BASEBALL
Mark Vientos and Matt Winaker hit two-run homers off Frank German as the Binghamton Rumble Ponies beat the Portland Sea Dogs 5-2 Wednesday night at Hadlock Field.
Vientos, who was 3 for 5, hit his homer in the first. Winaker hit his homer in the fourth. Luis Carpio added a solo home run in the eighth for the Rumble Ponies, who have 5 of 6.
Jeisson Rosario had an RBI single in the fifth for the Sea Dogs, whose other run came on a seventh-inning homer by Ronaldo Hernandez.
The Sea Dogs remained a 1/2-game ahead of Somerset for the Double-A Northeast lead as the Patriots lost to Altoona 6-5.
TENNIS
Defending champion Dominic Thiem has pulled out of the U.S. Open, saying Wednesday he will miss the rest of the year because of a right wrist injury.
Thiem was hurt in June while playing in the Mallorca Open and said the pain returned last week after he hit a ball during training. Doctors recommended he wear a wrist splint for another six weeks before resuming training. The No. 6-ranked Thiem made the announcement in a social media post, and a statement from his management company described the injury as a detachment of the posterior sheath of the ulnar side of the right wrist.
Thiem, 27, won his first major title last year at Flushing Meadows, beating Alexander Zverev by becoming the first player to come from two sets down in the U.S. Open final since Pancho Gonzales in 1949. But after the two-time French Open finalist was stunned by Pablo Andujar in the first round in Paris this year, he played only one more match. Thiem was leading Adrian Mannarino in the first set of his opening match at Mallorca when he had to stop playing.
Thiem joins five-time U.S. Open champion Roger Federer and 2016 winner Stan Wawrinka among players who will miss the year’s final Grand Slam tournament because of injury. The tournament begins Aug. 30.
• Two-time champion Venus Williams will be back at the U.S. Open after being given a wild card Wednesday. The 41-year-old Williams has won seven major titles, including victories at Flushing Meadows in 2000 and 2001. But with her current WTA ranking of No. 112, she has fallen outside the top 104 who received direct entry into the women’s main draw.
Williams hasn’t missed the U.S. Open since 2006, when she was sidelined by a left wrist injury. She reached her last major semifinal there in 2017.
CoCo Vandeweghe, who also reached those semifinals, also was awarded a wild card by the U.S. Tennis Association. The former No. 9-ranked American has battled injuries and is currently No. 160.
WESTERN & SOUTHERN OPEN: Down a set and a break to 17-year-old Coco Gauff, second-ranked Naomi Osaka fought back to pull out a 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 win in her first WTA Tour event since the French Open in late May.
In other matches, top-ranked Ash Barty needed a second-set tiebreaker to beat Heather Watson, 6-4, 7-6 (3) in a match postponed from Tuesday by rain.
Three-time Grand Slam champion Angelique Kerber upset fourth-seeded Elina Svitolina.
Simona Halep, the 12th seed, withdrew with a right thigh injury.
Men’s top seed Daniil Medvedev cruised to a 6-2, 6-2 win in 59 minutes over wild card Mackenzie McDonald, and three-time Grand Slam champion Andy Murray was eliminated by ninth-seeded Hubert Hurkacz.
SOCCER
MLS: Tommy McNamara and Tajon Buchanan scored four minutes apart in the second half and the New England Revolution beat D.C. United 3-2 at Foxborough, Massachusetts.
New England (14-3-4) has won seven of its last eight games — with a draw — to stay atop the Supporters’ Shield race. D.C. United (8-9-3) lost to New England for the fifth straight time.
McNamara tied it at 1 in the 49th with a curling shot from distance. Buchanan scored the go-ahead goal in the 53rd, one-touching Emmanuel Boateng cross at the back post.
DeJuan Jones made it 3-1 in the 85th by calmly sending home a loose ball from the penalty spot.
Paul Arriola opened the scoring for United in the 10th by forcing a turnover near midfield and running past the defense to Edison Flores’ through ball for a calm finish.
Ramón Ábila capped the scoring for United in the 96th.
BASKETBALL
WNBA: Betnijah Laney scored 17 points, including the go-ahead basket from the top of the key with 17.6 seconds left, to lift the host New York Liberty to an 83-79 victory over the short-handed Seattle Storm.
The Liberty (11-12) trailed by 10 heading into the fourth quarter before rallying behind Rebecca Allen, who had nine of her 17 points in the quarter. Her third 3-pointer of the quarter made it a two-point game with 1:38 left.
After a basket by Natasha Howard tied it, New York then got a stop on the other end and Laney took a few dribbles from the wing and banked in a shot just inside the 3-point line to beat the shot clock.
Laney then stole the ball on the ensuing possession and New York’s Sami Whitcomb made two free throws with 2.6 seconds left to seal the win.
The Storm (16-7) were missing stars Sue Bird and Breanna Stewart, who were still resting after leading the U.S. to a seventh consecutive gold medal at the Olympics earlier this month. They are expected back when the teams play again on Friday.
TRIATHLON
IRONMAN: Officials on Hawaii’s Big Island are considering closing beaches and cancelling the Ironman World Championship in response to a surge of coronavirus cases on the island.
“Right now our numbers are skyrocketing. It’s a shame because we as a county have been doing a great job,” Hawaii County Mayor Mitch Roth told County Council members. “But we let down our guards – I let down my guard.”
The administration is revising its emergency rules and will submit the changes to Gov. David Ige for approval, West Hawaii Today reported Wednesday. That revision could include a return to restrictions at parks and beaches that allow people to only cross the sand to get to the ocean to surf, swim or fish, but not to gather or sit.
Similar restrictions were enacted across Hawaii during the peak of the pandemic last year.
The Ironman World Championship is currently set for Oct. 9 in Kailua-Kona. Mayor Roth said a decision would be made soon about whether the event could go on. “Unfortunately, it doesn’t look too positive for Ironman this year,” Roth said.
ROAD RACING
NEW YORK CITY MARATHON: Olympic bronze medalist Molly Seidel is one of several standout American women planning to run the New York City Marathon in November, race organizers announced Wednesday.
Seidel stunned even herself with a third-place finish in Tokyo this month in just the third 26.2-mile race of her career. An NCAA Division I champion at Notre Dame in the 3,000, 5,000 and 10,000 meter events, she is now the headliner for the NYC Marathon’s 50th running in her five-borough debut.
“Since the beginning of 2021, I’ve had two races circled on my calendar: the Olympic Games’ marathon on Aug. 7 and the TCS New York City Marathon on Nov. 7,” said Seidel, 27, who grew up in Wisconsin. “Winning the bronze medal in Sapporo showed that I can run with the best in the world, and on any given day, anything is possible.”
Fellow U.S. Olympians Aliphine Tuliamuk, Sally Kipyego and Emily Sisson will also be in the field, along with 2018 Boston Marathon winner Des Linden. Four-time champion Mary Keitany of Kenya won’t participate for the first time since 2013.
The men’s professional field has not yet been announced.
SOCCER
U.S. WOMEN: Coming off the Tokyo Olympics, the U.S. women’s national team will play a series of four matches in September and October.
The team will play Paraguay in Cleveland on Sept. 16 and again on Sept. 21 in Cincinnati. They’ll also play South Korea on Oct. 21 in Kansas City, Kansas, and on Oct. 26 in St. Paul, Minnesota.
The match in St. Paul will be Carli Lloyd’s final game with the national team. The 39-year-old forward announced plans to retire earlier this week after a 16-year career that includes a pair of World Cup titles and two Olympic gold medals. Lloyd was on the U.S. team that won the bronze medal in Tokyo with a 4-3 victory over Australia earlier this month.
GOLF
WOMEN’S BRITISH OPEN: The AIG Women’s British Open set a new standard for prize money at the LPGA Tour majors by announcing Wednesday a record purse of $5.8 million, with plans to boost it by an additional $1 million for next year.
The winner this week will receive $870,000, compared with the $675,000 that Sophia Popov won last year at Royal Troon. The Women’s British Open starts Thursday at Carnoustie.
The U.S. Women’s Open still offers the biggest winner’s check for the LPGA majors at $1 million, though the total prize money was $5.5 million.
AUTO RACING
FORMULA ONE: This year’s Japanese Grand Prix was canceled following discussions between the government and race promoters, Formula One organizers said Wednesday. The race in Suzuka had been scheduled for Oct. 10, between the events in Turkey and the United States.
“The decision has been taken by the Japanese government to cancel the race this season due to ongoing complexities of the pandemic in the country,” F1 said in a statement. “Formula 1 is now working on the details of the revised calendar and will announce the final details in the coming weeks.”
The decision creates another dent in F1′s calendar of Asia-based races this season following the cancellation of the Australian and Singapore GPs and the indefinite postponement of the Chinese GP in Shanghai. The cancellation and postponement of races last year at the start of the pandemic meant the 2020 season didn’t start until July, and was compressed to a 17-race schedule through December.
CYCLING
SPANISH VUELTA: Jasper Philipsen secured his second stage win with Rein Taaramae losing the leader’s red jersey to Kenny Elissonde after crashing for the second straight day.
Philipsen prevailed at the final sprint of the fifth stage, a 114.6-mile route that finished in Albacete in southeastern Spain. Philipsen, a Belgian rider with team Alpecin-Fenix, also won the second stage of the three-week Grand Tour race.
Fabio Jakobsen, who won Tuesday’s fourth stage for his biggest victory since a horrific crash at the Tour of Poland a year ago, was second.
Taaramae finished more than two minutes back after getting caught in a crash in the peloton with about five miles to go. He also fell on Tuesday but recovered to stay in front. He finished only 125th on Wednesday after being among the dozens of riders who went down after the peloton collapsed near the front of the pack.
Elissonde, a French rider with team Trek-Segafredo, was able to avoid the crash and opened a 5-second gap to two-time defending champion Primoz Roglic in the overall standings.
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