Ball Girl #111: May I present you, Johnny "Ice Cream"

You know what we don't love? A 25-year old man who still acts like a little boy, AKA, Peter Pan-ning and refusing to ever grow up. You know what we do love? A little boy who acts like a little boy who is a goddamn NFL reporter. Age appropriateness is underrated.

Well may I present you your new favorite reporter, Johnny "Ice Cream;" Johnny is the official Atlantic Health Systems Kid Reporter for the NY Jets, and everytime our boys in green win, Johnny's Dad takes him out for a scoop of ice cream. Holy wholesomeness. Well, Johnny has gotten A LOT of ice cream thus far this season with the Jets standing at 6-3, and he let Twitter know he plans to have a lot more in the second half of the season...

Can I have your number?

1: Number of PGA tournaments Tony Finau won in his first 185 tournaments played. After winning the Houston Open yesterday, he now has four wins in his last 30 tournaments, including three in this calendar year.

TLDRs

⛳ Tony Finau wins the Houston Open, finishing 16-under for the tournament despite an objectively week R4 (1-under for the day). Finau takes home $1.512 million and a shiny new world ranking (#12). Tyson Alexander and Ben Taylor took 2nd and 3rd, finishing 12-under and 11-under, respectively.

🏈 This weekend, we got not just one, not two, but THREE intense games that came down to the wire. Read on for more.

🏒 It might be time to bring back Wiz Khalifa’s Black and Yellow because the Boston Bruins continue their domination with a 5-2 win over the Vancouver Canucks. This win marks their 9th win at TD Garden this season and a perfect at-home record. Why are the Bruins SO GOOD (as if Boston really needed another decent sports franchise)? 1) They have a new head coach Jim Montgomery who was a former assistant for the St. Louis Blues and kinda crushed it last year 2) A stellar season thus far from forward David Pastrnak who has notched 19 goals in just 16 games and 3) a DEEP bench; 8/9 of Boston’s regular rotating forwards this season have produced a goal this season.

🎓🏀  Only a week into season and we’re already seeing juicy upsets. This past weekend, unranked Colorado upset no. 11 Tennessee. The game came down to a whopping 43.5% shooting percentage by Colorado (read: Colorado players made 43.5% of the shots they attempted), whereas Tennessee managed just 25.4%. Womp, womp. Just like my hot blonde friends and myself 🐀 out at the bars! New rankings come out today and Tennessee is sure to take a tumble.

🏀We had more buckets last night than that scene in the Spongebob movie where Plankton forces everyone into little bucket helmets (the real ones know). Allow me to explain: a really good player in the NBA might score ~20 points in a game. But a great game? Expect somewhere in the 30s. Well, Darius Garland (Cleveland Cavaliers) dropped 51 points on the Minnesota Timberwolves (they still lost the game cause 1 man can’t do it all). Hold your horses, because mere HOURS later, Joel Embiid (Philadelphia 76’ers) decided to one up Garland with 59 points against the Utah Jazz. 59. Did I stutter?! Y’all this is not normal. But then again, neither are 7 foot men, so welcome to the sport of basketball.

🎓🏈  Have you ever heard of the horned frog? Nope, this is not a sex position but TCU’s mascot. TC-who? Texas Christian University. TCU is currently #4 in the latest AP poll, having started the season unranked. They are also 1 of 4 teams that still have a perfect, undefeated record, having just taken down the Texas Longhorns this weekend. The other top ranked teams are #1 Georgia #3 Ohio State and #3 Michigan, all brand names in football. So let me put this in perspective — this is like your local, one-off boutique suddenly hitting the runway with Prada, Gucci, and Versace.

NFL Update

This weekend, the Vikings narrowly defeated the Bills, the Packers bested the Cowboys in OT, and the 49ers just barely eked past the Chargers. But the most notable game of the weekend? Kirk Cousins and the Minnesota Vikings versus Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills. People are already calling it the game of the year… Let’s break it down:

• Going into this game, the Vikings’ record was 7-1 and the Bills’ record was 6-2. So… they are two of the best teams across the NFL right now. We already know the Bills are legit — Josh Allen proved that with his breakout performance last year. The Vikings, on the other hand, are generally solid but not too flashy… so this was Kirk Cousins’ time to defend the Vikings’ honor and prove they’re not messing around.

• The game went back and forth all four quarters… With the game on the line, Bills’ QB Josh Allen uncharacteristically fumbled the snap (read: when he was thrown the ball to start the play, he dropped it 😭), and the Vikings scored a defensive touchdown (read: the defense intercepts the ball, or in this case, recovers a fumble, and runs it to the opposing end zone for a touchdown). The Bills scrambled to kick a field goal to tie things up, sending the game to OT. Then the Vikings scored a field goal in OT to go up, giving the Bills an opportunity to respond… The Bills drove down the field and got in position to score a touchdown to win it… But QB Josh Allen choked and threw an interception 😢 handing the Vikings the win.

• Player of the Game? Justin Jefferson. King popped off. The Vikings’ receiver caught 10 balls for a career-high 193 receiving yards, and scored two touchdowns. That’s the most receiving yards by any player in the NFL this season.

• Side note: Since the Bills lost, this means that the NY Jets are now playing for first place in the AFC East next week 🤯. For context: the Jets were 4-13 last season.

• Everyone is talking about Kirk Cousins, Vikings’ quarterback. He is jokingly and lovingly known as the most average QB in the NFL — he’s not great, he’s not terrible, but things generally tend to work out for him. One minute he will make an insanely clutch throw, and the next he’ll do something so completely dumb that you’ll question his brain cell count. That is, except for yesterday, when he decided to be the best quarterback of all time…

Time Out for the Tea

The situation for Griner progresses, yet again

If you’ve been following the Brittney Griner story (TLDR: was caught in the Moscow airport with hash and has been detained in Russia ever since… Recently, she was denied an appeal of her nine year sentence), the situation has recently become even scarier. Griner has been transferred to a Russian forced labor camp and the U.S. Government “has no idea of her whereabouts.”

Fake accounts tweet LeBron James and Aroldis Chapman moving teams

• PSA: You can now pay for a blue checkmark on Twitter (for $8 a month). For all of our non-tweeters, a blue checkmark was previously a means to distinguish genuine famous account holders from impersonators. With this new move by Elon to return “power to the people” (and allow people to simply pay for a blue checkmark), we’re already seeing mayhem across the Twitterverse. Fake accounts of NBA star LeBron James and MLB star Aroldis Chapman tweeted that the two would be moving teams 🤦🏼‍♀️. But who’s to say if these are the real accounts or not?! We’re sure more stories like this to come in the coming months.

Must Watch This Week:

Monday, Nov 14

• 🎓🏀 8:00pm ET, #3 Houston Cougars vs. Oral Roberts Golden Eagles

• 🏈 8:15pm ET, Philadelphia Phillies vs. Washington Commanders

• 🏀 7:30pm ET, Pheonix Suns vs. Miami Heat

• 🏒 8:30pm ET, L.A Kings vs. Calgary Flames

Tuesday, Nov 15

• 🏀 9:00pm ET, NY Knicks vs. Utah Jazz

• 🏒 7:00pm ET, Dallas Stars vs. Tampa Bay Lightning