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NBC Sports
4 hours ago
- Sport
- NBC Sports
DB Boo Carter with Vols but work to do before hitting field for Tennessee, coach says
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — Tennessee coach Josh Heupel said Tuesday that sophomore defensive back Boo Carter is with the Volunteers as they start preseason practice. When Carter gets back on the field, however, remains to be seen after he reportedly missed workouts this summer. Heupel declined to get into details. 'Boo is a part of our team here,' Heupel said. 'There's some things that he's got to accomplish to get back on the field with us. Don't have a set timeline on that. Our leadership council has been a part of those things, those discussions with me and with Boo.' Heupel said he's proud of the leadership council. The head coach said he'll be the one handling all questions on Carter early in camp. Whether Carter would show for practice was a question amid reports about his conduct. Tennessee parted with quarterback Nico Iamaleava just before the spring game in April. Heupel said then that nobody was 'bigger than the Power T.' Carter made the Southeastern Conference All-Freshman team for his play in 13 games, with five starts last season. He ranked sixth on the defense with 38 tackles, including 28 solo. He also led the SEC averaging 16.5 yards per punt return. Tennessee gave him work in the slot at wide receiver during spring practice, allowing Carter a chance to follow in the two-way footsteps of Heisman Trophy winner Travis Hunter. The Vols need Carter with cornerback Jermod McCoy recovering from an ACL injured early this year. Quarterback competition The Vols start practice Wednesday needing a new starting quarterback with Iamaleava now at UCLA. Transfer Joey Aguilar, Jake Merklinger and freshman George MacIntyre all will be competing for the job for a program that made the College Football Playoff only to be routed by eventual champion Ohio State. Tennessee opens the season Aug. 30 in Atlanta against Syracuse. Offensive coordinator Joey Halzle said they are looking for a quarterback who can run the offense, not just throw the ball hardest or farthest. 'It's about who can operate this offense that when we take the field gives us a chance to win,' Halzle said.
France 24
22-07-2025
- General
- France 24
New vines bring hope to Israeli monastery scorched by wildfire
Wine production at Latrun monastery dates back 135 years, when the French monks first arrived. Cultivating fruit is central to both their spiritual practice and livelihood. The monks say the wildfires that broke out in late April damaged about five hectares (12 acres) of vineyard -- roughly a third of their crop. Undeterred, the monks called for help, drawing dozens of volunteers who busied themselves digging holes and planting stakes under the blazing sun. Father Christian-Marie, who has spent almost 28 years at the monastery, said planting fresh vines symbolised optimism for the future. "For me, it's quite important when I live here in this monastery to pray for peace," he told AFP. "To plant a vineyard is a sign of hope, because if we thought that tomorrow the land will be bombed and will not exist, we wouldn't do this work," he added. Working in a pensive hush, volunteers carried trays of sapling vines to be planted in long rows in a patch of the monastery's land untouched by the flames. Robed monks handed out stakes and delicately pressed the plants into the earth. "Planting is something exciting, you plant and it will grow. It will give fruit, and the fruit will give wine. And wine will make the heart of the human happy," said Noga Eshed, 74, a volunteer from Tel Aviv. For her, the exercise signified a reconnection with nature. "I see people touching the ground, the earth. And it's not very common. We are very disconnected these days," she added, trowel in hand. Eshed, who has volunteered at the monastery on previous occasions, said the brothers there were "good friends". Latrun's monks are Trappists, a Roman Catholic order centred on contemplation and simplicity. 'In God's hands' Fanned by high temperatures and strong winds, wildfires spread rapidly through wooded areas along the main Jerusalem–Tel Aviv highway on April 30. The flames travelled right up to the edge of Latrun monastery, prompting the evacuation of the 20 or so brothers who live there. "It was very hard because we are not used to getting out of our monastery and we have some very old brothers," Brother Athanase told AFP. The monks initially feared it had burned down, he added, but the monastery was spared although swathes of its agricultural land were destroyed. As well as vineyards, Latrun has around 5,000 olive trees, of which roughly 1,000 were entirely burnt down to the root in the blaze. Brother Athanase estimated that around 70 percent of the olive trees were in some way damaged and would take around four years to recover. Last year the monastery produced three tonnes of olive oil, but "there'll be no production this year", he said. "It's difficult for us because we are living off our production... but we are not afraid because life is always growing up," he added with a slight smile, surrounded by scorched earth. He was grateful for the assistance provided by the volunteers and said it was important "to know that people like monks in the Holy Land". Climate change is driving up temperatures, decreasing precipitation and increasing the frequency of extreme weather events in Israel. Standing in the newly planted vineyard, Father Alois said he hoped the monastery would not face a blaze as devastating in the future but that the monks were now better prepared after installing a new water system. Ultimately, he said, "we are in God's hands".
Yahoo
21-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
It's good to be in the wildly funny company of It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia again
[Editor's note: The A.V. Club will return to recap this season's fourth episode on July 23.] Thank God, the Paddy's Pub gang is back. It's not just that It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia has been on for two decades and starting its 17th season (three more than the previous record holder for live-action sitcoms, the polar opposite The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet), it's that it's still extremely funny. Sure, there have been stretches over the last few years in which the writing has shown its age, but that's certainly not the case with the two-episode premiere, 'The Gang F***s Up Abbott Elementary' & 'Frank is in a Coma.' It's smart to waste no time completing the crossover that began with Abbott Elementary's January episode, and even smarter to quickly get back to what fans love about Sunny's consistently hysterical character beats. Well-paced, unpredictable, and, most importantly, still comical, it's nice to be in Sunny days again. The season premiere offers the Sunny mirror image of Abbott's 'Volunteers,' using a story about unseen footage from the gang's court-mandated community service at the Philly elementary school to detail exactly what went wrong that day. The initial impression that this might be more of an AE episode vibe than a Sunny one gets annihilated when Quinta Brunson's Janine calls Dee a 'total f**king c*nt.' Take that, prudes at ABC. One of the great joys of this half-hour is getting to see AE performers like Brunson, Tyler James Williams, Janelle James, and Lisa Ann Walter play in a darker vein of humor, all of them seemingly invigorated by taking off a few off the guard rails that are understandably in place on broadcast TV. Of course, episode writers Charlie Day, Rob McElhenney, and Keyonna Taylor know we're here for the Paddy's Pub gang, all of whom try to get as much as possible out of their time at Abbott. Is Charlie just there to learn how to read? Of course not. As Dee leans into her jealous side and tries to take down Janine, Charlie & Mac work on recruiting kids in a 'reverse Blind Side' to their local school. It's all ridiculously in tune with Charlie, Mac, Dee, Dennis, and Frank, people who are constantly looking for a way to maximize the profit on their time and failing miserably, even while volunteering at an inner-city school. Much has been written about the bone-deep selfishness of this quintet, but it's almost refreshing to see how transparent they are about it in an era of two-faced grifters. They were almost ahead of their time in their desire to outwardly use every interaction as a road to improve their situations, and the humor of the show often comes from how they fall on their face every time that they attempt anything outside of their comfortable ruts. In the case of the premiere, it culminates with Dennis spearheading a new version of Billy Joel's 'We Didn't Start the Fire,' using Abbott teachers to sing about extremely un-timely topics like Guantanamo and Kaepernick—it's amazing how the gang's idea of current events is always a few years behind reality, even if they do get in a nice Ozempic dig. When Dennis learns that Fall Out Boy did their update to the Storm Front banger, the latest plan collapses, sending them back to a grift that Frank suggested from the very beginning: Ripping out the copper wiring. 'The Gang F**ks Up Abbott Elementary' is a reminder that anyone who thinks that the writing on It's Always Sunny is about misanthropes behaving badly isn't paying enough attention. Yes, this is a show about grifters, but it's also about people too dumb to do too much damage with their cons to anyone but themselves. Even the conclusion of the episode works in everyone's favor, as the school was going to have to replace the copper anyway. The follow-up is even better. After Frank goes into a coma while watching Netflix's Is It Cake?, Dee is forced to stay by his bedside in case his heartbeat falls below 50 BPM. As she goes through the cycles of grief, the guys find their way to a Liberty Ball to raise capital to turn Paddy's Pub into 'Starbucks for dive bars,' but end up mistaken for the help before finding their way to a crack house. In the end, Frank wasn't actually in a coma. He turned into a sweet treat himself to prove 'the magic of cake technology.' Amazing. This installment works from a classic Sunny template in which the gang cuts Dee out of a possible endeavor only to f*ck it up themselves. It also works from the comic vein in which the gang blames someone else for their failures, usually Frank, who gets trashed this episode for not elevating them like they intended when they allowed him into their idiot club so many years ago. As their failed benefactor lies in a supposed coma, Charlie, Mac, and Dennis take the Liberty Ball invitation that Dee found in the trash and try to find an investor. At first, they just end up working for the business fat cats around them as waiters, and then as bathroom attendants. The guys regularly talk about breaking out of their patterns but then dive right back into them, more comfortable getting a VIP a fresh bottle of wine than actually being one of them. A window to a brighter future opens in the form of a high-strung power player named Simon (a brilliant Alex Wolff, channeling the kind of spoiled bro-idiot he's certainly met at some Hollywood parties). He wins them over by saying, 'I really hope your father dies,' and giving them some of his cocaine. Before you know it, they're snorting meth at another party before landing in a final location that Cricket probably knows well—the kind of place with mattresses on the floor and where 'Narcan' is the password. After all, 'Frank knew that galas were gateways to crack houses.' Stray Observations •Tyler James Williams, who plays Gregory on Abbott, was 12 when Sunny premiered in 2005. •There's a wonderful example in the premiere of the thought processes of the Paddy's crew and how it devolves in a matter of minutes in the scene in which they start at least somewhat logically upset that the kids don't know about 9/11 and race down their mental holes of idiotic hoaxes to 'There was never even towers.' As someone says, 'Those people were passionate but dumb as shit.' Put that on a Sunny t-shirt. •There are so many wonderful little throwaway jokes in the premiere, but two of my favorites are Frank wasting no time urinating in an elementary school locker and the gang asking, 'Where's the volunteer's lounge?' when they get kicked out of the teachers' one. •Another great throwaway line in the second episode comes from Howerton, who responds to Frank's nurse talking about the denial stage of grief with a mumbled, 'I deny what you're saying, by the way.' •The bit about Ava always having cash on her to 'make things go away' in front of the Abbott cameras is even better when you think about what she hasn't paid to scrub over the first four seasons of that very funny show. •Call me an old man, but Fall Out Boy's 'Fire' update is legitimately horrible. I think I like the Sunny version better. Don't believe me, check it out. You've been warned. More from A.V. Club Staff Picks: A rug pull of a film and some deceptively breezy reads Nacho Vigalondo retreats to an unimaginative dream world for Daniela Forever Evan Rachel Wood says she wasn't asked back for Practical Magic 2 Solve the daily Crossword
USA Today
17-07-2025
- Sport
- USA Today
Tennessee coach Josh Heupel addresses 8 game losing streak vs. Georgia football
The Georgia Bulldogs have won eight straight games over the Tennessee Volunteers dating back to 2016. Georgia head coach Kirby Smart is 8-1 in his UGA career against the Volunteers including eight consecutive double-digit victories. Tennessee coach Josh Heupel is 0-4 in his career against Kirby Smart and Georgia, but he has helped lead the Volunteers' program back to respectability. Heupel is 37-15 in four seasons with Tennessee. The Volunteers have some momentum after they made their first ever College Football Playoff appearance in 2024. Now, Heupel and company are looking to reverse their fate against the mighty Bulldogs. "Thanks for reminding me," said Heupel when a member of the media told him about Georgia's recent success against Tennessee. "We haven't been able to be on the right side of the scoreboard in that game. That's players and coaches together ultimately being a little bit better. A couple of those games last year, it's a tight ballgame in the fourth quarter. For us, it's tying all three phases of the game together." Tennessee will have to try to beat Georgia in 2025 with a new starting quarterback after Nico Iamaleava transferred to UCLA this spring. The Volunteers and Heupel are confident UCLA/Appalachian State transfer Joey Aguilar can get the job done this year. "Kirby (Smart) and their staff and their players have done a really good job and played really well in those games. It will be important for us, that's Week 3, that we're ready to go play at the level that we need to against a really good football team," added Heupel. There's no doubt that Georgia will be a challenge for Tennessee, but we'll also learn a lot about Georgia when the two SEC rivals meet in Knoxville. Georgia opens the season with a pair of non-Power Four opponents (Marshall and Austin Peay) at home before playing at Tennessee, which is projected to be quarterback Gunner Stockton's first career road start. Despite Stockton's lack of experience on the road, Georgia has opened as early road favorites for their Sept. 13 game at Tennessee.
BBC News
17-07-2025
- Entertainment
- BBC News
Canterbury Shakespeare Festival set to begin
The Canterbury Shakespeare Festival is set to return this summer with five shows across four weeks around the first performance - The Tempest - is due to open at Tyler Hill House on performances at the community-led outdoor event include works by 17th century Canterbury writer Aphra Behn - one the first professional female playwrights, according to organisers. "They are fantastic plays and fantastic characters," said Canterbury Shakespeare Festival managing director Charlotte Groombridge. "Even if you have never seen Shakespeare before you will go in and see people you know," she continued. "Maybe it's your boss who it's hard to get on with or your best friend who is always worrying about things."He [Shakespeare] was a master of character, and we really do see ourselves and our community reflected in his plays." Venues used for the festival, which has run for 11 seasons, include The Mooring Café Island, Tyler Hill House and the Canterbury members of the company at the event are volunteers, students, residents, or professional or amateur actors who come together from all regions of Kent, organisers added.
