ON TODAY'S SCORECARD
Sleight of Hand

From October's opening night tipoff to Sunday's regular-season finale, the NBA playoffs have arrived 173 days later.

Here are the current favorites:

Oklahoma City Thunder +115
San Antonio Spurs +550
Boston Celtics +550
Denver Nuggets +1100
Cleveland Cavaliers +1100
New York Knicks +2000
Detroit Pistons +2000
Houston Rockets +6000

And for what it’s worth, Orlando’s loss at Boston on Sunday completely shook up the Eastern Conference playoff seedings.

By losing, the Magic cemented themselves as the eighth seed and will have to travel to Philadelphia to play the 76ers; the winner will move on to play the No. 2 seed Celtics in the first round.

The game directly determined the first play-in tournament game in the East. It also shook up the Eastern Conference playoff picture even beyond Orlando dropping to the No. 8 seed and gifting Philadelphia the No. 7 seed. Rather dramatically, as it turns out.

Orlando’s loss changed the playoff seeding of two other teams as well. The Magic’s loss paved the way for the Raptors to finish with the No. 5 seed; a win would have slotted Toronto into the sixth seed.

Consequentially the Hawks dropped to the sixth seed because they lose out on a tiebreaker. If Orlando had won, all three teams would have finished with identical records, and tiebreakers meant Atlanta would have been the fifth seed and Toronto the sixth.

In essence the Magic’s inability to beat what was effectively a G League roster (none of the Celtics starters played) flipped the Raptors and Hawks in the standings. The Knicks will now play Atlanta while the Cavaliers will play Toronto after entering the day expecting the opposite.

The year isn’t lost yet, technically. The Magic can still qualify for the playoffs by winning one of their next two games.

But that doesn’t change the deep disappointment that will be felt throughout the organization after beginning the season with expectations of homecourt advantage in the first round of the playoffs with hopes even higher than that.

With the Playbook Hoops newsletters having concluded for the season, we will utilize this ‘Grinding Out The Profits’ section in the Coffee Club to share exclusive insight into the 2026 College Football season directly from the 2026 Playbook Football Preview Guide magazine. With that here is a noteworthy

‘STAT YOU WILL LIKE’:

This will be the first season since 2011

that neither Clemson nor Florida State

will be favored to win the ACC.

Perhaps the most intriguing NBA Playoff opening round matchup is that of the Lakers and the Rockets.

The Lakers have won five of the eight postseason matchups and hold a 21–15 lead in their postseason history. Only two of the series went to a winner-take-all series-deciding game and one of those was in a three-game series in ’81.

However, this will be the first time that LeBron’s Lakers have played Durant’s Rockets in the postseason (as it is Durant’s first season in Houston), it's far from the only time these organizations have ever met.

If you’re like me and wondering why the 4 seed-Lakers, with only THREE teams in the entire league with a better record, are dogs to the Rockets then let me know.

Against one another in the postseason, James and Durant have played in three lopsided series. Here are their stats:

             Points          Assists        Rebounds

James   31.9 PPG     9 APG         10.3 RPG

Durant  31.6 PPG     8.1 RPG       4.8 APG

For some comparison to what those guys did over three Finals matchups, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander averaged 30.3 points, 4.6 rebounds and 5.6 assists on his way to Finals MVP last year. Doncic averaged 29.2 points, 8.8 rebounds and 5.6 assists in the ’24 Finals in a loss to the Celtics while Jaylen Brown won Finals MVP with 22.2 points, 7.8 rebounds and 7.2 assists over five games.

Jannik Sinner defeated Carlos Alcaraz on Sunday to win the Monte-Carlo Masters, adding another chapter to a rivalry whose margins remain razor-thin.

Head-to-head: In addition to weeks at No. 1, Sinner and Alcaraz entered Sunday's “Sincarez” final with the same number of ATP titles, the same number of points in their 16 previous head-to-head matches, and even the same amount of time on the court in Monte Carlo.

Sinner's historic run: Sinner's 7-6, 6-3 victory helped him reclaim the No. 1 ranking from Alcaraz and marked his fourth consecutive Masters 1000 title, a feat last accomplished by Novak Djokovic in 2013.

This will be Sinner's 67th week atop the rankings, breaking a tie with… Alcaraz for the 12th most all-time.

That's just one of the many areas in which the phenoms are neck-and-neck as they build two of the greatest careers in tennis history.

Sinner now holds the narrowest of leads in weeks at No. 1 (67-66), overall titles (27-26), and points in head-to-head matches (1,739-1730), while drawing even with eight Masters 1000 titles.

Alcaraz still leads the all-time series, 10-7, and has a commanding 7-4 lead in the all-important tally of Grand Slam titles. Still just 22, he's also two years younger than his Italian rival.

A league of their own: There's Sinner (13,350 ATP rankings points) and Alcaraz (13,240) … and then there's everyone else (next-most ATP ranking points: 5,555). "The Big Two" have claimed the past nine Grand Slam titles, and now they've won 11 of the past 21 Masters 1000 tournaments.

Looking ahead: This was Sinner's first "big" title on clay, whereas Alcaraz has six.

He'll have a chance to build on that with upcoming events in Madrid and Rome, which lead into next month's French Open — the only major standing between Sinner and the career Grand Slam.

Now that’s razor-close!

The Big 12 announced Friday its weekday contests for the 2026 football season, including nine telecasts among its national television partners.

Eight of these games will be played on Fridays, with one Thursday event taking place Thanksgiving Day.

The Border Showdown between Kansas and Missouri kicks off the slate of broadcasts on Friday, Sept. 11. Houston visits Texas Tech the following week to finish the September ledger of games.

October also offers a pair of games, with Iowa State traveling to BYU on October 9, followed by Baylor at UCF on October 30.

The schedule then ramps up in November with the final five contests. TCU heads to Arizona on Nov. 6, followed by Houston at Colorado on Nov. 13.

The final three games take place in a one-week span, starting with Iowa State at UCF on Nov. 20. The Thanksgiving affair takes place in Lubbock, with TCU visiting Texas Tech. West Virginia visits Utah on Nov. 27 to end the group of games.

2026 Big 12 Football Weekday Selections

Friday, Sept. 11 – Missouri at Kansas
Friday, Sept. 18 – Houston at Texas Tech
Friday, Oct. 9 – Iowa State at BYU
Friday, Oct. 30 – Baylor at UCF
Friday, Nov. 6 – TCU at Arizona
Friday, Nov. 13 – Houston at Colorado
Friday, Nov. 20 – Iowa State at UCF
Thursday, Nov. 26 – TCU at Texas Tech
Friday, Nov. 27 – West Virginia at Utah