Saturday, January 08, 2011

Jim Harbraugh to 49ers

Jim Harbaugh has agreed to become the next coach of the San Francisco 49ers, according to multiple reports.

After leading Stanford to an Orange Bowl rout over Virginia Tech Monday, Harbaugh quickly took center stage in the football world as he wavered between several options for his coaching future -- the Dolphins and Broncos both reportedly dropped out of the running for the highly coveted coach, while Stanford made one last push to reunite Harbaugh and star QB Andrew Luck for a 2011 run at a national title.

Instead, Harbaugh will end up in San Francisco, which was initially believed to be the front-runner for his services. ESPN's Adam Schefter reported that Harbaugh's deal with the 49ers is for five years and $25 million.

Harbaugh posted a 29-21 record in four seasons as Stanford's head man, including this year's 12-1 mark that included the Cardinal's BCS-bowl win. He had a 29-6 mark at San Diego, before Stanford hired him away from the Toreros.

Harbaugh, whose only NFL coaching experience came as Oakland's QB coach in 2002-03, will take over the job that became available when the 49ers fired Mike Singletary. San Francisco finished this season a disappointing 6-10, good only for third in the watered-down NFC West.

Tuesday, January 04, 2011

the greatest winning streak

The UConn women went for their 89th straight victory last night when they squared off against Florida State. With their win, they passed John Wooden’s famous UCLA men’s teams of the 1970s that put together the 88-game win streak that served as the gold standard in college basketball before Geno Auriemma’s women began their run. Yet neither of these two teams have the greatest winning streak in sports history.

With a streak that is nearly eight years long and counting, Dutch wheelchair tennis starlet Esther Vergeer has persevered from a spinal cord surgery at 8 years old which rendered her paraplegic to dominate the tennis courts like no other.

No matter the surface, Vergeer has known nothing but victory when she hits the court. Heading into next month’s Australian Open, the Dutchwoman is at 401 straight singles victories and counting. During that streak, further, Vergeer went over two years (from August 2004 to October 2006) without losing a single set — a stretch of 250 sets in which she was pushed to a thirteenth-game tiebreaker but once. Vergeer has won every Grand Slam tournament in which she’s competed in singles and all but her first (the 2002 Australian Open) in doubles. She’s taken seven singles and six doubles titles on the hard courts of Melbourne, all four editions of the French Open wheelchair tournament in both singles and doubles, both of the Wimbledon doubles tournaments held on the lawns of the All-England Club, and all five editions of the U.S. Open for both singles and doubles.