Cincinnati endured eight 3-pointers from Iowa State sharpshooter Milan Momcilovic and held on to beat the No. 2 Cyclones in Saturday afternoon in Fifth Third Arena, where fans stormed the court after a 79-70 win. It was Cincinnati’s first victory over a top-two team at home since 1967.
That feat last occurred nearly 59 years to the day when Cincinnati defeated Louisville. Both teams were part of the Missouri Valley Conference at the time.
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Before Saturday, the Bearcats (10-8, 2-3 Big 12) hadn’t won a game against a top-two team, period, since March 2012, when they upset Syracuse in the Big East tournament.
The Cyclones (16-2, 3-2) began the season 16-0, including 3-0 in conference competition, most notably with wins over then-No. 14 St. John’s and a top-ranked Purdue squad. But they’ve now lost back-to-back games to unranked foes, both this week. Iowa State dropped from the ranks of the unbeaten on the road Tuesday. Kansas steamrolled T.J. Otzelberger’s group 84-63.
Four days later, the Cyclones fell to a Bearcats team that has been competitive in Wes Miller’s fifth season at the helm but had struggled to finish games.
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Cincinnati practically led wire-to-wire against Iowa State, even fending off a furious 14-2 run that featured a trio of Momcilovic’s 3-pointers late in the second half. Momcilovic, who entered with a nation-leading 53.9 3-point percentage, clocked out 8 of 14 from deep and with a career-high 34 points.
The Bearcats were buoyed by their own run, a 17-3 surge, which they staged earlier in the period.
A skip pass from forward Baba Miller to Baylor graduate transfer guard Jalen Celestine set up a 3 and really put Cincinnati’s wheels in motion. Miller finished with four assists to go along with his 12 rebounds and eight points. Celestine chipped in 12 points off the bench, thanks to four triples.
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The Bearcats were paced by graduate guard Day Day Thomas, who scored a team-high 19 points. He made three 3s, plus a mid-range jumper that followed one of Iowa State’s consecutive giveaways.
Cincinnati scored 20 points off the Cyclones’ 10 turnovers.
Sencire Harris polished off the game-changing run with six straight points. Later, he missed a two-handed dunk on the break that could have helped the Bearcats shoo away Iowa State’s comeback bid.
But even with that Cyclones push, which drew them within five points with less than five minutes to go, Cincinnati persevered.
The Bearcats pulled away again late, triggering a euphoric postgame celebration.
DENVER — Even Buffalo Bills fans might not have realized who was catching their team’s first touchdown pass of the divisional round. But they recognized the name once they heard it.
Mecole Hardman is used to big stages. He caught a walk-off touchdown in the Super Bowl, but that was with the Kansas City Chiefs two seasons ago. If you didn’t know where he was playing currently that’s OK; Hardman hadn’t caught a pass for the Bills all season, appearing in only two games and spending most of the past few months either out of the NFL or on the Bills’ practice squad or injured reserve.
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He reemerged at the right time. At the end of Buffalo’s first drive, Hardman was wide open for a 4-yard touchdown from Josh Allen.
Hardman was playing due to extreme injury issues in Buffalo’s receiving corps. Tyrell Shavers and Gabe Davis suffered torn ACLs in the wild-card round. The Bills were perilously thin at receiver but had Hardman on the practice squad. Hardman was released by the Packers twice earlier this season, once at the end of preseason and then again off their practice squad in September. He was signed to the Bills’ practice squad in early November, and that paid off Saturday. Hardman had been on injured reserve for a while with Buffalo and had just one target from Allen before his number was called in a big spot against the Broncos.
If the play looked familiar, it was. It was almost exactly the same “Corn Dog” play the Chiefs ran to Hardman to win Super Bowl LVIII in overtime two years ago, as called out by CBS color commentator Tony Romo. The Bills sold the route to the left before coming back to Hardman on the right, and Josh Allen took the snap from under center, but otherwise it was remarkably similar to Hardman’s historic play against the 49ers, motioning in and then reversing direction and flaring out to the flat.
Hardman is a recognizable name to many football fans after that championship-winning touchdown. And so was the play that produced his first touchdown with the Bills.
That team would be Bryant’s current club, the Colorado Rockies.
The report triggered a wave of outrage on social media, with the Rockies making for an easy villain. No reason was provided for why they would do so. A day later, the Rockies denied they had any part in Bryant missing the reunion, via MLB.com’s Thomas Harding and the Denver Post’s Patrick Saunders.
So why wasn’t Bryant there while other active players on other teams, such as Schwarber and Baez, were? That remains unclear.
Bryant remains one of the most important players in Cubs history as a central figure on the team that broke through 108 years of disappointment, but his future in baseball has never been more cloudy due to a series of back injuries that have ravaged his Rockies career.
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The four-time All-Star signed a seven-year, $182 million contract with Colorado after the 2021 season. That deal is now considered one of the worst in MLB history, as he’s managed to play only 170 games in four seasons. While on the field, he’s slashed only .244/.324/.370 with the Rockies despite the advantage of Coors Field.
DENVER — Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen has been an outstanding performer in the playoffs. One reason is he has rarely turned the ball over.
He picked a really bad time, with a really bad play, for his first turnover in six playoff games.
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Near the end of the first half of a divisional playoff game at the Denver Broncos, Allen took off running because he found nobody downfield. But Allen was holding the ball recklessly in his right hand and it popped out without much of a hit from Broncos defensive end Nik Bonitto. The ball went backward, Bills guard David Edwards should have recovered but he couldn’t secure it and Denver grabbed it and was tackled with two seconds remaining before halftime.
Allen is a fantastic player but that was an inexcusable mistake, especially considering the game situation with so little time left before halftime.
After the fumble recovery the Broncos hit a 50-yard field goal as the half expired. Instead of the Bills trailing 17-10 at the half, Allen’s bad turnover gave the Broncos a 10-point lead.
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The Broncos forced another big fumble against Allen to begin the second half, though it was far from his fault alone. Bonitto got a clean rush off the edge and hit Allen from behind, causing a fumble that Denver recovered. Left tackle Dion Dawkins barely got a hand on Bonitto as he lined up wide and was first chipped by receiver Khalil Shakir, which barely slowed Bonitto down.
The Broncos didn’t do much with great field position but got another easy three points off the turnoer for a 23-10 lead.
It was uncharacteristic for Allen to have that bad of a mistake in a playoff game. And it came at a terrible time for Buffalo.
CORAL GABLES, Fla. — Above his office desk, Mario Cristobal keeps a reminder of the past.
Hanging on the wall are framed photos of the four football coaches who won a national championship at the University of Miami.
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Every day, when Cristobal enters the office before the sun rises and leaves well after it sets, the four faces — Howard Schnellenberger, Jimmy Johnson, Dennis Erickson and Larry Coker — are there to remind him that it can be done here, even though it’s been 24 years.
He needs no more reminders.
Four years after leaving the powerhouse program he built at Oregon, Cristobal is one win away from returning championship glory to this place, four quarters from delivering his hometown and alma mater the title.
But no matter what happens here Monday — in the national championship bout against Indiana in, of all places, the home of the Hurricanes, Hard Rock Stadium — Miami’s native son, Mario Cristobal, has accomplished something.
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He’s restored respect to The U.
“I’ve had 20 years of sitting from afar watching Miami get ridiculed and stomped on. It pissed me off,” Cristobal said this week. “I got to the f***ing point where I couldn’t stand the s*** going on here and the amount of s*** being thrown at it. My brother told me, ‘If you don’t f***ing do it, who the f*** is going to do it?!’”
Mario Cristobal is 35-18 in four seasons as the Miami Hurricanes head coach.
(CFP via Getty Images)
Lou Cristobal knew brother Mario could do it and would do it. In fact, four years ago, a few months after Miami hired Mario, Lou quipped to a reporter, “I think it’s a given: He’s going to win a national title.”
Earlier this week, Lou chuckles about his prediction.
There is an audible shrug from folks here. The ’Canes, after all, historically swim in a limitless confidence.
But in this case, the Cristobals have been underdogs for decades — sons of Cuban immigrants, Luis and Clara, who fled Fidel Castro’s communist regime in the 1960s, not long after Luis was incarcerated as a political prisoner on the island. They met in Miami and spoke only Spanish, the first language of their sons as well.
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More than 50 years later, the family’s most famous man leading the hometown Hurricanes to the national championship game in his hometown seems like the stuff of fairy tales and fiction novels.
This is why Mario returned to the place he left for so long. He views the last 25-year coaching journey as a plotted course back home: the assistant gig at Rutgers; his time back here as offensive line coach under Coker; the six-year head coaching stint at FIU, which ended in an unceremonious firing (he still keeps his termination letter in his desk as a motivational reminder); and then a coaching rehabilitation stay with Nick Saban at Alabama before the run at Oregon.
It was all for this.
“I owe Miami everything. The University of Miami changed the trajectory of me and my brother and our lives,” he said Tuesday between meetings. “I was ill from afar with people throwing dirt on Miami, making fun of Miami. It was in a really bad spot. It’s a rebuild.
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“If I don’t do it, who the hell is going to do it? It had been 20 years. Who is going to do what it takes and endure all the crap and bulls*** and difficult times. I owe Miami. It’s in my blood.”
‘All Roads Lead Home’
How he did it is too long and winding to explain in detail.
But the three most important points are clear: an extreme work ethic (he mostly works 16-18-hour days with plenty of cafecito — a Cuban coffee favorite that he and his brother consumed as children and now as adults); aggressive recruiting (he loves landing prospects just as much as winning games, evident by the three top-10 classes in the last four years); a university-wide commitment to athletic resources (millions from donors plus a university subsidy of more than 40% of the athletic department budget, some of it generated by the school’s health system, UHealth).
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All of these ingredients have produced a cocktail of success — a four-year run from Cristobal that saw annual improvements in victories: five in 2022, seven in 2023, 10 in 2024 and 13 so far this season.
“We are one year ahead of schedule,” says Miami president Joe Echevarria, who helped resuscitate the school’s failing health system in 2020, then assisted in landing Cristobal as coach a year later and developed with him a plan for the Hurricanes to compete for the national championship by Year 5.
The coincidental site of the game — Hard Rock Stadium won the championship game bid years ago — is the frothy goodness atop this Cuban espresso of a season. It’s a money-saver too, says athletic director Dan Radakovich. Chartering a football team, staff and families averages about $800,000 a trip.
Across this city, digital advertisements gesture to the hometown Hurricanes. “All Roads Lead Home,” says one.
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This is a moneymaker of historic proportions for the university.
Mario Cristobal and the Miami Hurricanes will have a home game at Hard Rock Stadium on Monday night. (Matias J. Ocner/Getty Images)
(Miami Herald via Getty Images)
Miami is the first true beneficiary of the ACC’s new uneven distribution structure awarding millions to those earning higher television viewership numbers and permitting a single school to retain all of its playoff distribution earned through winning postseason games (in this case, more than $20 million). The revenue change in the ACC — spurred by lawsuits from Florida State and Clemson and spearheaded by commissioner Jim Phillips — charts a roadmap to future revenue frameworks in other leagues, perhaps.
The “drumbeat” of uneven distribution is decades old in some places, Phillips says.
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“The strategy is, if you want a higher distribution from the conference, then you need to go invest and improve your chances of having that success,” Phillips told Yahoo Sports.
The ACC hasn’t had a team participate in the national championship game since the 2019 season. After a tumultuous few years — the litigation off the field and struggles on it — the league is back in the big game.
“There was so much noise in the air — the demise of the ACC and that it was headed to a similar destination of the Pac-12,” Phillips said. “To me, it wasn’t fair.”
The championship game boon for Miami goes beyond conference financial dollars.
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The school has seen “a lot more people” than last year at this time recommit to season tickets, Radakovich says, and he hopes this season’s success finally results in the construction of a seven-story football operations center announced in 2022. The school hasn’t yet broken ground.
“That’s what we really need,” he said from his office Friday. “Is now the time to do it? If you believe there’s going to be some intervention by Congress or collective bargaining, then there’s going to be some equaling out of the revenue expenses for [athlete] compensation. If that evens out, [recruiting] goes back to what we had before: How is your stadium and who is your coach and what’s the day to day like? Those will become important again.”
The ‘tipping point’
When Mario Cristobal arrived back here in December 2021, Miami felt like a shell of the institution for which he played in the early 1990s. The school had fallen behind in resourcing and facilities to the point that even former coach and UM quarterback Mark Richt acknowledged the failures in an interview years ago.
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After winning five national championships in a 28-year period, school officials got complacent.
“After all the success, they’re like, ‘Why build something new? We’re already winning without it,’” Richt said.
In fact, in September 2021 — roughly three months before the hiring of Cristobal — an unlikely person sparked change within Miami. During a segment on ESPN’s “College GameDay,” analyst Kirk Herbstreit delivered a passionate plea urging the school to get serious about its investment in football. The 70-second clip went so viral that the university’s most powerful people were embarrassed and, very quickly, sprung into action.
Herbstreit provided a “tipping point,” says Rudy Fernandez, the executive vice president of UM and senior advisor to the president whom the UM board put in charge of the football overhaul.
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The school replaced athletic director Blake James and coach Manny Diaz with a pair of high-profile hires: Radakovich, one of the architects of Clemson’s football dynasty, and Cristobal, luring each to Miami with hefty salary pools. The tandem hire, made within days of one another, sent a message across college football: Suddenly, Miami was trying to get back.
“I wasn’t trying to get Blake fired or Manny fired,” Herbstreit said in 2022. “I was really talking more to the people who spend money and where the money needs to go.”
But it was true, says Jose Mas, a prominent Miami booster whose company, MasTec, is worth more than $7 billion. The school “accepted mediocrity,” Mas said.
On the ground, once hired, Cristobal and staff needed to “create belief” again in The U after two decades of doldrums. Miami won 10 games or more in 14 seasons from 1983-2003. In the next 20 seasons, UM did that once.
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“Miami was Tier 1 when recruits visited when I played here,” he said. “When I came back, it was Tier 3.”
He needed the right people in place, both staff and players. In his fourth season as coach, Cristobal is on his second offensive coordinator and third defensive coordinator. One person close to Cristobal describes him as part Nick Saban, part Ed Orgeron and part Scarface. Many in the coaching fraternity say he’s difficult to work for. But that just means those people aren’t working hard enough, those close to him say.
“A rebuild comes with very difficult steps that you cannot skip. You’re going to have to endure,” Cristobal said. “The things that get in the way of progress are people. Sometimes it’s the very own people in the building. You got to find dudes who want to work to the level that is insane.”
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He works so much, in fact, that brother Lou grows concerned that Mario isn’t sleeping enough. Lou and a group of Mario’s closest friends hold a running joke about the coach.
“He’s the only guy who will give you a call just to tell you that he’s got to call you back later,” Lou says with a laugh. “He’s always running.”
Four years after assuming control of the program, Mario, a former offensive lineman, has a team in his likeness. They are physically imposing. They batter and bruise. And just when an opponent focuses on stopping the battering rams of running backs Mark Fletcher Jr. and CharMar Brown, quarterback Carson Beck — with his own redemption tale — stretches the field with star freshman Malachi Toney, Keelan Marion and CJ Daniels.
Two months ago, this team of highly paid standouts sat at 6-2, mostly counted out in the playoff race. But Mario preached persistence. The season is a marathon, he reminded players — not a sprint.
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“There’s days where you are running a mile and don’t feel good and your pace is off,” said Dennis Smith, the team’s executive director and frontman in recruiting. “Football is an example of an embodiment of running a marathon. We didn’t get recruits. We lost games. We kept running the marathon.
“We were 6-2. We had a bunch of players who transferred from places where they didn’t have a great year. People were like, ‘Why is that guy coming here?’ When we were 6-2, we didn’t point fingers. We closed ranks and we realized it’s a marathon. Here we are, seven games later, seven tough wins in different ways. That starts with our head coach.”
‘I broke’
During his first three months as head coach at Miami, Mario Cristobal spent late nights and early mornings with his mother at Kindred Hospital, a long-term care center located a few miles from UM’s campus.
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He’d show up before or after his time at the office. He’d hold her hand, kiss her forehead, talk to her and share stories, even though she couldn’t understand much or respond.
A couple weeks before he accepted the Miami job, doctors performed an emergency intubation on Clara Cristobal while Mario led Oregon in a practice. He never got to say goodbye.
It sticks with him still today.
“It was devastating,” he says.
He flew to Miami not long afterward, walked into her hospital room and fell to his knees.
“I had never broken,” Mario said. “For a few minutes, I broke. I never imagined seeing my mom in that state. She can’t recognize or talk or barely see.”
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Rumors and reports swirled that Mario flew to Miami not to only be with his mother, but to also interview for the Canes job — before Oregon played in the Pac-12 championship game against Utah the next week, an eventual 38-10 Ducks loss.
“I could give a rat’s ass what people think,” Mario said. “I live my life in a manner to do right by people, but people say I used the opportunity to come down here and interview with Miami. Are you f***ing kidding me?”
Clara Cristobal, an 81-year-old suffering from emphysema, kidney disease and septic issues, died on March 4, 2022. At the very end, Mario says Clara began blowing kisses to family members.
“She did know it,” Lou said. “I feel in my heart and mind that she knew Mario was coach at Miami. Her and my dad are watching him now and they’re dancing up in heaven.”
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Asked what his mother might say now, Mario shouts aloud, “Win the f***ing game!”
On Monday, from Hard Rock Stadium, the Miami Hurricanes go for national title No. 6.
“It’s the toughest ticket in freaking town right now,” Lou says. “I’ve had cousins reach out who I don’t even know.”
With one final victory, a last step, Mario Cristobal can finally fully resurrect Canes football — even if he’s already delivered respect back to this place.
But whatever you do, don’t tell Mario, “The U is back.”
“That’s what you heard for years. ‘The U is back,’” he says. “I cringe. There is no going back.”
“We are proud to name John Harbaugh as the next head coach of the New York Giants,” team president John Mara said in a statement. “Joe Schoen presented us an outstanding group of candidates, which allowed us to be deliberate and confident in this decision.”
“Through numerous conversations, John consistently stood out for his conviction and vision for leading a winning organization, and we welcome him and his family to the Giants,” he added.
The agreement is expected to be five years in length and with a total value of $100 million — one of the largest contracts in the league — according to NFL reporter Jordan Schultz.
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“This is the New York Giants,” Harbaugh said, per ESPN’s Adam Schefter. “I’m proud and honored to [be] the head coach of this historic franchise, and especially excited to work with the Mara and Tisch families. But most of all, I can’t wait to get started with the great players on this football team to see what we can accomplish together.”
Harbaugh told The Athletic’s Ian O’Connor that he’ll report directly to Giants owner John Mara, rather than general manager Joe Schoen.
Harbaugh becomes the Giants’ fifth head coach (seven counting interims) since Tom Coughlin resigned in January 2016. Former Baltimore Ravens offensive coordinator Todd Monken is reportedly expected to join Harbaugh on his staff.
Normally, a coach resisting a “massive push,” as the Giants’ pitch was described by one reporter, would mean a deal isn’t imminent, but Harbaugh was apparently still on the phone and ready to start talking numbers about his first Giants contract.
Harbaugh was the top name on the coaching market
Harbaugh coached the Ravens for 18 seasons before being fired this cycle after closing out a disappointing 8-9 season. He was 180-113 with the Ravens in the regular season and led the team to a Super Bowl victory in 2013.
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While it was only the sixth time he missed the playoffs with the Ravens, Harbaugh has struggled to advance in the playoffs since winning the Super Bowl. The last time the Ravens won multiple playoff games in a season was 2012-13. Since 2014, Harbaugh’s playoff record is 3-6.
Now that he’s with the Giants, it will be a long time before Harbaugh has a reunion with the Ravens, barring a Super Bowl matchup. The two teams aren’t scheduled to play in the regular season until 2028.
Harbaugh got his start with the Philadelphia Eagles under Ray Rhodes and Andy Reid as a special teams and defensive backs coach in the early 2000s.
Harbaugh is the Giants’ prize for a tough year
The Giants finished 4-13 in 2025 and missed the playoffs for the eighth time in nine seasons. After dropping their opening three games and starting 2-8, the Giants fired head coach Brian Daboll. Offensive coordinator Mike Kafka was named interim head coach for the remainder of the regular season.
There were signs of improvement, however, and if the roster can remain healthy, Harbaugh could help guide the Giants to a more successful 2026 season. The Giants saw 38.7 more total yards per game offensively, with increases in average passing and rushing yards per game, as well as points scored. There were some down years on the defensive side, but Brian Burns finished second in the NFL with a career-high 16.5 sacks.
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Help could be on its way come April’s NFL Draft as the Giants will be picking fifth overall, the fourth time in the past five seasons that they will have a top-six selection.
But the Packers won’t let one game — or a five-game losing streak — disrupt what has otherwise been an excellent run under LaFleur. The team reportedly agreed to a multiyear contract extension Saturday, according to NFL Network’s Tom Pelissero. The team is also reportedly extending general manager Brian Gutekunst.
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In seven seasons with the Packers, LaFleur, 46, has a 76-40-1 record. He’s led the team to the playoffs in six of those seasons. But the Packers have struggled to make deep runs in the postseason over that period. The team is 3-6 in the playoffs since LaFleur took over, which fueled rumors that LaFleur could be fired if the Packers lost to the Bears in the wild-card round.
For much of the game, it didn’t look like that would be the case. The Packers led Chicago 21-9 with roughly 13 minutes to play and then blew that lead, allowing Chicago to score touchdowns on three-straight offensive drives. It marked the second time in just a few weeks that the Packers blew a significant fourth-quarter lead to the Bears in a loss.
The Packers opted to extend LaFleur despite the fact that he had a year left on his contract, which notably paid him less than a good number of his peers. The team could have allowed LaFleur to coach without an extension in 2026, but that can have negative effects. LaFleur’s contract status could have become a possible distraction, and his voice could have lost authority in the locker room with players knowing there was a possibility he would be out of a job at the end of the 2026 season.
The Packers got ahead of those issues by extending LaFleur, making sure he wouldn’t enter the final year of his previous deal as a lame duck head coach.
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Matt LaFleur era started well, but cracks have emerged
LaFleur was hired in 2019 and his tenure started hot, with Aaron Rodgers winning two MVPs and Green Bay winning 13 games in each of LaFleur’s first three seasons, the most for a coach in NFL history. But as Yahoo Sports’ Charles Robinson detailed recently, LaFleur has gone just 37-30-1 the past four seasons.
Jordan Love developed well enough to earn a record-setting contract extension under LaFleur’s watch in July 2024. What followed was a season when the Packers beat just about everyone they were supposed to — and went a combined 0-6 against the No. 1 seed Detroit Lions, 14-win Minnesota Vikings and eventual Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles.
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Then this past summer, the Packers pushed their chips to the middle of the table, dealing away two first-round draft picks to the Dallas Cowboys to land elite pass rusher Micah Parsons. A late-season injury to Parsons, as well as season-ending injuries to Tucker Kraft and others, contributed to Green Bay losing its last four regular-season games and then the wild-card game against the Bears.
But it also, as Robinson wrote, called into question LaFleur’s ability to overcome adversity. The Packers failed to win a single game after losing Parsons, and the team’s otherwise excellent defense saw a major falloff, allowing at least 30 points three times during the team’s season-ending, five-game losing streak.
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While reports emerged shortly after the team’s playoff loss that the Packers wanted to keep LaFleur, there was no guarantee both sides would get a deal done. LaFleur and the Packers were headed toward a difficult negotiation, given that his contract was less than all three of the other NFC North coaches and even three first-time head coaches this season. The Packers ultimately stood by the coach, believing he has what it takes to push them back into Super Bowl contention.
Following the team’s collapse this season, however, there will almost certainly be more pressure on LaFleur’s Packers to make deeper postseason runs. Otherwise, he could find himself the subject of more job rumors much sooner than expected following his new deal.
According to NFL Network’s Tom Pelissero, the Packers and head coach Matt LaFleur have agreed on a multiyear extend, and general manager Brian Gutekunst also has an extension with Green Bay in the works. They were both entering the final seasons of their contracts.
“Of course [I want to return]. This is one of one,” LaFleur said. “I love this place. I love the people. As much as you guys drive me nuts sometimes, I love you guys. I love our players, the locker room, everybody in our organization. This is a unique place … My kids love it here, my family loves it here.”
Packers president Ed Policy told reporters in June that he preferred to not have the “lame-duck” label placed on his head coach or general manager as that type of situation “creates a lot of issues.”
“I think normally, you have a pretty good idea of where that relationship is going when you have two years left — not always, but normally,” Policy said at the time. “But it creates a lot of issues because they also have to hire a staff … generally speaking, I would avoid lame-duck status. It’s oftentimes difficult on everybody involved, but there are certain situations that probably call for it. So I would not say never.”
Gutekunst, who was promoted to GM in 2018, hired LaFleur in January of 2019. Over seven seasons LaFleur has led the Packers to a 76-40-1 record, three NFC North titles and six playoff appearances, including back-to-back appearances in the NFC championship in his first two years in charge.
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Gutekunst headed the transition at quarterback from franchise legend Aaron Rodgers to Jordan Love, as well as helped orchestrate the Micah Parsons trade. He’s been part of the Packers’ organization since 1999 when he started as a scout.
The last time the San Francisco 49ers met the Seattle Seahawks, it was the final game of the regular season and the Seahawks defeated them 13-3. The two NFC West rivals meet again this Saturday for a divisional round playoff game that will ultimately decide who advances to the NFC Championship game on Jan. 25 — and if the 49ers can manage to win the next two games, they’ll be playing in the Super Bowl on their home field, Levi’s Stadium, on Feb. 8, which would mark just the third time in NFL history that a team has played a championship game in their own stadium.
The 49ers vs. Seahawks game will kick off at 8 p.m. ET this Saturday on Fox. Here’s everything you need to know about how to watch the divisional playoff game and get the full weekend schedule for the rest of the playoffs.
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How to watch the San Francisco 49ers vs. Seattle Seahawks:
San Francisco 49ers vs. Seattle Seahawks game time:
The 49ers vs. Seahawks game kicks off at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT this Saturday, Jan. 17, 2026.
San Francisco 49ers vs. Seattle Seahawks game channel:
The game between the 49ers and the Seahawks will air on FOX.
How to watch the San Francisco 49ers vs. Seattle Seahawks game without cable:
You can stream FOX on platforms like DirecTV and Fubo, and the game will also be available on FOX’s streaming platform FOX One. You can also tune in on NFL+ for mobile viewing.
bundle FOX One with ESPN’s newly revamped streaming service for $39.99/month.
San Francisco 49ers vs. Seattle Seahawks, 8:00 p.m. (FOX)
Sunday, Jan. 18, 2026
Los Angeles Rams vs. Chicago Bears: 6:30 p.m. (NBC/Peacock)
How to watch NFL games in 2026:
Many NFL games are broadcast on local channels, so if you’re looking to catch an in-market game, it may be as simple as turning on your TV (or setting up a digital TV antenna) or finding a live TV streaming service that carries the correct RSN (Regional Sports Network). If you want to watch out-of-market games, a $7 monthly subscription to NFL+ will let you watch every out-of-market-game local and primetime game in the season on your phone — but only a select few regular season games on your TV. You could also spring for the uber-expensive NFL Sunday Ticket package to get every out-of-market Sunday game of the season.
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When it comes to nationally broadcast games, NFL games typically air across ESPN, NBC, CBS, Fox, ABC and NFL Network. Thursday Night Football games stream exclusively on Amazon Prime Video, select football games will stream exclusively on Peacock, games on CBS will stream live on Paramount+, and Monday Night Football games will air on ESPN or ABC and stream on the newly revamped ESPN+ this season. That’s six channels and four streaming platforms to keep up with this season — and that’s not counting your local RSN’s for in-market games and an NFL+ or NFL Sunday Ticket subscription for out-of-market games. And we can’t forget about Fox One, Fox’s first streaming service, a place where you can also stream games airing on FOX (if you don’t already have access to it).
Confused? You’re not alone. Here’s a breakdown of the platforms we recommend checking out ahead of the 2025 NFL season, so that come game time, tuning into your favorite team’s games will be as easy as simply turning on the TV.
Long after the game, Broncos head coach Sean Payton came back to the media room to announce that quarterback Bo Nix broke a bone in his ankle on the second-to-last play of the game and would undergo season-ending ankle surgery Tuesday.
Payton said he wanted to tell his team the news first, but came back to the media room to announce the injury because “the odds of something like this being kept quiet” until he could meet with the team Monday were “impossible.”
Stidham has started four games in his NFL career, none since starting two for the Broncos in 2023. Payton said he had confidence in his backup taking over as the starter for the rest of the playoffs.
“He’s ready,” Payton said. “I said this before the season, I feel like I’ve got a two that is capable of starting for a number of teams. Watch out. Just watch.”
Nix, in his second NFL season, helped the Broncos to a dramatic 33-30 overtime win on Saturday over the Bills. He threw for 279 yards and three touchdowns. The Broncos went 14-3 in the regular season with Nix at quarterback and got past the Bills to advance to their first AFC championship game since the 2015 season, but now need to turn to Stidham, who hasn’t thrown a pass in either of the last two seasons.
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“They’ll be disappointed,” Payton said. “There will be a lot of emotions. Then the refocus takes place.”
