June 6
1919 — Man o’ War wins his first race, a 5-furlong contest over a straightaway at Belmont Park. The 3-to-5 favorite wins by six lengths, covering the distance in 59 seconds.
1924 — Cyril Walker captures the U.S. Open with a three-stroke victory over Bobby Jones.
1936 — Granville, ridden by James Stout, wins the Belmont Stakes by a neck over Mr. Bones. Bold Venture, the Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner, does not run in the race.
1946 — The National Basketball Association is founded at the Commodore Hotel in New York.
1981 — Summing, ridden by George Martins, wins the Belmont Stakes, spoiling Pleasant Colony’s Triple Crown bid.
1987 — Bet Twice, ridden by Craig Perret, breezes to a 14-length victory in the Belmont Stakes to deny Alysheba the Triple Crown. Alysheba is a distant fourth.
1987 — West Germany’s Steffi Graf, eight days shy of her 18th birthday, becomes the youngest women’s champion of the French Open when she beats Martina Navratilova 6-4, 4-6, 8-6.
1998 — Real Quiet is denied the Triple Crown when Victory Gallop edges him at the wire in the Belmont Stakes.
1999 — Andre Agassi rallies to win the French Open and become the fifth man to complete a career Grand Slam. After losing the first two sets, Agassi surges back to beat Andrei Medvedev 1-6, 2-6, 6-4, 6-3, 6-4. Agassi won the 1992 Wimbledon, 1994 U.S. Open and 1995 Australian Open.
1999 — Juli Inkster wins the U.S. Women’s Open with a 16-under 272, the lowest 72-hole score in the championship’s 54-year history.
2007 — The Anaheim Ducks capture the Stanley Cup with a 6-2 victory over the Ottawa Senators, ending the series in five games.
2007 — Trevor Hoffman becomes the first major leaguer with 500 career saves when he closes out the San Diego Padres’ 5-2 victory over the Los Angeles Dodgers.
2010 — Rafael Nadal wins his fifth French Open title and avenges his lone Roland Garros defeat, beating Robin Soderling 6-4, 6-2, 6-4. Nadal improves to 38-1 at Roland Garros, with the only loss to Soderling in the fourth round a year ago.
2011 — The Bowl Championship Series strips the Southern California Trojans of their 2004 title, leaving that season without a BCS champion. BCS officials vacated the championship after the Trojans were hit with heavy NCAA sanctions last year for rules violations committed during the 2004 and ’05 seasons.
2015 — American Pharoah leads all the way to win the Belmont Stakes by 5½ lengths, becoming the first horse in 37 years to sweep the Kentucky Derby, Preakness and Belmont Stakes. The bay colt, trained by Bob Baffert and ridden by Victor Espinoza, is the 12th horse and first since Affirmed in 1978 to win the Triple Crown.
2015 — Serena Williams overcomes a mid-match lull and a third-set deficit to win her third French Open title and 20th major singles trophy by beating Lucie Safarova of the Czech Republic 6-3, 6-7 (2), 6-2.
2015 — Tiger Woods hits a new low with the highest score of his career — an 85 in the Memorial at Muirfield Village, the course where he has won eight times. Woods ends his front nine of the third round with back-to-back double bogeys and finishes with a quadruple-bogey 8.
