Sunday SI: Skubal Is Ready for October

Inside the 49ers’ Australia trip, our NBA standings forecast and the night Ole Miss moved on.

SI WEEKEND EDITION  The Best Stories, Videos and Moments From This Week    Kohjiro Kinno/Sports Illustrated COVER STORY The Shoulders on Which Titles Are Built: Tarik Skubal Is Calibrated for October By Tom Verducci It’s been a generation since the last World Series three-peat, and the Dodgers are going old school to end the drought. With Skubal in the mix, their embarrassment-of-riches rotation is ready to recall the pitching giants of postseasons past. READ MORE  🔓 SI ACCESS Exclusive reporting and behind-the-scenes access: IMAGN IMAGES/Reuters Connect Inside the 49ers’ Trip to Australia and How They Defeated Jet Lag and the Rams By Albert Breer For San Francisco’s longest-tenured player, all it took was some melatonin, ‘a lot of caffeine’ and time for his body to wake up Down Under.   READ MORE  ☕ SI COFFEE SHOP While drinking your favorite beverage, here are some stories to read:  From left: Jesse D. Garrabrant/NBAE/Getty Images; Nathaniel S. Butler/NBAE/Getty Images; Joshua Gateley/Getty Images; Adam Pantozzi/NBAE/Getty Images Photo illustration by Bryce Wood Predicting the 2026–27 NBA Standings: Which Teams Will Rise, Fall and Surprise? By SI NBA Staff It’s time to get the crystal ball out and predict how the NBA standings will look come April. We are less than five weeks away from opening night. Teams will begin reporting to training camp in just a handful of days. READ MORE  IMAGN IMAGES/Reuters Connect The NFL’s Latest Offensive Trend Was Hiding in Plain Sight As It Swept the League in Week 1 By Conor Orr The NFL saw its highest usage of under-center snaps since 2017. Ten teams had at least a 10% increase in under-center usage and, for the first time since at least 2022, there was a positive EPA per play on under-center snaps collectively.  READ MORE  Calvin Mattheis/Reuters Connect Ranking the 15 Most Hostile Games in College Football History By SI College Football Staff On-field brawls, field storms, flying mustard bottles and burned effigies, these games brought some of the sport’s fiercest rivalries to a boiling point. READ MORE  COLLEGE FOOTBALL REVIEW Justin Ford/Getty Images Inside the Night Ole Miss Finally Put Lane Kiffin in the Rearview Mirror By Bryan Fischer, Pat Forde The LSU coach left the Rebels amid a storm of bitterness last season that built a 10-month grudge. In their first meeting, his former team sent him home with a definitive loss. READ MORE  Justin Ford/Getty Images North Carolina’s Investigation Is Over. Bill Belichick’s On-Field Problems Aren’t. By Dan Lyons A day after UNC closed the investigation that led to the ouster of general manager Michael Lombardi and defensive coordinator Steve Belichick, the Tar Heels suffered an ugly loss at Clemson. READ MORE  Andrew Nelles/Imagn Images Vanderbilt’s Miracle Win Over NC State Rivals Western Michigan-Michigan for Last-Second Finish of the Year By Patrick Andres The Wolfpack will be thinking about that one until the end of time. READ MORE  📺 WHAT TO WATCH Bob Donnan/Imagn Images NFL Minnesota Vikings vs. Chicago Bears, 1 p.m. ET, FOX The Bears—who scored an NFL-high 59 points last week—tied for the second-most points ever in a season-opening game. The Vikings scored 29 unanswered second-half points to defeat Green Bay 39-22 last week. Washington Commanders vs. Dallas Cowboys, 4:25 p.m. ET, FOX Both teams suffered season-opening losses, but history favors the Cowboys in this NFC East battle. Over the past 10 years, Dallas holds an 8-2 home record against the Commanders. Indianapolis Colts vs. Kansas City Chiefs, 8:20 p.m. ET, NBC For the first time since 1970, three teams—the Chiefs, Rams and Giants—will each play their first two games in prime time (7 p.m. ET or later) in the same season. WNBA Washington Mystics vs. Indiana Fever, 4 p.m. ET, NBA TV Portland Fire vs. Los Angeles Sparks, 7 p.m. ET, USA Network Seattle Storm vs. Las Vegas Aces, 9 p.m. ET, USA Network The final week of the season begins with teams setting positions for the postseason.   #️⃣ BEST OF SOCIAL 🎬 BEST OF SI VIDEO 🔢 THE WEEK IN NUMBERS 192 The number of high school players who hail from the state of Texas is the highest of any state on NFL kickoff weekend rosters. 56 Ohio State has the most active players from one school in the NFL. We may receive compensation for some links to products and services included in this email. 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