for the U.S. men’s bobsled team, driving to the silver and bronze medals in the four-man race at the Salt Lake Olympic Games.
2007 — Tiger Woods’ winning streak on the PGA Tour, which began in July, comes to a shocking end. Woods fails to notice a ball mark in the line of his 4-foot birdie putt that would have won his third-round match against Nick O’Hern. Woods misses, then loses in 20 holes when O’Hern saves par with a 12-foot putt at the Accenture Match Play Championship.
2013 — Ronda Rousey and Liz Carmouche makes history just by stepping into the UFC cage. Rousey wins the UFC’s first women’s bout, beating Carmouche on an armbar, her signature move, with 11 seconds left in the first round of their bantamweight title fight at UFC 157.
2014 — Canada defends its Olympic men’s hockey title with a 3-0 victory over Sweden. Canada becomes the only repeat Olympic champ in the NHL era and the first team to go unbeaten through the Olympic tournament since the Soviet Union in Sarajevo in 1984.
2014 — Russia, the host country of the Winter Olympics, finishes with 33 medals overall and 13 gold. It’s the first time Russia topped both medals tables since the breakup of the Soviet Union. The U.S. wins 28 total, including nine gold.
2014 — Jason Collins becomes the first openly gay athlete in the United States four major pro leagues, playing 10 scoreless minutes with two rebounds and five fouls in the New Jersey’s 108-102 victory of the Los Angeles Lakers.
2014 — Dale Earnhardt Jr. wins a rain-delayed Daytona 500, a decade after his first victory in the “Great American Race.” Earnhardt snaps a 55-race winless stretch that dated to 2012. It also ends a frustrating sequence at Daytona International Speedway that had seen him finish second in three of the previous four 500s.
2021 – Tiger Woods crashes his car driving south of Los Angeles, injuring both his legs
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