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CLEVELAND (AP) — Braden Montgomery lined a two-run double down the right-field line, Sean Burke allowed one hit in 5 1/3 innings of splendid relief and the Chicago White Sox beat the Cleveland Guardians 4-3 on Monday to take a 2-0 lead in their AL Division Series.

The surprising White Sox improved to 4-0 in these playoffs — all on the road — and are one win from advancing to the American League Championship Series for the first time since winning the World Series in 2005. Chicago became the first team to reach the postseason after three straight 100-loss seasons, including a post-1900 record 121 defeats in 2024.

Jo Adell hit an RBI triple in the eighth and Chase DeLauter had two hits for the Guardians.

Starting pitcher Gavin Williams struck out 11, tied for second-most in a Cleveland postseason game. But the offense failed to produce for the second straight game.

Grant Taylor worked 1 1/3 innings and allowed one hit as he got his second straight save.

The best-of-five series shifts to Chicago for Game 3 on Wednesday.

3-run sixth propels the White Sox

Kyle Teel got Chicago’s first hit with a single up the middle leading off the fourth. He advanced to second on Miguel Vargas’ walk and scored on Munetaka Murakami’s base hit to pull Chicago within 2-1.

The White Sox went ahead with a three-run sixth.

Vargas led off with a base hit to chase Williams and advanced to second on a groundout. Randal Grichuk drew a walk before Erik Sabrowski’s wild pitch with Tommy Pham at the plate advanced the runners to second and third. Pham flied out to shallow left before Montgomery jumped on a first-pitch fastball to drive in the go-ahead runs.

Montgomery celebrated at first base before scoring on Chase Meidroth’s single to right.

Williams allowed two runs and four hits in five-plus innings.

Burke almost silences Cleveland's bats

Burke came on with one out in the third. After Travis Bazzana walked with one out in the fourth, the right-hander retired 13 straight until DeLauter had a base hit to left to end Burke's night.

Burke struck out six and threw 83 pitches, including 53 strikes.

Taylor entered and allowed an RBI triple to Adell before Nathaniel Lowe flied out to end the inning.

Guardians get on the board quickly

After getting shut out on Saturday, the Guardians struck quickly with a pair of runs in the first inning.

Steven Kwan led off with a base hit and José Ramírez drew a walk before Chase DeLauter's grounder off opener Anthony Kay moved the runners to second and third. Sean Newcomb came on and intentionally walked Adell to load the bases. Lowe hit a high chopper to drive in Kwan, but Newcomb threw it wide of the bag at first, allowing Ramírez to score on the error.

It marked the first time in four games this postseason the White Sox were behind.

Kay faced three batters and threw 17 pitches, including eight strikes.

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See AP’s full MLB coverage here

The Associated Press

MONTREAL - Promise David walked up to a self-checkout in Estonia with four apples, some bread and no way to pay for it all.

It was 2023 and the well-travelled Canadian striker, after stops in Croatia, Oklahoma, and Malta, was playing unpaid soccer for Nomme Kalju's reserve team in the small European country's third tier. On the morning of an away match, David was so hungry he resorted to shoplifting.

"I woke up, I went to the grocery store and I had to steal apples," David recalled. "I couldn't even pay for all of it, so I hid a couple items in my bag, God forgive me."

That was just the beginning of a long day that included hours of bus and scooter rides from Tallinn to Estonia's eastern border and back — with 90 minutes, a goal and a gas-station KitKat in between — before ending with "sleep for dinner."

And though he laughs about it now, the 25-year-old from Brampton, Ont., looks back on that period as one of the lowest points on an improbable journey to Brighton & Hove Albion in England's Premier League.

The six-foot-five David, whose charismatic personality matches his size, eventually cracked Nomme Kalju’s first team and scored 30 goals in 44 appearances, catching the attention of Belgian Pro League side Union Saint-Gilloise.

In two seasons there, he scored 41 goals in 82 matches and helped the club win its first league title in 90 years. David's rapid rise continued with Canada at this past summer's World Cup, where he scored off the bench in a group stage loss to Switzerland, before signing with Brighton over several other suitors in mid-August.

"I wanted to give myself the biggest challenge on the biggest stage, and see what it would do to me as a human being and as a football player," David said at a downtown Montreal hotel last week before Canada beat Peru 2-0 in a friendly.

"I thought it would be very funny to think to myself that like three, four years ago I was like not even professional, and then now I'm playing in the Premier League."

The move to England's south coast came together so quickly, the timing of the transfer caught him completely off guard.

Some 10 days after learning of Brighton's interest, David was on a beach north of Bruges, dancing in a mosh pit at a music festival, when his phone started ringing off the hook. He ignored three calls before finally picking up and learning his Brighton medical was scheduled in just a couple of days.

"It was shocking because I was already having fun and I was like, 'Oh my God, I just got transferred,'" he said. "I remember looking at my friends like, 'Damn, you guys are not gonna see me for a long time.'"

David made his Brighton debut Aug. 30 at Stamford Bridge, coming off the bench in the 80th minute of a 4-3 loss to Chelsea.

The Canadian has faced stiff competition for playing time in a crowded forward group that includes talented Greek teenager Charalampos Kostoulas, logging just two appearances and 24 minutes so far — much to the dismay of Canada coach Jesse Marsch.

"I'm always supportive of the guys, but the fact that he's not playing is not good, right? He's not as fit and not as sharp as he was the last year and a half," Marsch said after training last week. "He's gonna have to push there, hard. He's gonna have to make sure that he's on top of himself in every little way professionally.

"If he's not getting playing time, then he may have to think about what alternatives are out there, because he needs to play."

Marsch used David as a substitute in Canada's first two friendlies of the international break against Chile and Peru. That leaves Tuesday's match against the United States in St. Paul, Minn., as David's final chance to start during the window.

David, meanwhile, is confident he has what it takes to be successful in the world's best league. Why?

"Gaslighting and manipulation," the candid centre forward quipped, before adding: "I just got there, and time will tell. When I got to Belgium I didn't play for four months, and then after the first goal everything clicked, so I guess the same is bound to happen.

"I've just made the biggest move of my life. I'm OK right now."

David always believed he would make a living playing soccer, even when he stole groceries to make ends meet. But the former Toronto FC youth player — cut from the Major League Soccer club's academy at age 15 — didn't think he would one day take to a Premier League pitch.

He's taken a different path to getting there, one that David doesn't necessarily recommend.

"Don't do what I did," he said with a laugh. "I feel like the reality of the situation is for every one Promise, there's about hundreds of thousands of people that have tried this route and it didn't work out.

"But yeah, I feel if you have a goal, make objectives, plans, checkpoints, write them down and seriously make realistic preparations to reach them, then you'll be fine. And if you don't make it, at least you gave it your all at the end of the day, and you were serious with it."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 5, 2026.

BEIJING (AP) — Daniil Medvedev was disqualified from his semifinal against Novak Djokovic at the China Open after he hit a ball into the stands that struck a spectator in the front row on Monday.

The spectator was helped out of the arena holding a hand over his left eye.

Djokovic was serving for the match at 7-5, 5-3 when Medvedev hit the ball into the stands in apparent frustration.

After a forehand volley winner from Djokovic, the ball bounced off the advertising boards and back toward Medvedev, who smacked a backhand that sailed into the stands.

The spectator who was hit was helped away as Medvedev stood on the court watching.

The chair umpire and tournament supervisor came down onto the court to talk with Medvedev, who didn't appear to put up much of an argument with the disqualification. Medvedev then walked to the net and shook hands with Djokovic.

The incident was reminiscent of when Djokovic was kicked out of the 2020 U.S. Open for accidentally hitting a line judge in the throat with a ball.

Medvedev has a history of on-court behavior issues. He was fined 6,000 euros ($7,000) for unsportsmanlike conduct after he smashed his racket seven times during a 6-0, 6-0 loss to Matteo Berrettini at the Monte Carlo Masters earlier this year.

Djokovic extends perfect record

Djokovic extended his perfect career record at the China Open to 33-0.

In Tuesday’s final, Djokovic will face ninth-ranked Alex de Minaur, who advanced when Hubert Hurkacz retired due to an apparent injury midway through the second set of their semifinal.

It will be Djokovic’s second final of the year after losing to Carlos Alcaraz at the Australian Open.

With his ranking down to No. 11, this is the first time in eight years that Djokovic is playing a tournament without being in the top 10. It's also his first tournament since a first-round exit from the U.S. Open. The 39-year-old Serb rallied to beat top-seeded Alexander Zverev in the quarterfinals on Sunday.

Against Medvedev, Djokovic was twice caught exceeding the time limit on the serve clock. After first receiving a warning, he was then stripped of his first serve on a crucial break point midway through the second set. But Djokovic still won the point.

Medvedev won only two of 18 break points as the pair of former No. 1s traded one grueling rally after another.

De Minaur led 6-4, 3-2 when Hurkacz — who was barely able to run for balls in the second set — stopped playing.

The nature of Hurkacz’s injury was not immediately clear.

In the third round of the women’s tournament, which ends Sunday, six-time Grand Slam champion Iga Swiatek rallied past Donna Vekic 4-6, 7-6 (0), 6-2 and will next meet Iva Jovic, who beat Kamilla Rakhimova 6-1, 7-5.

Elina Svitolina beat Maria Sakkari 6-4, 7-5.

Later, Coco Gauff was playing 16-year-old Chinese wild card Sun Xinran, who recently won the U.S. Open junior title.

Rybakina withdraws from Wuhan

U.S. Open champion Elena Rybakina withdrew from the upcoming Wuhan Open due to a foot injury.

On Saturday, Rybakina lost her first match with the No. 1 ranking when she was ousted in Beijing by No. 118 Alina Charaeva of Armenia in the second round.

“I’ll take some time to rest and recover,” Rybakina was quoted as saying by Wuhan Open organizers.

Charaeva extended her breakout run by beating Sonay Kartal 6-4, 6-1 to reach the last 16.

Every summer, Wuikinuxv Nation crews walk the streams of Rivers Inlet on BC’s remote central coast, counting how many salmon have returned from the ocean to spawn.

This year, for the first time, the creek walkers — local members who monitor salmon and stream conditions — are working with a restoration expert to assess habitat and develop plans for larger-scale restoration efforts, building on observations from this year and previous years.

The Wannock River system, which flows from Owikeno Lake into Rivers Inlet, once supported one of BC’s largest sockeye runs and remains home to all five salmon species. But historic logging and increasingly unpredictable water levels have damaged the streams the fish depend on, said Raven Walkus, the nation’s salmon restoration co-ordinator.

She said crews had already noticed “a big drop” in returning salmon compared with last year, while lower water levels in many creeks were making it harder for fish to reach their spawning grounds. They had also seen flooding that can wash out stream channels and salmon eggs.

“We can already tell it’s going to be a tough year,” she said.

Local salmon stocks are struggling, with Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) expecting fewer sockeye to return to Owikeno Lake and Chinook numbers in the Wannock River system remaining uncertain.

Those warning signs have led Wuikinuxv to expand its seasonal monitoring into a broader restoration effort.

The nation’s roughly 11-week creek-walking season runs until late October. This year, crews are using it to map where water is disappearing, banks are washing away and salmon habitat has been lost — information that will help Wuikinuxv decide where future restoration money should go.

Earlier this summer, Tom Balfour, a biologist and field operations manager with the Redd Fish Restoration Society, joined the Wuikinuxv crews. They walked the streams together, reviewed sites the creek walkers had identified and used a drone to survey the river systems.

Balfour said two major river systems in the territory will require significant work. Logging removed the large trees that once slowed rainfall, stabilized riverbanks and supplied the logs that create pools and shelter for salmon. “Big trees are essential to the function of the river,” Balfour said.

Future restoration could include planting trees, stabilizing slopes and placing large logs in river channels. But the work will be difficult in Wuikinuxv’s remote watershed, where the roads, barges, trucks and heavy equipment once used by logging companies are no longer available. Moving machinery or large logs by helicopter could cost $20,000 to $30,000 a day, Walkus said.

For now, Wuikinuxv is piecing together government and other funding to keep creek walkers in the field and the Redfish Restoration assessment is expected to help the Nation find future funding.

Until that money is secured, creek walkers are taking on smaller fixes they can safely carry out themselves, such as opening drying pools, guiding salmon away from shrinking channels and clearing debris that blocks their passage.

The nation is making the most of its short field season at a time when funding for salmon monitoring is becoming increasingly uncertain across coastal BC. DFO provides support one year at a time and many neighbouring communities have lost funding or seen their seasonal creek-walking programs reduced.

“We are super fortunate that we are getting any funding at all from DFO,” Walkus said.

Wuikinuxv also has a much smaller stewardship department than some coastal nations, but Walkus said its crew has still managed to take on monitoring and early restoration work.

Ted Walkus, a hereditary chief of the Wuikinuxv Nation, said creek walking is also a responsibility passed through his family. His nephew is the fourth generation of their family to monitor the streams.

For decades, Wuikinuxv members were mainly hired as trail guides or field workers while outside officials directed the monitoring program and controlled the information gathered from the rivers. Now, in the third year of running the work themselves, nation members are deciding where to send crews, what changes to record and how those observations can guide restoration.

The program is also bringing younger people onto the land to learn how the territory is changing. They see where water levels are dropping, where salmon are spawning and where logging damage continues to affect the rivers.

Raven Walkus said that knowledge stays in the community instead of leaving with outside agencies or disappearing when a seasonal contract ends.

“It’s not just a job,” Ted Walkus said. “It’s a way of life and it’s a way of sustaining ourselves.”

Sonal Gupta / Local Journalism Initiative / Canada's National Observer.

Canada's National Observer

Tucked in at the bottom of a midsummer Curling Canada news release was a single paragraph that confirmed the PointsBet Invitational was no longer on the organization's annual schedule.

It was a quiet goodbye for a competition that failed to gain traction after debuting in 2022.

The event was originally trumpeted by the national federation as the first major championship of the quadrennial, featuring new teams, a new format and "new ways to be entertained."

Legalized sports betting was in its infancy in Canada at the time. Comparisons to the March Madness American men's college basketball tournament were made.

But the PointsBet Invitational fell flat in Year 1 and never found its footing.

"It was a good idea. It really was," said longtime TSN curling broadcaster Russ Howard. "But the format, in my humble opinion, was part of the problem."

The September 2022 debut — dubbed "Fall Madness" — was held in Fredericton. The top 12 Canadian teams in each gender were joined by national junior champions, club champions, host committee-selected teams and sponsor's exemptions.

The competition later moved to Oakville, Ont., and eventually to Calgary, but crowds were sparse.

Curling Canada high-performance executive director David Murdoch said sponsorship and the compact calendar were two key components of the decision to remove the PointsBet Invitational this season.

"We were like, 'Well, is it a necessity for us?,'" he said. "Maybe it isn't. Should we take a year off and just see where this year goes? Because it is (a) busy (time) for our athletes. And is it really necessary?"

There was no event replacement in a packed 2026-27 campaign, which includes five Grand Slam of Curling events before Christmas and three Rock League stops through early February.

Starting next year, the Canadian mixed doubles championship will move into the vacant spot on the calendar as a major fall event, Curling Canada said in its release announcing the pre-qualified teams for the national playdowns.

The PointsBet Invitational's debut included 16 men’s and 16 women’s teams competing for a purse of over $350,000.

"I think we can just see how this first year goes and if it's something that we really want to see for the high-performance program," Murdoch said in a recent interview. "And for Curling Canada in terms of promotion, where it's just the Canadian athletes, then maybe that's something that we can build out as the quad goes.

"There's certainly some benefits that we enjoyed from just having the Canadian teams all together under one roof."

PointsBet launched a Sweep 16 Bracket Challenge in 2022 with a $1-million prize if a fan predicted a perfect men's and women's bracket. A celebrity invitational that included legendary sprinter Donovan Bailey, former NHLer Shayne Corson and TV's "Trailer Park Boys" also generated some buzz.

However, early rounds featured some lopsided results with inexperienced curling teams meeting top-ranked rinks. At times, it put the television rights-holder in an unusual spot for picking feature matchups to broadcast.

"We had to say, 'OK well there's four games out there, what's our best game?'" Howard said. "So you don't cover Rachel Homan. But people tune in to see Rachel Homan.

"So we'd end up with Team 8 against Team 9 and it's not great TV. I think that was part of the problem."

The Sweep 16 challenge was dropped in 2024 and the event format was significantly tweaked last year to mimic the environment at the Pre-Trials and Olympic Trials. The single-knockout setup was dropped, teams were cut to 20 from 32, and each rink was guaranteed four round-robin games.

The PointsBet Invitational also generated a fraction of the revenue that other Season of Champions events like national and world championships brought in.

The 2022 event operating loss before distributions to the host committee and member associations was $654,623, per financial figures posted on Curling Canada's website.

Numbers were similar for 2023 ($643,833 loss) and 2024 ($671,377 loss). Information from the 2025 competition, which would be included in the 2025-26 year-end financial statement, has yet to be released.

The Canadian mixed doubles championship will be held Oct. 25-31, 2027, in Liverpool, N.S. Reigning champions Serena Gray-Withers and Victor Pietrangelo will represent Canada at the Jan. 4-10 world playdowns in Lohja, Finland.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 5, 2026.