The Washington Post - USA (2022-02-20)

D2 EZ M2 THE WASHINGTON POST.SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 20 , 2022

PRO FOOTBALL

Steelers hire Flores

as an assistant coach

Brian Flores is back in the
NFL, joining the Pittsburgh
Steelers as an assistant coach.
Flores, the former coach of the
Miami Dolphins who filed a racial
discrimination lawsuit t his
month against the league and its
teams, was hired by the Steelers
as a senior defensive assistant
and linebackers coach, the team
announced Saturday.
He will work for Steelers Coach
Mike Tomlin, one of two active
Black head coaches in the league.
“I am excited about Brian
Flores joining our coaching s taff
given his history of developing
and teaching defensive players
during his time in the NFL,”
To mlin said in a written
statement.
Flores’s lawsuit will proceed,
his attorneys said. He f iled his
lawsuit in U.S. District Court for
the Southern District of New
York, accusing the NFL and its
teams of discriminating against
Black coaches and denying them
equal opportunities. Flores
named the Dolphins, New York
Giants and Denver Broncos while
listing the 29 other NFL teams as
potential defendants.
Flores was fired by the
Dolphins last month after a
second s traight winning season.
The NFL had three Black head
coaches this past season, but two
of them were fired, Flores by the
Dolphins and David Culley by the
Houston Te xans. Only one of the
nine head coaching vacancies
leaguewide this offseason was
filled by a Black coach, with the
Te xans’ hiring of Lovie Smith.
One other minority head coach
was hired. The Dolphins hired
Mike McDaniel, who is
multiracial.
Flores was a finalist for the
Giants’ head coaching job this
offseason that went to Brian
Daboll. After his lawsuit was
filed, he was a candidate for the
vacancies of the Te xans and New
Orleans Saints. The Saints
promoted their defensive
coordinator, Dennis Allen, to
succeed Sean Payton as c oach.
The league and the teams
named in Flores’s lawsuit denied
his allegations.
— Mark Maske

COLLEGE FOOTBALL In New Orleans, Tennessee State’s Geremy Hickbottom passed for 72 yards and rushed for 25 yards and a touchdown a nd was named the top offensive player in Te am Gaither’s 22-6 victory over Team Robinson in the L egacy Bowl, the first all-star game organized for historically Black colleges and u niversities. The teams were named for two prominent former HBCU head coaches: Grambling’s Eddie Robinson a nd Florida A&M’s Jake Gaither. K ansas City C hiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes took part in the pregame coin toss.

AUTO RACING In Daytona Beach, Fla., A ustin Hill won the NASCAR Xfinity Series season opener at Daytona International Speedway following Myatt Snider’s airborne crash that shredded a chunk of catch fence directly in front of where Michael Jordan was watching. Hill had pulled alongside leader AJ Allmendinger on the final lap and was scored ahead when NASCAR called the caution.

COLLEGE LACROSSE In Towson, Md., Payton Cormier scored four goals and added two assists to help spark the No. 2 Virginia men’s team to an 18-9 victory over Towson. Jack Simmons added a career- best four goals for the Cavaliers (3-0), who trailed 4-1 after one period before outscoring the Tigers 13-3 over the middle two periods. Connor Shellenberger had two goals and three assists and Xander Dickson chipped in with two goals and two assists. Griffin Schutz also scored twice for Virginia. Kyle Berkeley had two goals and a pair of assists and James Avanzato and Nick DeMaio added two goals each for To wson (1-2).... Graham Bundy Jr. had two goals and two assists to lead the No. 3 G eorgetown men to a 10-8 victory over No. 11 Penn in Philadelphia. Connor Morin added two goals and an assist for the Hoyas (2-0). Dylan Gergar netted four goals for the Quakers (0-1). — From news services and staff reports

TELEVISION AND RADIO
PROFESSIONAL BASKETBALL
2 p.m. NBA G League: G League Ignite at Cleveland » NBA TV
8 p.m. NBA All-Star Game » TNT, TBS

NHL
1 p.m. Carolina at Pittsburgh » NHL Network

MEN’S COLLEGE BASKETBALL
1 p.m. Providence at Butler » Fox Sports 1
1 p.m. Houston at Wichita State » ESPN
1 p.m. Michigan at Wisconsin » WUSA (Ch. 9), WJZ (Ch. 13)
2 p.m. Temple at Cincinnati » ESPN2
2 p.m. Missouri State at Northern Iowa » ESPNU
2:30 p.m. George Mason at Fordham » USA
3 p.m. Memphis at SMU » ESPN
3 p.m. Marquette at Creighton » Fox Sports 1
4 p.m. New Mexico at San José State » CBS Sports Network
5:30 p.m. Rutgers at Purdue » Fox Sports 1
7:30 p.m. Washington State at Southern California » Fox Sports 1
8 p.m. Mississippi State at Missouri » SEC Network

WOMEN’S COLLEGE BASKETBALL
Noon North Carolina at Florida State » MASN
Noon Massachusetts at Davidson » CBS Sports Network
Noon Texas at West Virginia » ESPN2
Noon Georgia at Auburn » SEC Network
Noon Wake Forest at Boston College » ACC Network
1 p.m. Tennessee at South Carolina » WJLA (Ch. 7), WMAR (Ch. 2)
1 p.m. Purdue at Rutgers » Big Ten Network
2 p.m. Virginia Tech at Louisville » ACC Network
2 p.m. Kentucky at Arkansas » SEC Network
2 p.m. Georgetown at Connecticut » CBS Sports Network
2 p.m. Syracuse at North Carolina State » MASN
2 p.m. UNC Wilmington at James Madison » NBC Sports Washington
3 p.m. Arizona at Washington State » Pac-12 Network
3 p.m. Maryland at Michigan » Big Ten Network
4 p.m. Stanford at Oregon » ESPN2
4 p.m. Florida at LSU » SEC Network
4 p.m. Oklahoma State at Kansas State » ESPNU
4 p.m. Pittsburgh at Virginia » ACC Network
5 p.m. Northwestern at Illinois » Big Ten Network
6 p.m. Alabama at Texas A&M » SEC Network
6 p.m. Houston at Tulane » ESPNU

AUTO RACING
2:30 p.m. NASCAR Cup Series: Daytona 500 » WTTG (Ch. 5), WBFF (Ch. 45)

GOLF

1 p.m. PGA Tour: Genesis Invitational, final round » Golf Channel
3 p.m. PGA Tour: Genesis Invitational, final round » WUSA (Ch. 9), WJZ (Ch. 13)
3 p.m. PGA Tour Champions: Chubb Classic, final round » Golf Channel

SOCCER

7 a.m. French Ligue 1: Angers at Nice » beIN Sports
7 a.m. Scottish Premiership: Rangers at Dundee United » CBS Sports Network
9 a.m. English Premier League: Manchester United at Leeds United » USA
9 a.m. French Ligue 1: Troyes at Rennes » beIN Sports
11 a.m. French Ligue 1: Monaco at Bordeaux » beIN Sports
11:30 a.m. English Premier League: Leicester City at Wolverhampton » USA
2:45 p.m. French Ligue 1: Clermont at Marseille » beIN Sports
3 p.m. SheBelieves Cup: New Zealand at United States » WJLA (Ch. 7),
WMAR (Ch. 2)

TENNIS
6 a.m. ATP: Qatar Open, Open 13, Rio Open and Delray Beach Open, finals;
WTA: Qatar Open, early rounds » Tennis Channel

COLLEGE SOFTBALL
10 a.m. Clemson vs. Washington » ESPNU
Noon UCLA vs. Wisconsin » ESPNU
7 p.m. UCLA vs. Florida State » ESPN

COLLEGE SWIMMING AND DIVING
8:30 a.m. ACC championships, Day 5 » ACC Network

COLLEGE WRESTLING
7 p.m. Iowa at Nebraska » Big Ten Network

MEN’S COLLEGE GOLF
11:30 a.m. Big Ten championship, match play » Big Ten Network

WOMEN’S COLLEGE GYMNASTICS
5 p.m. UCLA at Arizona State » Pac-12 Network

DIGEST

ASSOCIATED PRESS

The tee shot was close to per- fect, staying on the 10th green at Riviera and just left of the flag for the longest time until it trickled off the back. Joaquin Niemann was in no mood to complain. He holed the putt from just over 20 feet for eagle, and at that moment Saturday in the Genesis Invitational in Los Angeles, the 23-year-old from Chile was in a place no one had ever been on the fabled course off Sunset Boule- vard. Niemann was 21 under par. Lanny Wadkins never got there in 1985 when he set the 72-hole scoring record, the oldest such record on the PGA To ur. Dustin Johnson didn’t g et t here where he won big in 2017. Now it’s a matter of Niemann getting the prize that matters. He will try to become the first wire- to-wire winner of the tournament since Charlie Sifford in 1969. Niemann didn’t hit another fairway the rest of the third round, dropped two shots and

still managed a 3-under-par 68 that gave him a three-shot lead over Cameron Young. Niemann was at 19-under 194, breaking by two shots the record last matched by Justin Thomas in 2019. “I’m having the best time of my life right now,” Niemann said. “I just try to keep it calm, but, yeah, I’m enjoying it a lot and I just can’t wait to have a good day tomorrow.” That wouldn’t bode well for those chasing him. Young showed plenty of moxie for a 24-year-old PGA To ur rookie in only his 12th start on the tour. Even with Niemann playing so well, Young stayed with him for the longest time. Trailing by two, he caught a plugged lie in the bunker in front of the par-3 16th, took two shots to get out and made double bogey. A birdie on the par-5 17 th gave him a 69. He was looking at leader boards and wasn’t all that comfortable with what he saw, even with Young’s name in the second spot.

“It’s hard not to notice when you look at him running away from everybody,” Young said. “He was 5 under through 10 when he made 2. At 21 under with an eight- or whatever-shot lead over third? Honestly, I was playing okay... and he was running away from me.” Joining them in the final group will be 24-year-old Viktor Hov- land, who had eight birdies in his round of 65. That only got the Norwegian within six shots of Niemann. “It’s a little frustrating because 7 under through 11 holes and I had hardly gained any momen- tum, or I was peeking a little closer but I was still pretty far behind,” Hovland said. “If they just keep playing the way they do, there’s not much I can do. Should have played better the first day. All I can do is just keep playing like I am, and we’ll see what happens tomorrow.” Niemann was poised to win for the second time on the PGA To ur and needed only one more round in the 60s to break the tourna-

ment scoring record of 20-under 264 that Wadkins set in 1985. l PGA TOUR CHAMPIONS: Bernhard Langer maintained a two-stroke lead i n pursuit of a fourth Chubb Classic victory in Naples, Fla. A day after shooting his age, the 64-year-old German star had a 4-under 68 to get to 12-under 132 on Tiburon Golf Club’s Black Course. “It was a little more up and down,” Langer said. “Yesterday, I had a very clean card, no bogeys. To day, I h ad seven birdies but also three bogeys. I felt it was a little tougher today. Different wind direction and stronger wind as well.” Scott Parel (64), Retief Goosen (67) and Tim Petrovic (68) were tied for second in the PGA To ur Champions’ first full-field tournament of the year. Langer won the event — in its 35th season, the longest-running PGA To ur Champions tournament in the same city — in 2011 at the Quarry and 2013 and 2016 at TwinEagles.

GOLF ROUNDUP

Niemann touches 21 under to set a Riviera record

BY LIZ CLARKE

Former Cup Series driver Clint Bowyer loves the look of NAS- CAR’s new “Next Gen” racecar, smitten at first sight by its bigger, 18-inch wheels and sleek, stylish body. He’s wild about its deeper, throatier sound, too, as a self-pro- fessed “car guy” who hears music in the roar of V-8 engines. But what Bowyer likes best is the look of anxiety he sees in the eyes of NASCAR drivers as they prepare for Sunday’s season- opening Daytona 500 in a radical- ly retooled racecar they’ve barely had a chance to figure out. “They’re all nervous about this car,” said Bowyer, 42, a Fox broad- caster who as a driver famously skidded across the finish line of the 2007 Daytona 500 in an up- side-down Chevrolet in flames. “These guys are going to have their hands full, and I want to see that as a fan! I don’t want to see a guy, when you go to an in-car camera, looking like he’s on a Sunday afternoon cruise with his family.” The Next Gen car represents a major gamble for NASCAR, the country’s most popular form of auto racing. But it’s a gamble the sport had to take as the automotive industry steers away from four-door sedans, internal com- bustion engines and the old- school design principles at the heart of the 1970 s-era stock cars NASCAR’s Cup Series has been racing and refining for decades. More than any factor in the next five to 10 years, the Next Gen car will probably determine whether NASCAR keeps pace with the rapidly evolving auto industry that is stock-car racing’s lifeblood or gets left behind on the scrap heap of irrelevance. Come Sunday, however, when the 40-car field lines up at Dayto- na International Speedway, the only thing fans will care about is how the Next Gen car races. Will the 64th edition of what’s billed as the Great American Race deliv- er side-by-side action, hair-rais- ing passes, lead changes galore and a green-flag finish with plenty of good cars still running at the finish? Martin Truex Jr., who’ll start 14th in one of Joe Gibbs Racing’s

four To yota entries, is as curious as anyone. “We’re racecar drivers; we’ve driven all different kinds of cars,” said Truex, 41, who was edged by teammate Denny Hamlin in the closest Daytona 500 finish in history in 2016. “But we’ve been driving the same style of car for a long time at Daytona. So now, how’s this car going to feel once we get out there in a big pack, drafting two- and three-wide, 30 cars long, with the whole field in a big wad and the air disturbed? How’s it going to feel then? We don’t know.” Kevin Harvick, the winner of the 2 007 Daytona 500, explains drivers’ acclimation process this way: “It’s driving your street car for 20 years and then going to the lot and buying a new car and trying to figure out what all the buttons do. You’re figuring out the steering and why the brake pedal feels different, the gas pedal feels different — all the little things that go with transitioning from your old car to your new car.” The development of the Next Gen racecar, which took nearly three years amid a pandemic slowdown, was driven by business imperatives as NASCAR ex- ecutives looked five and 10 years down the road at the sport’s future and where the automotive industry was heading. They reached two primary conclu- sions. First, NASCAR needed to re- plenish its ranks of team owners. The founders of its most success- ful, multicar operations were ag- ing — Rick Hendrick is 72; Rich- ard Childress, 76; Joe Gibbs, 81; and Roger Penske, 85. These vet- erans, who account for 27 Cup Series championships among them, also account for 13 cars in Daytona’s field of 40 this year. To attract a new generation of owners, NASCAR concluded, the sport needed to reduce the cost of launching start-up Cup Series operations. Second, NASCAR needed to attract new car manufacturers to challenge Ford, Chevrolet and To yota and provide a hedge in case one of them pulled out of Cup Series racing, as Dodge did in 2012. Mustang is Ford’s last remain- ing production car, and its future

points toward an all-electric version. Chevrolet is expected to phase out the Camaro after 2024 and replace it with an EV version. But wooing new manufacturers to compete in NASCAR — whether Honda, Nissan or another company — is a tough sell when virtually nothing about the Cup cars’ antiquated technology relates to what they’re building. The conclusion: Get in step with automakers or get left behind. “The Next Gen car was built to be relevant,” said John Probst, NASCAR’s s enior vice president of racing innovation, by phone. Given that NASCAR’s business is entertainment, Probst added, another goal in developing the new car was to improve the racing by emphasizing drivers’ skill over teams’ engineering wizardry and costly wind-tunnel testing. “We’ve never sold a ticket to a wind tunnel,” he noted. The upshot is a racecar that differs from its predecessor in ways both subtle and significant. The exterior is now brand-spe- cific, with each model more close- ly resembling the Ford Mustangs, Chevy Camaros and To yota Cam- rys on the showroom floor — a change the manufacturers have long pressed NASCAR to make. The body is segmented into three parts, with f ront and rear sections that can be popped on and off. Rather than fabricating virtually every piece of the car from scratch, teams will buy Next Gen components from a common supplier, which makes building the car less labor-intensive and more like assembling a kit. Though not evident to the eye, there’s no sheet metal in the body panels. They’re made of carbon fiber-reinforced plastic that has some give. So when battered cars pull into the pits for repairs, fans won’t see crews banging out crumpled steel with mallets. In- stead, crews will pop off a dam- aged carbon-fiber panel and pop on a new one, as if a Barbie doll’s arm. With no mangled sheet metal to puncture or abrade tires, there ought to be fewer blowouts. And because the tires are bigger (18 rather than 15 inches), that puts more emphasis on the driver’s ability to keep the car from spin- ning out, Probst noted.

Engineering-wise, the Next Gen car includes an independent rear suspension and rack and pin- ion steering that’s more reactive to slight driver adjustments. Nei- ther technology is new; they’re “givens” on production cars. But their introduction in NASCAR is another example of the relevance automakers want to see. Though the gas-powered, V-8 engine is unchanged, the Next Gen car makes the deeper sound that Bowyer loves because the exhaust has been reconfigured. And in a move Probst charac- terizes as “future-proofing,” the car has been designed to accom- modate an inevitable transition from gas-powered engines to a “greener” powertrain — whether hybrid, electric or some variation — as manufacturers wean them- selves from fossil fuels. “Our whole purpose with this car is to be flexible enough to pivot in whatever direction we need to go that is in the best interests of our [manufacturing] partners,” Probst said, adding that NASCAR will take care not to alienate its fans in the process. So, what will fans notice when the green flag drops at Daytona? Pit stop aficionados will notice that tires are anchored with one central lug nut rather than five. But as the field speeds past in a 200 mph blur, the action ought to look much the same. Inside his No. 4 Ford Mustang, Harvick hopes to prove a quick study in mastering the myriad small, essential details he was fluent in the first two decades of his Cup career. “I’m still not comfortable with knowing what switches on what inside the racecar,” Harvick said by phone after the week’s first test at Daytona. “I still have to think about where third gear is; it’s not up and to the right anymore.” But as a former team owner in the second-tier Xfinity Series and third-tier Truck Series, he’s con- vinced NASCAR is on the right track with the Next Gen car. “In the end, I believe that the owners and the sport will come out better,” Harvick said. “But it’s going to take a few years for all the changes to cycle through.”

‘ Next Gen’ car roars into D aytona 500

Daytona 500 Today, 2:30 p.m., Fox

CHRIS GRAYTHEN/GETTY IMAGES Kevin Harvick practices in the n ew “Next Gen” racecar, NASCAR’s years-in-the-making gamble to maintain relevance in motorsports.

The Washington Post - USA (2022-02-20)

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