March 31
1909 - Baseball’s National Commission rules that players who jump contracts will be suspended for five years. Players joining outlaw organizations will be suspended for three years as punishment for going outside organized baseball.
1923 - The Ottawa Senators of the NHL completes a two-game sweep of the WCHL’s Edmonton Eskimos with a 1-0 victory to win the Stanley Cup for the third time in four years. Harry “Punch” Broadbent scores the goal.
1968 - The American League’s new franchise in Seattle chooses Pilots as its nickname.
1973 - The Philadelphia Flyers tie an NHL record for most goals in one period, scoring eight goals in the second period of a 10-2 win over the New York Islanders.
1973 - Ken Norton scores a stunning upset by winning a 12-round split decision over Muhammad Ali to win the NABF heavyweight title. Norton, a 5-1 underdog, breaks Ali’s jaw in the first round.
1975 - UCLA beats Kentucky 92-85 for its 10th NCAA basketball title under head coach John Wooden. Wooden finishes with a 620-147 career record after announcing his retirement two days earlier.
1985 - Old Dominion beats Georgia 70-65 for the women’s NCAA basketball championship.
1986 - Freshman center Pervis Ellison hits two free throws with 27 seconds left to seal Louisville’s 72-69 victory over Duke in the NCAA basketball championship.
1990 - Quebec’s Joe Sakic, 20, becomes the youngest player in NHL history to score 100 points in a season and the first to do so with a last-place team.
1991 - Tennessee edges Virginia 70-67 in overtime for its third NCAA women’s basketball title. It’s the first overtime in the NCAA’s 10-year history.
1991 - Amy Alcott wins the Dinah Shore golf tournament with a record eight-shot victory over Dottie Mochrie.
1995 - Major league baseball players end their strike when Federal judge Sonia Sotomayor of U.S. District Court in Manhattan rules against the owners in the labor dispute.
1997 - Martina Hingis becomes the youngest No. 1 player in tennis history. The 16-year-old Swiss sensation, who claimed her fifth title of 1997 at the Lipton Championships on March 29, supplants Steffi Graf in the WTA Tour rankings.
2012 - Ray Whitney passes 1,000 career points with a goal and assist in Phoenix’s 4-0 victory over Anaheim.
2013 - In one of the biggest upsets in the history of the NCAA women’s tournament, sixth-seeded Louisville stuns defending national champion Baylor in the regional semifinals, 82-81. It’s the end of a remarkable college career for Baylor’s Brittney Griner, a record-setting 6-foot-8 post player who ended up as the second-highest scoring player in NCAA history.
2013 - Pete Weber ties Earl Anthony by winning his 10th major Professional Bowlers Association title with a 224-179 win over Australian Jason Belmonte in the Tournament of Champions.
2013 - Louisville overcomes Kevin Ware’s gruesome injury and advances to the Final Four with a 85-63 win over Duke. Ware breaks his leg in the first half of the Midwest Regional final when he lands awkwardly after trying to contest a 3-point shot.
2017 - Evgenia Medvedeva retains her world figure skating title, breaking her own world record total score with 233.41 points. The 17-year-old Russian becomes the first woman to win back-to-back titles since 2001.
2017 - UConn’s record 111-game winning streak comes to a startling end when Mississippi State pulls off perhaps the biggest upset in women’s basketball history, shocking the Huskies 66-64 on Morgan William’s overtime buzzer beater in the national semifinals.
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April 1
1920 - The Ottawa Senators defeat the Seattle Metropolitans 6-1 to capture the NHL Stanley Cup, three games to two.
1938 - Joe Louis knocks out Harry Thomas in the fifth round in Chicago to retain his world heavyweight title.
1940 - Gov. Herbert Lehman of New York signs the Dunnigal bill, which legalizes pari-mutuel wagering and outlaws bookmakers at the state’s racetracks.
1972 - The first collective players strike in major league history begins. The strike lasts 12 days and cancels 86 games.
1984 - Southern California beats Tennessee 72-61 for the NCAA women’s basketball title.
1985 - Villanova shocks Georgetown with a 66-64 victory to win the NCAA title. The Wildcats, led by Dwayne McClain’s 17 points, shot 79 percent, making 22 of 28 shots, and hit 22 of 27 free throws.
1990 - Betsy King holds on for a two-stroke victory over Kathy Postlewait, taking the LPGA Dinah Shore tournament for the second time in four years.
1991 - Duke ends years of frustration with a 72-65 victory over Kansas for its first national title in five championship-game appearances and nine trips to the Final Four.
1992 - A week before the Stanley Cup playoffs are to begin, the NHL players strike for the first time in the league’s 75-year history. The strike lasts 10 days.
1996 - Kentucky wins its first national title in 18 years with a 76-67 victory over Syracuse.
2002 - With Juan Dixon and Lonny Baxter leading the way, Maryland wins its first national championship with a 64-52 victory over Indiana.
2003 - Ed Belfour becomes the seventh NHL goalie to win 400 regular-season games when Toronto beats New Jersey 3-2 in overtime.
2007 - Morgan Pressel, 18, becomes the youngest major champion in LPGA Tour history, closing with a 3-under 69 at the Kraft Nabisco Championship. Pressel plays her final 25 holes at Mission Hills without a bogey. Suzann Pettersen squanders a four-shot lead with four holes to play.
2009 - Eastern Kentucky plays Kentucky State in a baseball game on April Fools’ Day, and the result is no joke: EKU led 49-1 when the teams stop after five innings. EKU began substituting during its 22-run first inning.
2010 - Dayton denies last year’s national champs another title, with the Flyers beating North Carolina 79-68 to win the NIT.
2011 - Jarome Iginla scores his second goal of the game with 5:03 left to reach 1,000 points and help Calgary rally to beat St. Louis 3-2.
2012 - Sun Young Yoo wins the Kraft Nabisco Championship with an 18-foot birdie putt on the first playoff hole, earning her first major title after I.K. Kim misses a 1-foot putt on the final hole of regulation.
2017 - Japan’s Yuzuru Hanyu rallies to win the men’s world figure skating title. Hanyu, fifth after the short program, posts a world-record free skate score and lands four quadruple jumps.
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April 2
1939 - Ralph Guldahl beats Sam Snead by one stroke to capture the Masters.
1983 - New York Islander Mike Bossy becomes the first player to score 60 or more goals in three consecutive seasons.
1984 - Georgetown, led by junior center Patrick Ewing and freshman forward Reggie Williams, beats Houston 84-75 to win the NCAA championship in Seattle.
1986 - The 3-point field goal, at 19 feet, 9 inches, is adopted by the NCAA.
1990 - UNLV pounds Duke 103-73 to win its first NCAA championship and extend the Blue Devils’ streak to eight Final Four appearances without a title. The Runnin’ Rebels become the first team to score more than 100 points in a championship game and the 30-point margin is the largest ever.
1995 - Connecticut caps an unbeaten season by defeating Tennessee 70-64 for the NCAA women’s championship. The Huskies, 35-0, become the winningest basketball team for one season in Division I.
2000 - Connecticut wins its second women’s national championship with a 71-52 victory over Tennessee. The top-ranked Huskies beat No. 2 Tennessee for the second time in three meetings this season.
2005 - Roger Powell Jr. and Luther Head score 20 points apiece leading Illinois to a 72-57 win over Louisville in semifinals of the Final Four. With the win, the Illini (37-1) ties the single-season NCAA record for victories.
2007 - The Florida Gators keep their stranglehold on the college basketball world with an 84-75 victory over Ohio State for their second straight national championship.
2012 - Doron Lamb scores 22 points as Kentucky wins its eighth men’s national championship, holding off Kansas for a 67-59 victory.
2014 - The Sacramento Kings beat the Los Angeles Lakers 107-102 to give the Lakers their 50th loss of the season. The last time the Lakers had 50 or more losses was 1974-75 (30-52).
2016 - Villanova advances to the national championship game with the biggest margin of victory in Final Four history, overwhelming Oklahoma 95-51. The margin topped 34-point Final Four wins by Cincinnati over Oregon State in 1962 and Michigan State over Penn in 1979.
2017 - So Yeon Ryu wins the ANA Inspiration in a one-hole playoff with Lexi Thompson, who was given a four-stroke penalty late in the final round for an incorrect ball placement a day earlier. Ryu birdies the 18th hole in the playoff to win her second major title.
2017 - A’ja Wilson scores 23 points to help coach Dawn Staley and South Carolina win their first women’s national championship with a 67-55 victory over Mississippi State. Staley made the Final Four three times as a player at Virginia but never won. She also led the Gamecocks to the national semifinals two years ago before losing to Notre Dame.
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