Briefly: North Carolina wins National Women's Soccer League title

The North Carolina Courage won the National Women's Soccer League title in a rout Sunday, in keeping with the rest of its season and most recent seasons.

The Courage beat the Chicago Red Stars 4-0 in Cary, N.C., for their second straight National Women's Soccer League title. The Courage also won the regular season's NWSL Shield for the third consecutive year, this time with a 15-5-4 regular-season record.

Debinha, from Brazil's national team, scored in the fourth minute, and U.S. national team members Jessica McDonald, Crystal Dunn and Sam Mewis also scored for the Courage.

Debinha was named the game's MVP, the first Brazilian to win it.

North Carolina's four goals were the most in an NWSL title match.

A sellout crowd of 10,227 attended the championship at Sahlen's Stadium.

The Red Stars (14-8-2 in the regular season) had a six-game winning streak heading into the final.

Naomi Osaka extended her winning streak to 11 matches, defeating Petra Kvitova 7-6 (1), 4-6, 6-4 in the round-robin portion on the first day of the WTA Finals in Shenzhen, China.

The tournament pits the top eight on the women's tour this season.

"There are some times when I play higher-ranked people and I don't do that great," Osaka said. "So I feel like this tournament is a big challenge."

Top-ranked Ashleigh Barty also won, rebounding from a set down to defeat Belinda Bencic 5-7, 6-1, 6-2.

Roger Federer won his hometown Swiss Indoors title for the 10th time by dominating Alex de Minaur in a 6-2, 6-2 victory in Basel. It was Federer's fourth title in 2019 and the 103rd of his career.

Only Mercedes teammate Valtteri Bottas' third-place finish denied Hamilton the championship Sunday. Hamilton needed to beat Bottas by 14 points but picked up only 10.

"I don't mind. I love racing," Hamilton said.

The championship moves next week to the U.S. Grand Prix, where Hamilton has won five times since 2012. He clinched the 2015 title there.

"It's been a good hunting ground for me," Hamilton said.

Ha Na Jang birdied the third playoff hole to beat American Danielle Kang at the LPGA's BMW Ladies Championship in Busan, South Korea.

Men's skiing: Alexis Pinturault beat Mathieu Faivre to lead a French 1-2 finish in the World Cup season-opening men's giant slalom in Soelden, Austria. Pinturault win by 0.54 seconds.

Figure skating: Two-time Olympic champion Yuzuru Hanyu of Japan landed four quadruple jumps in his free skate, scored a total of 322.59 points, less than a point from the world record, and won the men's title at Skate Canada in Kelowna, British Columbia. Russian teenager Alexandra Trusova won the women's competition with 241.02 points in her first Grand Prix event.

Skeleton: Katie Uhlaender and Andrew Blaser won their second consecutive USA Skeleton team trials races, strengthening their bids to compete on the World Cup circuit this winter. Uhlaender, daughter of former Twins outfielder Ted Uhlaender, is a four-time Olympian who didn't compete last year.