The Biggest Sports Stories of 2007

25) Runners-Up and Still Champions
The Rutgers University women's basketball team was still licking its wounds after losing to Tennessee in the NCAA finals when Don Imus chimed in. Imus's racist and misogynistic remarks on the lady Scarlet Knights put the coach and the team on a far bigger stage than the basketball game did. This time, with class and dignity, Rutgers triumphed. And Imus, for his sins (present and past) lost his gig.

24) Pound for Pound, Dollar for Dollar
The much ballyhooed meeting of Oscar de la Hoya and Floyd Mayweather for the welterweight championship was boxing's biggest pay-per-view seller ever. While Mayweather won the decision, confirming his stature as the best "pound for pound" fighter in the game, the fight was largely technical and light on action. Mayweather gave fans more of what they want in his next bout, knocking out undefeated Englishman Ricky Hatton. In the amateur ranks two Americans won gold medals at the World Boxing Championships—the first gold for U.S. fighters in eight years. But the most unlikely American fight news occurred in virtual obscurity, in Azerbaijan, where the American Greco-Roman wrestling team won gold at the world championships.

23) A Paralympian First
Fifteen-year-old Jessica Long became the first paralympian ever to win the AAU's Sullivan Award as the nation's top amateur athlete. Long beat out such notables as Michael Phelps, Sasha Cohen, Apolo Ohno, Joakim Noah and Hannah Teter. Long, who had both legs amputated below the knee when she was just 18 months old, won nine gold medals at last year's International Paralympic Swimming Championships and, at the time of the award held 12 world records.

22) No Hope in China
The U.S. women's soccer team cruised into the semifinals of the World Cup in China. Then coach Greg Ryan had a brainstorm, or perhaps a brain glitch. He stunned the team by benching goalkeeper Hope Solo, who had played every minute of the tournament, in favor of veteran Briana Scurry, a hero of the 1999 World Cup. It's not clear Solo would have made any difference, though she was impolitic enough to suggest she would have. Regardless, Brazil ran circles around the American team and kicked it 4-0. The U.S. team pulled itself together to win the bronze medal for the second straight World Cup. The disappointing result, coupled with the controversy, cost the coach his job. Solo, who was booted off the team after her public complaints, is now back, playing for coach Pia Sundhage, a Swede and the first foreigner ever to lead the U.S. women.

21) An Old Favreite Revived
It had gotten to the point where each year Bret Favre would agonize over whether he would return to the NFL fray for one more season, and each year we fans would groan when he decided to play. But this year Favre—39 years old and playing his 16th season for the Green Bay Packers—has staged an extraordinary revival. Leading an unseasoned team short on veteran receivers and established running backs, Favre has passed for more than 4,000 yards (and surpassed Dan Marino to become no. 1 in NFL history in passing yardage) while leading the Pack back to the playoffs.

20) Driver Supreme
Jimmie Johnson is the undisputed king of the NASCAR circuit, catching his mentor, Jeff Gordon, with a brilliant stretch run. He won four consecutive races—nos. six through nine in the Nextel Cup series—to give him 10 victories for the season and allow him a nice Sunday drive in the season's finale to secure the Cup. There was history on the Formula One circuit, too, where Lewis Hamilton became the first black driver to capture a race and, at 22, emerged as dominant performer. But Hamilton's success was overshadowed by spying scandals involving his McLaren team. The World Motor Sports Council hit McLaren with a $100 million fine, the biggest in the history of sports.