Pope Leo’s sporting loyalty has turn out to be a topic of dialog nearly as quickly as white smoke emerged from the Vatican sixtine chapel.
Elected Thursday, Robert Prevost is the primary pope of the USA within the historical past of the Catholic Church. The missionary born in Chicago, who took the title of Leo XIV, additionally attended Villanova College close to Philadelphia, the place he obtained a Baccalaureate ès Sciences in 1977.
The 2 Chicago baseball groups have been on the entrance and middle whereas sports activities followers reacted to the information.

It was initially reported that the brand new pope was a fan of the cubs. The workforce congratulated Pope Leo XIV in an article on X which had an emblematic model photograph of Wrigley Subject with the message: Hey, Chicago. He is a fan of cubs!
However his brother, John Prevost, put the report straight in an interview with WGN-TV. The Pope is a fan of the White Sox.
“He was by no means a fan of the cubs, so I do not know the place it got here from. He was at all times a fan of the Sox,” mentioned John, including that confusion may come from the truth that the facet of their household mom was the followers of North Siders and Cubs.
The tv interview requested the White Sox followers who puzzled the Pope’s capacity to persuade the proprietor Jerry Reinsdorf to promote the workforce of the final place.
The group praised the clarification of the pope’s brother.
“The household nonetheless is aware of the very best, and plainly the Life Fandom of Pope Leo XIV is nearer to thirty fifth and shields,” the White Sox mentioned in a press release. “Some issues are larger than baseball, and on this case, we’re joyful to have a White Sox fan represented within the Vatican. A jersey white Sox at positive
Followers who’ve been struggling for a very long time have additionally weighed.
One identified on X that Chicago developed a pope earlier than the Bears developed 1 / 4. One other mentioned that bears now have a direct line to God. And one other mentioned that the Bears will not be on the improper facet of Hail Marys, a reference to the completion of the quarter of the commanders of Washington Jayden Daniels in Noah Brown from Noah Brown to beat the Bears in October.
The election of the brand new pope coincides with a trio of former villanova gamers main the New York Knicks throughout an NBA eliminatory race. It did not take lengthy for a photoshopped photograph of the 4 collectively to seem on social networks.
The Knicks have erased 20-point deficits in matches 1 and a couple of winners in opposition to title champion Boston Celtics within the semi-finals of the Japanese Convention.
Now followers pray to the mixture of Villanova guys and the brand new Pope can assist the workforce in its first NBA title since 1973.
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AP Sports activities: https://apnews.com/sports activities