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The Houston Texans have won consecutive games for the first time this season by virtue of a hard fought 24-21 victory over the visiting San Francisco 49ers. The Texans led 21-0 at halftime but fought themselves in a ball game after the Niners scored the first 14 points of the second half. The rally fell short, however, and Houston improved to 4-3 on the NFL season.

Nicknamed The Golden Jet for his blond hair and his jet-like slap shot, Bobby Hull was the most feared goal scorer of the 60s and 70s He and teammate Stan Mikita were the first NHL players to use curved stick blades, which made his already wicked slapshot even more difficult to stop.

Alabama didn’t so much win their game against Tennessee on Saturday as much as they escaped. Despite playing one of their worst games of the year they managed to keep their undefeated season alive as nose tackle Terrance Cody blocked a potential game winning field goal on the last play of the game to preserve a 12-10 victory for the Crimson Tide. Alabama held a tenuous 12-3 lead late in the game before a Tennessee touchdown and recovered onside kick had them facing the specter of the defeat for the first time this season. Instead, Alabama improved to 8-0 while Tennessee slipped to 3-4.

Vitor Belfort made his first appearance in the UFCs iconic octagon in five years, headlining the main event of UFC 103 in Dallas, Texas. Just over three minutes later, he had already become a top contender in the middleweight and light heavyweight divisions. Belfort dominated veteran Rich Franklin en route to a devastating knockout victory, and following the bout talk quickly shifted to The Phenom as a potential future opponent for both Anderson Silva and Lyoto Machida.

After losing the services of starting goalie Roberto Luongo for the indefinite future with a broken rib, the Canucks may have breathed a sigh of relief too soon after backup goalie Andrew Raycroft’s performance in his first game in relief. After an excellent effort in an overtime victory over Los Angeles, Raycroft was torched for four goals in two periods before being pulled from the game. Corey Schneider, recently recalled from Manitoba of the AHL, played the third period in net giving up three more goals as Anaheim cruised to a 7-2 victory. The Canucks scored twice in the first five minutes of the game to lead 2-0 before giving up seven unanswered goals.

It wasn’t a game for the ages by the Buffalo Bills, as they blew much of a 17 point lead to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Still, they did what they had to do and put some offense on the board en route to a 33-20 National Football League victory. The Bills shot out to a 17-0 first quarter lead before Tampa Bay answered with 14 of their own in the second quarter.

Helio Gracie–patriarch of the legendary Gracie MMA family–died earlier this year in Rio De Janeiro at age 95. His influence on martial arts, and even more so the sport that is known known as mixed martial arts, is staggering. The Gracie family name will forever be synonymous with Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, MMA and the UFC due to the accomplishments of Helio Gracie and his progeny.

One of the stranger sports stories of the past is that of Rick Ankiel. Ankiel became a vital cog in the starting rotation of the 2000 St. Louis Cardinals and as a lefthanded pitcher possessing both velocity and wicked breaking stuff his upside was unlimited. As the playoffs began, injuries had decimated the Cards starting rotation forcing Tony LaRussa to use Ankiel as the game 1 starter against the Atlanta Braves and their ace, Greg Maddux. In the course of an inning, it all fell apart for Rick Ankiel’s career as a starting pitcher. In the third inning of game one, working with a 6-0 lead, Ankiel allowed 2 hits, 4 walks and 5 wild pitches before being pulled with two outs. Initially, he wrote it off as a bad outing until history quickly repeated itself in game 2 of the NLCS against the NY Mets. He threw only 20 pitches in that game, 5 of which went past catcher Eli Marrero. For the next several years he tried to fix the control problems that suddenly manifest themselves on baseballs biggest stage but was unable to do so. Compounding the frustration of Ankiel and his team was the fact that his control problems weren’t physical or mechanical, but strictly psychological.

In a victory for the highlight reels, Brett Favre completed a 32 yard touchdown pass to Greg Lewis with 2 seconds remaining in the game to lift the Minnesota Vikings to a dramatic 27-24 come from behind victory over the San Francisco 49ers. The rapidly improving 49ers dropped their first game of the year in heartbreaking fashion, while the Vikings remained undefeated at 3-0.

Though it enjoyed solid fan support and was popular among sports betting enthusiasts, arena football fell off the map with the demise of the Arena Football League. The AFL suspended play under the weight of a poor business model in 2009 and later pulled the plug altogether. Since then, a new league has announced plans to take its place. Arena Football One (AF1 for short) will begin play in April and on Thursday secured a TV contract to broadcast games on the NFL Network in the United States. The TV deal should help the new arena football entrant to get off to a successful start as they attempt to revive the sport.