Nobody thinks of an American labor union and pictures multimillionaires fighting against a multibillion-dollar corporation. Nor does anyone usually assume that the union holds the upper hand in negotiations. Major League Baseball’s latest dramatic implosion, however, checks both boxes.
As the final buzzer sounded in Tufts women's basketball's matchup against the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth Corsairs on Dec. 4, the Jumbos came out on top with a resounding 76–59 win over the hosts to improve to 5–1 on the season. In a game defined by lots of back-and-forth action, the Jumbos used a huge fourth quarter to pull away and come out with the win.
Tufts men's basketball fell to Brandeis after five overtime periods in the final of the New England Big 4 Challenge this past weekend. Tufts beat Salem State 78–52 on Dec. 3 to advance to the championship game. Yet after a hard-fought battle, the Brandeis Judges ultimately secured the home court championship win with a score of 108–102.
At first glance, Zack Cummings is a cheerful 19-year-old from Saugus, Mass., a first-year undergraduate student at Tufts University who plans on studying political science and is a die-hard New England Patriots fan. But behind his contagious positivity and unending smile is a story of adversity and an extraordinary will to overcome.
Paul Svagdis (A93, AG96), an alum of the Tufts baseball and football programs, assumed his role as the new head coach of the baseball team last month. Svagdis comes to Tufts after serving as head coach at Azusa Pacific University in Southern California since 2002.
Standing at a modest 5 feet, 3 inches, Allison Cheng doesn’t intimidate at first glance. You’ll often find this friendly child studies and human development major conducting research in the Kaplan Lab or working in the music department. However, once equipped with a fencing foil and jacket, you won’t want to mess with this former Junior Olympics participant.
If you’ve been to a game at Bello Field this year, you’ve probably wondered who the tall man wearing bright neon green in goal is. Roaming the penalty area as his eyes scan the opposition’s attacking movement, he tracks the ball like a hawk, ready to charge at any loose ball. In spite of being blinded by the sun as the ball travels through a crowd of players, he manages the save, often at full stretch, palming the ball away.
Both Tufts men’s and women’s teams dropped all nine matches to the visiting Harvard Crimson in their home opener at the glistening Tufts Squash Courts on Tuesday. This is the first loss for both the men's and women's Jumbo teams, which are both now 3–1 on the season.
At a certain point in a team's successful run, the discussion of the "championship window closing" becomes a hotbed topic; for the Boston Bruins, it's all they've been hearing since 2019. Although they've been to two Stanley Cup finals since their win in 2011, the Bruins continue to fall short of expectations in the most frustrating of fashions. Take for example the recent playoff series loss to the New York Islanders; even though the Islanders took the Tampa Bay Lightning to the brink in the Eastern Conference Finals, they weren't the better team in the Bruins series. In each loss, the Bruins committed frustrating mistakes that ultimately led to their demise — bad turnovers, horrific shot attempts and undisciplined hockey, just to name a few.
In a close bout between Emerson and Tufts on Nov. 28, the Lions just squeaked by the Jumbos 75–72 to hand Tufts its fifth loss of the season. The 2019 NESCAC champions continue to struggle without senior co-captain Luke Rodgers, who exited the first game of the season with a knee injury. Without Rodgers, junior guard and co-captain Tyler Aronson and junior guard Carson Cohen have taken the helm on the offensive end, but the lack of a major post presence has hurt the Jumbos during most of their efforts this season.
On Nov. 21, the NFL encountered its 1,070th instance of Scorigami. What’s that, you say? Created by Jon Bois from SB Nation, Scorigami is the concept of experiencing a final score unique to NFL history. So when Indianapolis finished its beatdown of Buffalo on that Week 11 Sunday, the 41–15 result was added to the Scorigami record books.
Over Thanksgiving weekend, the Tufts men’s ice hockey team was swept in a two-game series against Stevenson University. Entering the weekend, the Jumbos’ record was 0–2–1. Comparatively, the Stevenson Mustangs’ record was 4–1–2. The first game ended with a score of 6–2, and the second 4–0, both in Stevenson's favor.
On Nov. 20, the men’s and women’s cross country teams traveled to E.P. “Tom” Sawyer State Park in Louisville, Ky. to compete in the NCAA Championship race. The men and women competed in the 8K and 6K races respectively.
On Nov. 24, Aaron Rodgers proclaimed on popular podcast “The Pat McAfee Show” that his post-COVID symptoms involved a case of “COVID toe.” One day later, he released a statement saying that he had no idea what COVID toes were, and that his toes were merely broken.
The only thing I am sure about at this point in the NFL season is that the transitive property is not applicable to the NFL. The Titans beat the Bills, Chiefs, Colts, Rams and Saints but have had gut-wrenching losses to the Jets and Texans. This epitomizes the energy of this NFL season, where no one team is the clear favorite and where nobody really knows what is going on. This is especially the case in the AFC.
Tufts men's and women’s squash took to the courts in Clinton, N.Y., to win their first three season matches this weekend. On Friday, both Jumbo teams blanked the Hamilton Continentals, each winning 9–0. Both teams brought that same momentum on Saturday when they beat Hobart and William Smith, followed by shutting out Connecticut College. The men’s team, ranked at 18th, lost only one game in the triple-header weekend, while the No. 16 women’s team lost three.
On Nov. 17, the Tufts men’s club soccer team flew to Foley, Ala., to participate in the National Intramural and Recreational Sports Association (NIRSA) National Championship tournament. The road there, however, has not been completely smooth.
On Oct. 7, 2021, multiple newspapers and sports channels confirmed that the Public Investment Fund, a Saudi Arabian wealth fund, had bought the English football team Newcastle United. The $400 million deal makes Newcastle United, nicknamed the "Magpies" by local fans, the richest football club in the world.
After a two-year hiatus from seeing action on the court, Tufts men’s basketball returned on Tuesday to play its first regular season game of the 2021–22 season against the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. Since their successful 2019 postseason run, the Jumbos have hired a new coach in Brandon Linton and return four starters and thirteen total players to their roster from 2019. The four starters, senior center and co-captain Luke Rogers, senior guard Brennan Morris, junior guard and co-captain Tyler Aronson, and junior guard Carson Cohen, will attempt to build on their NESCAC Championship and make a run at the NCAA Championship this season. However, the Jumbos also need to lose the rust and relearn how to play with intensity, which they lacked in their first game back. In the tough NESCAC division, the last team to surrender usually comes out on top. Aronson explained how the team felt ready to play, but still needed some time to figure out the kinks.
