Nadal rallies past Del Potro for Davis Cup

Tennis: Rafael Nadal recovered from a terrible start and beat Juan Martin del Potro of Argentina 1-6, 6-4, 6-1, 7-6 (0) in Seville, Spain, on Sunday to give Spain its fifth Davis Cup title.

Nadal endured his most lopsided set defeat in the competition as Del Potro fired forehand winners at will, with the Spaniard failing to hold his first four serves to trail 1-0, 40-0 by the second game of the second set.

But Del Potro started misfiring and Nadal found his rhythm to break back before finally holding serve.

Nadal stretched his record on clay to 16-0 as Spain won its third title in four years.

Avalanche put end to Red Wings’ streak

NHL: Ryan O’Reilly had two goals, Semyon Varlamov made 27 saves and the Colorado Avalanche beat Detroit 4-2 in Denver to end the Red Wings’ winning streak at seven games.

Paul Stastny and T.J. Galiardi also scored, and Gabriel Landeskog added two assists to help Colorado.

In other games, Nick Johnson scored the go-ahead goal with 5:31 left in the third period leading the Minnesota Wild to a 4-3 victory over the Ducks 5-3 in Anaheim, Calif.

In Vancouver, B.C., Roberto Luongo made 21 saves, Chris Higgins and David Booth each had a goal and two assists and the Canucks beat the Calgary Flames 5-1.

San Diego State edges No. 24 Cal

Men’s college basketball: Chase Tapley scored 25 points, including two free throws with 8.6 seconds left, and San Diego State (8-2) beat No. 24 California (6-2) 64-63 in San Diego.

The Aztecs made 9 of 10 free throws in the final 2:21. Tapley had 10 of SDSU’s final 21 points.

• Shockers hand No. 18 Runnin’ Rebels first loss: Joe Ragland scored 19 of his 31 points in the first half and Wichita State cruised to an 89-70 victory over No. 18 UNLV (8-1) in Wichita, Kan.

Ragland was 8 of 9 from beyond the arc for Wichita State (5-2).

• Undefeated Baylor beats Northwestern: Quincy Acy and Pierre Jackson both scored 16 points and No. 7 Baylor (7-0) remained unbeaten with a 69-41 victory over Northwestern (7-1) in Evanston, Ill.

• Free throws lift Harvard over Seattle: Jonah Travis came off the bench to score 19 points and grab 10 rebounds in 19 minutes as Harvard (8-0) remained undefeated with an 80-70 nonconference victory over Seattle (2-4) at Cambridge, Mass. Harvard made 29 of 36 at the free-throw line as the Redhawks made 9 of 18.

No. 13 Purdue upsets No. 4 Texas A&M

Women’s college basketball: Courtney Moses scored 15 points and Brittany Rayburn added 14 to help Purdue (7-1) defeat Texas A&M in the Big 12/Big Ten Challenge in West Lafayette, Ind.

The defending national champion Aggies (6-1) saw their winning streak end at 12 games.

Hirscher holds off Ligety in giant slalom

Skiing: Marcel Hirscher of Austria turned in a blazing final run to overtake Ted Ligety and win a World Cup giant slalom in Beaver Creek, Colo.

Hirscher finished in a combined time of 2 minutes, 38.45 seconds, holding off Ligety by 0.16 seconds. Fritz Dopfer of Germany was third.

• Vonn wins Super G for weekend sweep: Lindsey Vonn won a super-G for her third victory in three days at the Lake Louise (Alberta) Winterstart World Cup.

Vonn finished in 1 minute, 20.21 seconds to beat Anna Fenninger of Austria and fellow American Julia Mancuso. Vonn also won downhill races Friday and Saturday.

Stanford earns first women’s soccer title

Miscellany: Teresa Noyola scored from point-blank range to help top-ranked Stanford beat No. 3 Duke 1-0 in Kennesaw, Ga., and finally give the Cardinal their first NCAA women’s soccer title.

Noyola scored in the 53rd minute after Camille Levin won a ball at the goal line about 8 yards right of the goal. She crossed to the far post, where Noyola headed it from one yard.

Duke (22-4-1) had several scoring opportunities after that, but couldn’t beat Stanford keeper Emily Oliver.

• Iowa wrestlers top Iowa State: Iowa’s top-ranked wrestling team won its first five matches and beat rival Iowa State (0-6) 27-9 in Ames, Iowa.

Tony Ramos and Derek St. John had pins to lead the Hawkeyes (5-0).

Iowa hasn’t lost in 82 consecutive duals meets and is two wins away from tying Oklahoma State’s record of 84 duals without a defeat set from 1959-66.

• Kuechly wins Butkus Award: Luke Kuechly of Boston College won the Butkus Award as the best linebacker in college football. He leads the nation this season with 191 tackles.