Toronto Raptors expected to confirm plans to retire Vince Carter’s No. 15

NEW YORK (AP) — Aaron Judge hit his major league-leading 58th home run, going deep for the fifth straight game to help the New York Yankees wrap up their second AL East title in three years with a 10-1 victory over the Baltimore Orioles on Thursday night.

Giancarlo Stanton had four RBIs that included his 27th homer, Alex Verdugo also homered and Gerrit Cole outpitched Corbin Burnes in a possible postseason preview. Judge and Stanton homered in the same game for the 14th time this year, tying Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris in 1961 for the most in Yankees history.

New York assured itself a first-round bye and home-field advantage in a best-of-five AL Division Series starting Oct. 5.

Baltimore, which clinched a postseason berth by winning Tuesday night’s opener of the three-game series, will be in a best-of-three Wild Card Series starting Tuesday.

Stanton homered in the second to put the Yankees ahead and hit a three-run double in a six-run sixth.

Judge hit a two-run homer in the seventh against Bryan Baker and has 144 RBIs, the most in the major leagues since Ryan Howard’s 146 in 2008. Judge matched his career best by homering in five consecutive games.

Making his last start before the playoffs, Cole (8-5) allowed two hits in 6 2/3 innings, struck out five and walked one, lowering his ERA to 3.41. He struck out Anthony Santander with a 98.1 mph fastball that ended the eighth after plate umpire David Rackley called a ball on the previous pitch, a knuckle-curve that appeared to be just above the strike zone. Cole glared as the umpire as the pitcher walked back to the dugout.

Cole was given a standing ovation when he walked to the dugout with two outs in the seventh and tipped his cap to the crowd of 42,022.

Burnes (15-9) allowed two hits in five innings, one walk and nine strikeouts — including eight on cutters. Burnes came out after 69 pitches and is likely to start the Orioles’ postseason opener on Tuesday. He had a 1.20 ERA in five September starts.

Stanton lofted a slider at the bottom of the strike zone into the left-field seats after missing badly at a slider on the prior pitch.

Austin Wells, in a 4-for-42 slide, forced in a run when he walked with the bases loaded against Cionel Pérez. Stanton drove the next pitch on one hop to the wall in right-center for a 5-1 lead. Stanton has 72 RBIs after hitting 6 for 18 with two doubles, two homers and eight RBIs in his last five games.

Anthony Rizzo added a two-run single against Baker.

Emmanuel Rivera hit a ninth-inning sacrifice fly for the Orioles.

UP NEXT

Orioles: LHP Cade Povich (2-9, 5.59) starts a series opener at Minnesota on Friday, when LHP Pablo López (15-9, 4.11) will be on the mound for the Twins.

Yankees: LHP Carlos Rodón (16-9, 3.98), 7-2 with a 2.87 ERA since the All-Star break. starts Friday’s series opener against Pirates RHP Jared Jones (6-8, 4.14).

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AP MLB:

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

OTTAWA – Noah Ostlund scored the overtime winner for the Buffalo Sabres in a 3-2 pre-season win over the Ottawa Senators on Thursday night.

Buffalo’s lineup had a combined total of just over 100 NHL games of experience as most of its regular roster is in Munich, Germany for the upcoming Global Series Challenge.

Felix Sandstrom made 14 saves for the Sabres (4-0-0). Josh Dunne and Isak Rosen had the Buffalo goals.

Adam Gaudette and Noah Gregor scored for Ottawa. Linus Ullmark made his first start in a Senators (3-1-0) uniform and didn’t disappoint, stopping 28 of 29 shots through 30 minutes of play.

Dustin Tokarski made 10 saves over a period and a half.

Ottawa opened the scoring at 7:55 after Carter Yakemchuk made a great defensive play to create a turnover. Gregor was then sent down the wing and he beat Sandstrom on the glove side.

Buffalo tied the game at the 10-minute mark. Vsevolod Komarov made a cross-crease pass to Dunne who stepped into the faceoff circle and beat Ullmark.

Buffalo had a 24-5 edge in shots after the first period.

Gaudette gave Ottawa the lead midway through the third with a power-play goal that was set up by Yakemchuk. Rosen tied it with 40.7 seconds remaining.

The Senators were expected to make a number of cuts after the game to reduce the size of their roster.

NOTES: The Sabres were given a special exemption from the league before the game. Teams usually have to dress a minimum of eight NHL veterans, but Buffalo didn’t have any in its lineup.

UP NEXT: The Senators will take on the Pittsburgh Penguins on Sunday in Sudbury, while the Sabres will head to Columbus on Saturday.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 26, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

CALGARY – Allyson MacNutt produced the biggest upset yet in a curling event that provides a stage for toppling heavyweights.

MacNutt’s team from Halifax, which will represent Canada at the 2025 world junior curling championship, defeated four-time national women’s champion Kerri Einarson 8-6 on Thursday at the PointsBet Invitational.

“So much fun. I’m freaking out,” MacNutt declared.

The round of 16 in Curling Canada’s PointsBet features junior, college, university, under-25 and club champions taking on some of the top teams in the country.

The single-knockout format of an event that offers just over $350,000 in prize money is unforgiving of early-season rust and rewarding for an unheralded team that’s hot at the right time.

The 14th-seeded MacNutt went toe-to-toe with the third-seeded Einarson at WinSport Arena.

She and teammates Maria Fitzgerald, Alison Umlah and Grace McCusker shot 84 per cent as a team to the Einarson foursome’s 74. MacNutt posted a 90 per cent to Einarson’s 71.

MacNutt led 7-6 on a miss from Einarson in the eighth end. After a blank ninth, MacNutt’s draw rubbed off a rock and rolled to the button.

Einarson’s attempted raise to remove it and score with her final throw of the 10th gave up another steal of one.

“It’s definitely tough,” Einarson said. “They played really well. They made a lot of great draws and we missed quite a few opportunities.

“We can’t take anything away from them. They played really well and we didn’t.”

MacNutt and teammates were such fans of Einarson, they asked for a group photo with her team before warm-up Thursday.

A couple hours later, it was MacNutt advancing to the quarterfinals and not Einarson.

“It’s crazy watching them on TV growing up and now, like playing against them, and beside all of these amazing teams, and just like having a great game, it’s just so insane,” MacNutt said. “I’m like, speechless right now.”

All 32 teams receive $5,000 to defray travel expenses.

A first-round win is worth $3,000, a quarterfinal is $6,000, a semifinal is $12,000 and $24,000 goes to Sunday’s men’s and women’s victors for a total take of $50,000 for those teams.

MacNutt will face Kate Cameron, who was an 8-5 winner over Jolene Campbell, in Friday’s quarterfinal.

Kayla Skrlik meets Chelsea Carey, Kaitlyn Lawes takes on Selena Sturmay and defending champion Rachel Homan is up against Corryn Brown in the other women’s quarterfinals.

Brad Gushue squares off against Rylan Kleiter, Kevin Koe faces Jordan MacDonald, Brad Jacobs plays Owen Purcell and Mike McEwen meets Felix Asselin in the men’s quarterfinals.

The 11th-seeded Asselin ousted defending champion Reid Carruthers 5-4 on Thursday evening with a tiebreaking draw-the-button that is part of the PointsBet format.

McEwen thumped national junior men’s champion Kenan Wipf 11-3, second seed Jacobs defeated college champion Jacob Horgan 9-2 and Purcell was an 11-6 winner over Aaron Sluchinski.

Einarson was without her usual front end in Calgary. Shannon Birchard, who is nursing a knee injury, was replaced by Laura Walker.

Birchard won’t be available to the team at next week’s season-opening Grand Slam, the HearingLife Tour Challenge, in Charlottetown.

“I’m not exactly sure how long she’s out for, but we’ll see,” Einarson said. “No surgery. She just needs a lot of physio.”

Krysten Karwacki has been Einarson’s lead since the eve of February’s Scotties Tournament of Hearts.

Einarson’s regular lead Briane Harris is awaiting the outcome of an appeal of a doping violation that she says was due to inadvertent ingestion.

“Laura is a great fill-in,” Einarson said. “She’s a great addition to the team to fill in for Shannon, but it does change a little bit of our dynamics.

“We did our best with what we could do, and always a lineup change is tough.”

Skrlik beat Danielle Inglis 9-2 and Carey was a 10-4 winner over Canadian women’s club champion Abby Burgess in the afternoon draw.

Second-seeded Carey, who is skipping retired Jennifer Jones’s former team, admitted that it can be uncomfortable playing an underdog with nothing to lose and everything to gain.

“It’s big pressure on the top-seeded teams,” Carey said. “It almost can feel like a no-win situation, because if you win, everybody goes, ‘Well, yeah, of course they won.’ And if you don’t, then everybody goes, ‘Well, what’s wrong with them?'”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 26, 2024.