NYT Connections Sports Edition hints & answers: Sunday, September 20, 2026

Updated: Sunday, September 20, 2026 · Hints reviewed by Omer Liban · New puzzle daily at midnight local time — free from The Athletic. · Puzzle editor: Mark Cooper.

This page has every level of help for the NYT Connections Sports Edition puzzle of Sunday, September 20, 2026: 3 spoiler-free hint tiers that narrow things down step by step, followed by the complete answers with explanations — each behind its own tap-to-reveal card.

Stuck on today's Sports Edition? Same drill as regular Connections: work the tiers below from a single answer per group up to the full explained solution, revealing only as much as you want.

Connections: Sports Edition works exactly like regular Connections — four colour-coded groups from easiest 🟡 yellow to trickiest 🟣 purple — but every category is sports: players, teams, rules, moments. It's made by The Athletic and free to play.

Sports Connections hints (September 20, 2026)

1One answer from each group

Yellow (easiest): one of its answers is “MIDSHIPMEN”.
Green (easy): one of its answers is “QUEBEC CITY”.
Blue (tricky): one of its answers is “LEMON”.
Purple (trickiest, usually wordplay): one of its answers is “GOLF”.

2Category hints (no answers)

Yellow (easiest): the theme is “Maryland teams”.
Green (easy): the theme is “Former nhl cities”.
Blue (tricky): the theme is “Nfl rookie wrs”.
Purple (trickiest, usually wordplay): the theme is “Sports terms in the nato phonetic alphabet”.

3One full group revealed

Yellow (easiest) — the connection is “Maryland teams”, and its four answers are: MIDSHIPMEN, TERRAPINS, ORIOLES, RAVENS.

Sports Connections answers — September 20, 2026

★Today's full Sports Connections answers, explained

Yellow (easiest) — the connection is “Maryland teams”. The answers: MIDSHIPMEN, TERRAPINS, ORIOLES, RAVENS.
Green (easy) — the connection is “Former nhl cities”. The answers: QUEBEC CITY, HARTFORD, ATLANTA, PHOENIX.
Blue (tricky) — the connection is “Nfl rookie wrs”. The answers: LEMON, TATE, TYSON, BOSTON.
Purple (trickiest, usually wordplay) — the connection is “Sports terms in the nato phonetic alphabet”. The answers: GOLF, UNIFORM, VICTOR, YANKEE.

The puzzle, explained

The purple group is all sports terms that are also NATO phonetic alphabet letters—GOLF (the sport), UNIFORM (what athletes wear), VICTOR (another word for winner), and YANKEE (a type of baseball team). The real trap here was that YANKEE could totally seem like it belongs with the Maryland teams since the Yankees are a sports franchise, but it's actually in the wordplay category. UNIFORM was probably the sneakiest because most people think of it as clothing first and might've tried to force it into a group about uniforms athletes wear. VICTOR and GOLF are the more straightforward wordplay entries since they're clearly sports-related terms that also happen to be NATO letters.

Next in today's routine: Soccer Connections → · every game's answers on one page. New puzzle daily at midnight local time — free from The Athletic. Bookmark this page for tomorrow's hints. Or play Sports Connections on the official site.

More of today's puzzles

LinkedIn puzzles

Sports Connections — common questions

How is Connections Sports Edition different from regular Connections?

Same rules — sort sixteen answers into four colour-coded groups — but every category is sports: players, teams, rules, kits, moments. It's made by The Athletic (the NYT's sports newsroom), it's free, and it lives on The Athletic's site rather than the NYT Games app.

What time does Sports Connections reset?

At midnight in your own local timezone, like Wordle — not at midnight Eastern like regular Connections. Wherever you are, the new puzzle arrives when your clock strikes twelve.

What do the colours mean in Sports Connections?

The same difficulty ladder as regular Connections: yellow is the easiest group, then green, then blue, and purple is the trickiest — often wordplay or a sneaky link between the leftover answers.

Previous Sports Connections puzzles

Full Sports Connections archive (137 puzzles) → · How to play Connections: Sports Edition →