Carolina avoids further infamy, and a CFP battle heats up

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Good morning! Don't throw your college pitcher too long today.
Finally, for a night, there is peace in Carolina. A 3-1 series deficit isn't ideal, sure, but gone are the Hurricanes from a strange, ignominious place in the sports world — losing 15 straight conference final games.
Quickly:
Now comes the harder part: doing it again, especially against a Panthers team that has steamrolled everyone in front of it during this postseason run. Game 5 is tomorrow.
Big playoff night tonight, too. More on that in a bit. Let's keep moving:
Osaka, Fritz lose
Naomi Osaka and Taylor Fritz, two of the biggest names in the French Open, are already heading home after first-round defeats yesterday. Osaka fell to No. 10 seed Paula Badosa in a loss that left her near tears. Fritz, the world No. 4 and top American men's seed in this tourney, came up short against Germany's Daniel Altmaier. Fritz has already had a great year, but clay isn't his best surface.
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Fight over CFP intensifies
The fabric of college football is changing by the day, as the College Football Playoff — freshly expanded to 12 teams this past year — could move to 14 or even 16 in the near future, and the power conferences continue to squabble over the overall number of teams and automatic bids assigned to each conference. From the outside, it appears a 14-team format would mostly benefit the Big Ten and SEC, while 16 teams could even odds a bit. SEC commissioner Greg Sankey said yesterday his members are intrigued by a 16-team format. It's a mess.
Clark out 2 weeks
Caitlin Clark suffered a strained quadriceps and will miss at least two weeks, the Fever announced yesterday. It's tough for Clark, an MVP favorite, and Indiana, who most expect to make the playoffs this year. If she misses the prescribed two weeks, it'll only be four games lost, though. Stay tuned.
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As the NBA and NHL playoffs inch closer to a conclusion, the summer's most prominent sport — baseball — continues a slow burn in the background.
I want to talk about two things (three players, really), based on our fresh Power Rankings published this morning:
Baseball season is incredibly long, yes, but barring unforeseen circumstances I suspect we'll be talking about all three of these guys in September.
See the full Power Rankings here. Almost finished:
📺 NBA: Knicks at Pacers
8 p.m. ET on TNT/Max
I mean, yes. This has been an incredible series. I have no idea what will happen. Just don't turn it off if someone goes up by 20. Huge news, too: Tyrese Haliburton's dad will be allowed in the building.
📺 NHL: Stars at Oilers
8 p.m. ET on ESPN
Another great series! Edmonton appears in control here, but that's more of a gut feeling than anything. Or maybe it's because Connor McDavid is scoring again.
Get tickets to games like these here.
Keith Law penned a fiery, must-read column on a new problem emerging in the baseball ecosystem: College coaches cannot be trusted with their pitchers' arms. Read it here.
Jaelan Phillips was going to be a superstar in the NFL. Then he missed most of the last two seasons with injuries. How did he cope? As Dan Pompei writes today, it was mostly music … and fantasy novels, and his cat. Great story.
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Novak Djokovic said he hopes to have a similar sendoff to Rafael Nadal's warm goodbye at the French Open this week. I thought his comments were interesting.
Laurie Whitwell published an incredible account of Manchester United's disaster season. There is already tremendous pressure on next season.
Most-clicked in the newsletter yesterday: Our story on Nadal's emotional farewell to the French Open and Roland Garros. Read it if you missed it.
Most-read on the website yesterday: The live blog from Thunder-Timberwolves.
Ticketing links in this article are provided by partners of The Athletic. Restrictions may apply. The Athletic maintains full editorial independence. Partners have no control over or input into the reporting or editing process and do not review stories before publication.

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The Brooklyn Nets have 52 jersey numbers worn by over 600 different players over the course of their history since the franchise was founded in 1967 as a charter member of the American Basketball Association (ABA), when the team was known as the "New Jersey Americans". Since then, that league has been absorbed by the NBA with the team that would later become the New York Nets and New Jersey Nets before settling on the name by which they are known today, bringing their rich player and jersey history with them to the league of today. To commemorate the players who played for the Nets over the decades wearing those 52 different jersey numbers, Nets Wire is covering the entire history of the franchise's jersey numbers and the players who sported them since the founding of the team. The 21st of those 52 different numbers is jersey No. 20, which has has had a total of 28 players wear the number in the history of the team. The second of those players wearing No. 20 played in the (then) New York (now, Brooklyn) Nets era, forward alum Randy Mahaffey. After ending his college career at Clemson, Mahaffey was picked up with the 16th overall selection of the 1967 NBA draft by the Los Angeles Lakers. The LaGrange, Georgia native would play parts of the first two seasons of his pro career with the ABA's (defunct) Kentucky Colonels instead, however, coming to an end when he was dealt to New York in 1968. His stay with the team would span just 48 games before he would be dealt again, this time to the (also defunct) Carolina Cougars in 1969. During his time suiting up for the Nets, Mahaffey wore only jersey No. 20 and put up 13.8 points, 8.1 rebounds, and 1.3 assists per game. All stats and data courtesy of Basketball Reference.