Looking Ahead to 2023 in Sports

There’s nothing particularly special about State Farm Stadium, which, since we are leaning into the fanciful, resembles what we’d imagine a U.F.O. to look like, a large silver-colored dome visible for miles in the desert. But it was the setting for moments that forever changed N.F.L. history: the end to the Patriots’ quest for a perfect season, still the only gap on Tom Brady and Bill Belichick’s football résumés, and the unraveling of Seattle’s would-be dynasty as the Patriots began the second phase of theirs.

It’s entertaining to envision what might take its place alongside these past chapters in N.F.L. lore in February.

— Jenny Vrentas

The Emergence of the Next Great American Speedskater

Jordan Stolz may not be the next great American speedskater. He may be the next great speedskater, period.

Stolz, an 18-year-old from Kewaskum, Wis., about 45 miles north of Milwaukee, competed in the Olympics earlier this year. But the Beijing Games came just a bit too early in his development, and he did not finish in the top 10 in either of the races he entered.

Stolz tore up the World Cup circuit this fall, winning three gold medals and two silver and lowering his national record and some of his world junior records in the process. His diet of eating pizza every day before training, as well as the elk and moose meat his family hunts, seems to fuel him just fine.

Stolz, a sprinter who has shown aptitude and interest in distance events, has already drawn comparisons to Eric Heiden, the fellow Wisconsinite who won five gold medals at the 1980 Games, even as it is widely acknowledged Heiden’s feat likely cannot be replicated in the modern era.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/23/sports/sports-moments-2023.html