Softball. Baseball. Lacrosse. What do these sports have in common? In 2025, they all fielded brand-new professional women’s leagues.

But wait, there’s even more high-stakes playoff football on deck: It’s also NFL Wild Card Weekend, giving us five straight days of touchdowns, tackles, and tension. We’ll preview Monday’s tilt between the Houston Texans and Pittsburgh Steelers in our next newsletter. Until then, here’s a two-minute drill on this weekend’s five games. That NFL bracket won’t pick itself, after all.

Settle into your best RBF — the College Football Playoff (CFP) national title game is halfway set following last night’s heart-stopping semifinal, and one more squad will punch their ticket to the January 19th championship tonight. Here’s what you need to know ahead of the 7:30 p.m. ET kickoff.

After months of consideration, Tomorrow Golf League (TGL) is teaming up with the LPGA to launch the WTGL, a virtual offseason golf league featuring LPGA athletes. When announcing the league on ESPN’s SportsCenter, LPGA star Lexi Thompson said WTGL “brings in a whole different fan base” than traditional golf does.

The second League One Volleyball (LOVB, pronounced “love”) season is officially underway. Here’s what went down during Wednesday’s season-opening rematch between defending champ Austin and runner-up Nebraska, plus where to watch the NCAA-stars-turned-LOVB-rookies you know and love this weekend. Bump to it.

And then there were four. The College Football Playoff (CFP) semis kick off with tomorrow’s 7:30 p.m. ET Fiesta Bowl, featuring No. 6 Ole Miss and bracket-busting No. 10 Miami, followed by the Peach Bowl slated for Friday.

It’s officially pro women’s volleyball season. Two leagues — League One Volleyball (LOVB) and Major League Volleyball (MLV) — will begin their second and third seasons, respectively, this week, so we’re serving up a deep dive on the surging sport.

We’re six stops into the PWHL’s third Takeover Tour, which expanded significantly this year in terms of length, number of stops, and brand partners. While Canadian tour stops are pulling more fans than U.S. ones, the tour is proving successful in every city when it comes to attendance.

With the calendar turning to 2026, that means it’s officially an Olympic year — that’s right, the Milano Cortina Games begin in just 32 (!!!) days. As the Olympic torch travels across Italy, here are the latest Olympic headlines, by the numbers.

The Week 18 NFL slate can sometimes be a buffet of meaningless football, with the playoff field often set and teams resting their top talent — but not this year. There was plenty to play for in the regular-season finale, from division titles to all-important playoff seeding. Let’s dig in.

Before we dig into all the hoopla to come, let’s take a look back at Unrivaled’s stellar 2025 debut. Unrivaled was launched in part to provide hoopers with a domestic playing option during the WNBA offseason, a welcome addition to the (increasingly crowded) women’s basketball landscape.

Save one lockout-canceled holiday in 1998, the NBA’s top teams have met on December 25th each year since 1947, just one year after the Basketball Association of America (which later became the NBA) was formed.