The New York Times has released today’s Connections: Sports Edition, and the answer is a set of words that will stump anyone who doesn’t watch volleyball. The game, a spinoff of the popular word-puzzle app, asks players to group 16 words into four categories. Each category comes with its own hint, and today’s puzzle covers Arizona sports, Midwest college towns, the Manning family, and professional volleyball.
How Connections Works
Connections is a daily word game that tests sports knowledge. Players are given 16 words and must group them into four categories, each containing four words. The categories are color-coded: yellow is the easiest, followed by green, blue, and purple. Get all four words in a set correct, and those words disappear from the board. Make a mistake, and you lose one of your four lives. Rearrange the board or shuffle the words to spot connections more easily.
The game resets after midnight, just like Wordle, and each new set of words gets harder. The New York Times runs the game in association with The Athletic, the publication’s sports division, and it works on both web browsers and mobile devices.
The Hints For Today
The game offers hints without giving away the full answer. For today’s puzzle, the categories are:
- Yellow: Arizona Pro Teams
- Green: Big Ten School Locations
- Blue: Manning Family Members
- Purple: Major League Volleyball Teams
That last one is the tricky one. Volleyball is not a sport most casual sports fans follow closely, and the professional leagues are smaller than football or basketball. The hint alone tells you the category exists, but it doesn’t tell you which teams are in it.
The Full Answer
The solution to today’s Connections: Sports Edition #719 is a set of four words per category. Here they are:
- Arizona Pro Teams: CARDINALS, DIAMONDBACKS, MERCURY, SUNS
- Big Ten School Locations: CHAMPAIGN, COLUMBUS, LINCOLN, PISCATAWAY
- Manning Family Members: ARCH, ARCHIE, ELI, PEYTON
- Major League Volleyball Teams: PULSE, SUPERNOVAS, VALKYRIES, VIBE
The solution to today’s Connections: Sports Edition #719 is…
That is the entire answer, laid out in order. The categories are straightforward once you know what they are, but finding the right words without the hints would require remembering which teams play in Arizona, which colleges sit in the Midwest, which Manning family members exist, and which volleyball teams are in the league.
What The Puzzle Tests
The game is designed to test sports knowledge across different levels of fandom. The categories are also uneven in difficulty. Arizona Pro Teams is a simple list of team names. Big Ten School Locations requires knowing where each university sits. Manning Family Members is a list of brothers and relatives. Volleyball teams is the hardest, because professional volleyball is a niche sport with a small following.
The categories are varied, covering professional sports, college sports, a family of athletes, and a sport most people associate with the beach. That mix is what makes the game interesting, even if the volleyball category is the hardest.
Why The Hints Matter
The hints are the real draw. They let players narrow down which words belong in which group without solving the whole puzzle. A player who knows the Arizona teams can skip that category entirely. A player who knows the Manning family can fill in three of the four words before touching the others. The hints turn the puzzle into a partial solve, which is exactly what the game wants.
The hints also highlight the range of sports knowledge the game covers. One category is about professional football. One is about college basketball. One is about a family of quarterbacks. One is about a sport most people associate with the beach. That mix is what makes the game interesting, even if the volleyball category is the hardest.
The Categories In Order
To break it down further, here is each category with its four words:
- Yellow: Arizona Pro Teams — CARDINALS, DIAMONDBACKS, MERCURY, SUNS
- Green: Big Ten School Locations — CHAMPAIGN, COLUMBUS, LINCOLN, PISCATAWAY
- Blue: Manning Family Members — ARCH, ARCHIE, ELI, PEYTON
- Purple: Major League Volleyball Teams — PULSE, SUPERNOVAS, VALKYRIES, VIBE
The order matters because the game presents the categories in a sequence, and the difficulty increases from yellow to purple. That means players who solve the yellow category first can move on to the easier green and blue sets before facing the hardest one.
What Comes Next
Tomorrow brings a new puzzle. The game resets after midnight, so players who missed today’s answer can start fresh. The format stays the same: 16 words, four categories, four chances to get it right.
For players who want more, Mashable runs a games hub with Mahjong, Sudoku, free crosswords, and more. The site also offers hints and answers for today’s Strands, another NYT game.
The Bottom Line
Connections: Sports Edition is a simple matching game dressed up as a sports quiz. The categories are varied, the difficulty is fair, and the hints are generous. The hardest part is the volleyball category, which requires knowledge of a sport most people don’t follow closely. The game is fun, the hints are useful, and the answer is a set of words that will make sense to some people and none to others.
The puzzle exists to give people hints they can ignore if they prefer to solve it themselves. That is the honest reaction to this story. The game is a pleasant diversion, the hints are a genuine help, and the answer is a set of words that will make sense to some people and none to others.
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