Portal:American football/News

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• At Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego, California, San Diego Chargers running back LaDainian Tomlinson rushes for three touchdowns in a game betwixt his team and the Denver Broncos to tally the twenty-seventh, twenty-eighth, and twenty-ninth touchdowns of his 2006 season of the National Football League; Tomlinson, with twenty-six rushing and three receiving touchdowns, displaces, having played but thirteen of sixteen regular season games, Seattle Seahawks running back Shaun Alexander—in 2005 a scorer of twenty-eight touchdowns and the league's offensive player of the year and most valuable player—atop the enumeration of players by single-season touchdowns scored, on which list Kansas City Chiefs running back Priest Holmes, with 27 touchdowns across the 2003 season the record-holder between 2003 and 2005; Saint Louis Rams running back Marshall Faulk, with 26 touchdowns across the 2000 season the record-holder between 2000 and 2003; and Dallas Cowboys running back Emmitt Smith, with 25 touchdowns across the 1995 season the record-holder between 1995 and 2000, fall respectively to third, fourth, and fifth.
• The 2006 Canadian Football League regular season concludes and the CFL playoffs, to culminate with the contesting at Canad Inns Stadium in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, of the 94th Grey Cup, begin. Having earned first place in the West and East Divisions respectively, the British Columbia Lions and Montreal Alouettes, the latter in view of its two season victories over the Toronto Argonauts, which also finish the regular season having won ten games and having conceded eight, earn byes into division finals, whilst the Argonauts, Winnipeg Blue Bombers, Calgary Stampeders, and Saskatchewan Roughriders also earn playoff qualification; the Edmonton Eskimos, in 2005 the 93rd Grey Cup titlists, earn just fourteen points across eighteen games and fail to qualify for postseason play.
• Indianapolis Colts quarterback Peyton Manning completes, in his team's regular season game against the Washington Redskins, four touchdown passes—two to wide receiver Marvin Harrison and one each to wide receiver Reggie Wayne and tight end Dallas Clark—of which the last is the 256th of his National Football League career; Manning, in his ninth NFL season, earns sole tenth place on the enumeration of NFL players by career passing touchdowns—he surpasses Sonny Jurgensen (255) and Dan Fouts (254).
• Having four weeks thither surpassed Art Monk and three weeks thither surpassed Andre Reed to claim clear fourth place on the enumeration of National Football League players by total career receptions and having two weeks thither extended to 159 the number of consecutive regular season games—dating to the 1996 season, in which, having been selected ninteenth overall by the Colts in the league draft, he started sixteen games—to begin his career in which he had at least one reception, which was better by one than that of Colts and Saint Louis Rams running back Marshall Faulk and greater than that of any other player in league history, Indianapolis Colts wide receiver Marvin Harrison, in the second quarter of a game betwixt his team and the Washington Redskins, catches, for nine yards, a pass from quarterback Peyton Manning to displace, with 12,786 career receiving yards, Irving Fryar for eighth place on the enumeration of NFL players by total career receiving yards.
• In the third quarter of a game betwixt his team and fellow Atlantic Ten Conference side University of Richmond Spiders, University of New Hampshire Wildcats wide receiver David Bell catches, whilst situated in the end zone, a one-yard pass from quarterback Ricky Santos to record the fifty-first receiving touchdown of his collegiate career; he supplants Jerry Rice of Mississippi Valley State University Delta Devils atop the list of National Collegiate Athletic Association Division I-AA players by career touchdown receptions and Rice and Troy Edwards—with the Louisiana Tech University Bulldogs the 1998 Fred Biletnikoff Award winner—atop that of all Division I players.
• Placekicker Morten Andersen, having apparently retired subsequent to the league's 2004 season, returns to the National Football League (NFL) prior to the third week of its 2006 season. Andersen, aged forty-six years and most recently employed as a television analyst for NFL Europe games, agrees to a contract with the Atlanta Falcons, with whom he previously played betwixt the 1995 and 2000 seasons and for whom he will attempt all extra points and those field goals of fewer than fifty yards; Andersen replaces Michael Koenen. He returns to the NFL having over his career tallied more points (2,358) and converted more field goals (520) than any player save Gary Anderson, who, having, as Andersen, been a member of the league's 1980s and 1990s All-Decade Teams, leads the latter by 73 career points and 17 career field goals.
• At Ivor Wynne Stadium in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, Toronto Argonauts quarterback Damon Allen, the reigning Canadian Football League (CFL) Most Outstanding Player Award winner, formerly of the Edmonton Eskimos, Ottawa Rough Riders, Hamilton Tiger-Cats, and British Columbia Lions, in his team's eleventh game of the 2006 season and in his twenty-second CFL season, having three weeks thither become the first player in league history to have totalled more than 70,000 career passing yards, completes a 29-yard shovel pass to wide receiver Arland Bruce III to surpass Warren Moon for first place in the ranking of players by career CFL-National Football League passing yards.
• Fifteen players and five coaches are inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame as the 2006 enshrinement class in a ceremony in South Bend, Indiana, United States. Amongst the twenty inductees are Notre Dame University quarterback John Huarte, the 1964 winner of the Heisman Memorial Trophy Award as the most outstanding player in the National Collegiate Athletic Association's Division I; University of Idaho quarterback John Friesz, the 1989 winner of the Walter Payton Award as the top offensive player in Division I-AA; Mississippi Valley State University quarterback Willie Totten and wide receiver Jerry Rice, who helped the Delta Devils average 59 points per game during the 1984 season, for which each earned All-America honors; and Saint John's University head coach John Gagliardi, the winningest-ever coach in college football who, between 1952 and 2005, led the Johnnies to 24 Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference championships, two National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics titles and two Division III national championships.
• Chief operating officer Roger Goodell is elected by the owners of the teams of the National Football League to be that league's commissioner; Goddell, who helped to negotiate the league's collective bargaining agreement and establish the league's cable specialty channel NFL Network, will assume control on or about September 7, when the 2006 NFL season begins, replacing Paul Tagliabue, who has led the league since 1989.
• The Pro Football Hall of Fame inducts its 2006 class, comprising five players—quarterbacks Troy Aikman and Warren Moon, offensive tackle Rayfield Wright, linebacker Harry Carson, and defensive end Reggie White—and one coach—John Madden—in Canton, Ohio, United States.

For other recent American football news, see current sports events, 2006 in sports, and the Wikinews American football portal.