Rory McIlroy beat Brooks Koepka in the final round of the 2018-19 PGA Tour season, shooting 66 over the final 18 holes to win a $15 million bonus at the Tour Championship at East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta in August.

After a somewhat surprising vote by PGA Tour members, McIlroy also edged Koepka for PGA Tour Player of the Year honors on Wednesday. It is the third time McIlroy has won the Jack Nicklaus Award.

"I couldn't be more proud of what I achieved this year," McIlroy said. "I wanted to try to bring my best every single week that I played, and I feel like I did that to the best of my ability. I think the greatest compliment you can receive is that your peers feel like you've done something pretty special. For this award to be voted on by my fellow players, I'm very humbled and very honored. I think it says a lot about what I've put into this year and some of the decisions I made starting off the year."

Sung-jae Im, the only rookie who qualified for the Tour Championship, was voted PGA Tour Rookie of the Year.

PGA Tour members who played at least 15 official FedExCup events during the 2018-19 season were eligible to vote for the awards. Voting ended on Sept. 6.

Last month, Koepka was named PGA of America Player of the Year based on points. It is only the third time player of the year honorees were different: Nick Faldo (PGA) and Wayne Levi (PGA Tour) in 1990 and Corey Pavin (PGA) and Fred Couples (PGA Tour) in 1991 were the other occasions.

"Look, Brooks has had an incredible year, an incredible two or three years, whatever it is," McIlroy said. "He's the number one player in the world in the World Golf Ranking. I think this speaks volumes about what PGA Tour players feel is important. I've harped on this a little bit over the course of the year: I think players don't just feel four weeks a year are important, it's more than that. We play for a lot more. Why do we play 25 times a year when only four weeks are really important?

"I think it's a huge vote of confidence from the players that we play for more than just what maybe the narrative suggests. I thought maybe Brooks winning the PGA Championship this year was going to be the difference-maker, but the other players thought differently."

McIlroy and Koepka were the only PGA Tour players to win three events this past season. McIlroy won the Players Championship, Canadian Open and Tour Championship. Including his FedEx Cup and Wyndham Reward bonuses, McIlroy won $24.3 million last season, the most in Tour history.

McIlroy also won the Byron Nelson Award for adjusted scoring average (69.057) for the third time in his career and led the PGA Tour in top-10s (14) and total strokes gained (2.551 average).

After one start in the fall of 2018, McIlroy opened the 2019 calendar year with top-six finishes in his first five starts before winning the Players Championship. He became only the third player to win The Players, a major championship, the FedExCup and a World Golf Championships event in his career, joining Tiger Woods and Henrik Stenson.

But McIlroy wasn't nearly as good as Koepka in majors. McIlroy finished tied for 21st at the Masters, tied for eighth at the PGA Championship, tied for ninth at the U.S. Open and missed the cut at The Open Championship at Royal Portrush in his native Northern Ireland, after shooting 79 in the first round.

Along with a second straight PGA Championship title, Koepka also won the C.J. Cup and WGC-FedEx St. Jude Invitational. He led the Tour money list with nearly $9.7 million.

Koepka was the most consistent player in golf's biggest events for the second season in a row. He has finished in the top five in the last five majors championships, including all four this past season. He finished tied for second at the Masters in April, won the PGA Championship for the second straight year at Bethpage Black in May, finished solo second at the U.S. Open at Pebble Beach in June and tied for fourth at the Open Championship in July.

Koepka is only the fifth player to finish in the top five in all four majors in one season during the Masters era (since 1934); Nicklaus (1971 and '73), Woods (2000 and '05), Rickie Fowler (2014) and Jordan Spieth (2015) were the others.

Kopeka finished in the top 10 in 18 of the last 19 rounds in major championships. He shot in the 60s in 11 of 16 rounds in major championships this season, joining Spieth (2015) for second most in the Masters era. Only Woods (12 in 2000) had more in majors in a single season.

Im, from South Korea, was the top Tour rookie in FedEx Cup points last season and was the only one to advance to East Lake. He had 16 top-25s and seven top-10s in 35 events.

COSTA MESA, Calif. -- Los Angeles Chargers tight end Hunter Henry has once again been bit by the injury bug, suffering a tibial plateau fracture to his left knee during Sunday's game against the Indianapolis Colts, the team announced Wednesday.

The Chargers expect Henry will miss four to six weeks, a source told ESPN's Adam Schefter. No official timetable has been given for his return, and the team will continue to evaluate the injury.

"He's taking it tough, but he's doing fine," coach Anthony Lynn said. "He wants to be here with his teammates. He wants to play. And not being out there with them, he feels like he's letting them down. But he's not. You can't control these things. You can only control what you can control.

"He'll be back, though. He'll be OK."

Henry suffered the injury when a Colts defender hit him in the legs to bring him down during the second half of the Chargers' 30-24 victory. Henry eventually returned to the game, playing 55 of 59 snaps in Week 1.

The 2016 second-round pick out of Arkansas has battled injuries throughout his career with the Chargers. He missed all of the 2018 regular season with a torn ACL, playing just 14 snaps in the AFC divisional playoff loss to the New England Patriots.

Henry also suffered a lacerated kidney that forced him to miss the last two games of the 2017 season. He also missed a game his rookie season due to a knee injury.

Despite the injuries, Henry leads the Chargers with 12 touchdown receptions since the start of the 2016 season.

"It's obviously disappointing," quarterback Philip Rivers said. "You hate it for him. You saw how excited he was to be out there this year and how hard he worked to get back. From an offensive standpoint, you saw how big a part of it he is and what it was going to be from last week here as the season gets going."

Lynn said the Chargers will count on backups Virgil Green and Sean Culkin to "step up."

The Chargers worked out former Seattle Seahawks tight end Luke Willson this week, most recently released by the Oakland Raiders during final roster cuts. The Chargers also signed tight end Stephen Anderson to the practice squad.

Antonio Gates also remains available and has not ruled out a potential return to the field. The Chargers signed Gates right before the season began last season due to Henry's ACL injury.

T. Boone Pickens, the billionaire oil tycoon whose money helped put Oklahoma State football on the map, died Wednesday. He was 91.

Pickens had been battling a series of strokes and head injuries as a result of a fall he took in 2017, according to his spokesman, Jay Rosser.

Pickens' penchant for philanthropy and love for Oklahoma State football dovetailed in 2006 when he donated $165 million to the athletic program, the largest single gift in NCAA history.

"The greatest Cowboy of them all has taken his last ride," athletic director Mike Holder said in a statement. "It will never be the same again. We could never thank him enough for all that he did for our university. He gave us everything he had -- and all that he asked in return was that we play by the rules and dream big. He was living proof that anything is possible if you're wearing orange. 'Great ride Cowboy, great ride!'"

Pickens graduated from Oklahoma State in 1951 with a degree in geology when the university still went by Oklahoma A&M.

He wound up giving more than $300 million to Oklahoma State athletics.

Pickens' initial contribution bankrolled several state-of-the-art athletic facilities, as well as a new football stadium, which was named after him.

"I know how to win. I have won before. And I win every day in the business I am in," Pickens told ESPN in 2006. "I don't find sports a helluva lot different than business. ... I want us to be competitive."

With sparkling facilities to attract recruits, that's exactly what Oklahoma State football became under Mike Gundy, whom Pickens had urged Holder to promote to head coach after Les Miles left for LSU in 2004.

Gundy paid tribute to Pickens on Twitter.

Mr. Pickens is a big part of our success and we're all thankful for the lasting impact he's had on Oklahoma State. It would have been difficult for us to climb as high as we have without him. He'll be missed, but his legacy here will live on for a long time to come. pic.twitter.com/1jYVwBcHo0

— Mike Gundy (@CoachGundy) September 11, 2019

Before Pickens' donation, the Cowboys had reached double-digit wins only three times in their history. Since, they've won 10 or more games in six seasons. In 2011, Oklahoma State captured its first Big 12 title and just narrowly missed out on playing LSU for the BCS National Championship.

"We have some added advantages that we've never had," Gundy said in 2008, when his team climbed into the top 10 of the polls for the first time since Barry Sanders' Heisman Trophy season in 1988. "It would have never happened without [Pickens]. There's just no way. It couldn't happen."

Yet as Oklahoma State rose to prominence behind Pickens' and Gundy's contributions, tensions rose between them. Pickens would become irritated when Gundy entertained job overtures. And on multiple occasions, Pickens publicly criticized Gundy for having a poor record against rival Oklahoma.

But in 2017, the two made amends, and Pickens tweeted a letter of support to Gundy after Oklahoma State's 62-52 loss to the Sooners.

"Over the years, him and I have butted heads a lot, but we do think a lot alike and we have a common goal," Gundy said a week later. "He wants to win every game. He's a competitor."

Pickens made his fortune founding Petroleum Exploration with just $2,500 in 1956. Over the following three decades, the company he renamed Mesa Petroleum ballooned into one of the largest oil companies in the world. Pickens later became famous for being a corporate raider of other oil companies. In 1985, Time magazine put him on its cover with the headline "The Takeover Game."

At 68, Pickens left Mesa and founded the hedge fund BP Capital Management, which bet heavily and successfully on natural gas, turning him into one of the richest people in America, while laying the groundwork for his involvement in Oklahoma State athletics.

"He was the ultimate Cowboy,'' Oklahoma State University president Burns Hargis said in a statement. "It is impossible to calculate his full impact on Oklahoma State. His historic gifts to academics and athletics not only transformed the university, they inspired thousands of others to join in the transformation.''

Pickens was born Thomas Boone Pickens Jr. on May 22, 1928, in Holdenville, Oklahoma. After graduating from high school in Amarillo, Texas, Pickens spent one year at Texas A&M on a basketball scholarship. When that scholarship was not renewed, he transferred to Oklahoma A&M.

Pickens was married and divorced five times. He is survived by five children and 11 grandchildren.

FOXBOROUGH, Mass. -- Antonio Brown took part in his first practice with the New England Patriots on Wednesday afternoon, a day after his former trainer filed a civil lawsuit in the Southern District of Florida accusing him of sexually assaulting her on three occasions.

Brown, who has worn the No. 84 throughout his career, was wearing No. 1, his temporary number, at practice.

Coach Bill Belichick declined to comment on additional questions about Brown before the practice, including his status for Sunday's game at Miami. Belichick repeatedly said "We're working on Miami" during his brief news conference.

In the lawsuit, a copy of which was reviewed by ESPN, Brown's former trainer, Britney Taylor, accuses the newly signed Patriots receiver of sexually assaulting her on three separate occasions in 2017 (in the Pittsburgh area) and 2018 (both in the Miami area).

Taylor is willing and planning to meet with the NFL next week. She is getting married and can't meet before then, sources tell ESPN's Adam Schefter.

Ed Griffith, the public information officer for the Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office, said in a statement that, "having reviewed our records, we found no prior police investigative contacts regarding these allegations or these individuals.

"We will be reaching out to the pertinent police agencies to determine if they had any prior contacts or investigations. If such police investigations exist, we would certainly be interested in those reports and any related evidence gathered," he said.

The Allegheny County District Attorney's office told ESPN "as a matter of course" it reviews "information in a federal lawsuit whenever that information references potential criminal activity, even if that activity had not been previously known to law enforcement."

Belichick deferred to the Patriots' statement late Tuesday, which said they were aware of the lawsuit and "take these allegations very seriously."

"On Antonio's situation, both Antonio and his representatives have made statements, so I'm not going to be expanding on any of those. They are what they are. We've looked into the situation. We're taking it very seriously, all the way through the organization. I'm sure there are questions, but I'm not going to be entering a discussion about that today," he said.

Brown has denied the allegations. Darren Heitner, a lawyer representing Brown, said his client plans to countersue.

Drew Rosenhaus, Brown's agent, told ESPN on Wednesday that he and his client were "anticipating this possibility" that a lawsuit would be filed, but he declined to say whether the Patriots knew of the looming lawsuit before signing Brown.

Rosenhaus said he has been in contact with the NFL Players Association, which has spoken to the NFL.

"What I want to emphasize to everybody is, please allow the situation to play itself out. Antonio will cooperate. He will cooperate with the Patriots, with the NFL, with any investigation, with the NFLPA; and in time, Antonio will be cleared," he said.

The NFL has declined comment but will begin its investigation into the matter on Wednesday, ESPN's Dan Graziano reports.

The lawsuit caught the Patriots by surprise, sources told Schefter, and the team will have to decide how to proceed with Brown. One possibility is that Roger Goodell will place Brown on the commissioner's exempt list, sources said, which would mean Brown will not be counted on the Patriots' active list while the league investigates the allegations.

Brown was originally traded from Pittsburgh to Oakland in the offseason. But a bizarre foot injury, fights with the NFL over his helmet, skipped practices, multiple fines, a run-in with Raiders general manager Mike Mayock and his inflammatory social media posts ultimately led to the decision to release him.

He agreed to a deal with the defending Super Bowl champions hours after the Raiders granted his request and let him go.

ESPN's Mike Reiss, Jeremy Fowler and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Hornets owner and six-time NBA champion Michael Jordan is pledging $1 million to organizations assisting with Hurricane Dorian relief efforts in the Bahamas.

Jordan said in a statement Tuesday on Twitter through his spokeswoman, Estee Portnoy, that he's "devastated" at the destruction in the Bahamas, adding "my heart goes out to everyone who is suffering and to those who have lost loved ones."

Jordan, who owns property in and frequently visits the Bahamas, says as the recovery and relief efforts continue he will be tracking the situation closely and working to identify nonprofit agencies where the funds will have the most impact.

Jordan added that "the Bahamian people are strong and resilient and I hope that my donation will be of help as they work to recover from this catastrophic storm."

SHANGHAI -- Patty Mills scored 24 points and Australia moved into the World Cup semifinals with an 82-70 victory over the Czech Republic on Wednesday night.

Chris Goulding scored 14 and Andrew Bogut added 10 for Australia, which will meet Spain in Friday's semifinals. France and Argentina will play in the other semifinal on Friday.

France ousted the two-time defending World Cup champion U.S. 89-79 in another quarterfinal earlier Wednesday.

The first half was back and forth, with Australia leading 33-30 at the break. But a 30-18 third quarter was the difference for the Aussies, who led by as many as 17 in the second half. Patrik Auda scored 21 points for the Czech Republic. Tomas Satoransky was one rebound shy of the first triple-double in World Cup history -- he finished with 13 points, 13 assists and nine rebounds.

Australia, which beat the U.S. in an exhibition last month while tuning up for the World Cup, improved to 6-0 so far in China this summer.

TIP-INS

Australia: The win assures Australia of no worse than a fourth-place finish at the World Cup -- the program's best showing in this tournament. The Aussies were fifth at the world championships at 1982 and 1994. Czech Republic: Pavel Pumprla scored 10 for the Czechs. ... The Czechs were outscored 33-21 from 3-point range, and those 12 points matched the game's 12-point margin.

WELCOME BACK

Australia and Spain are the only semifinalists from the 2016 Olympics to make the final four at this World Cup.

PLAYOFF FORMAT

All eight quarterfinalists have two games remaining. Serbia, the U.S., the Czechs and Poland will play to decide fifth through eighth place -- with those spots decided on Saturday in Beijing. The semifinal losers of the Spain-Australia and France-Argentina games will play for third place Sunday in Beijing, immediately before the title game.

UP NEXT

Australia: Faces Spain in the semifinals on Friday at Beijing. Czech Republic: Faces Poland in a consolation playoff game on Thursday at Shanghai.

LOS ANGELES -- Twenty-eight counterfeit NBA championship rings have been seized by federal authorities at Los Angeles International Airport.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection said Wednesday that the rings were in a wooden box shipped from China, with a final destination in Arizona.

Investigators suspect the intent was to sell the phony rings as a collection.

Inspectors confirmed the rings were fake and in violation of trademarks for the NBA and several teams, including the Los Angeles Lakers, Golden State Warriors and San Antonio Spurs.

No arrests were immediately announced.

Officials said that if the rings were real, the collection could be worth more than $550,000.

DONGGUAN, China -- The United States has been ousted from medal contention by France at the FIBA World Cup, failing to capture gold at a major international tournament for the first time since the 2006 world championships.

Evan Fournier scored 22 points, Rudy Gobert added 21 points and 16 rebounds, and France beat Team USA 89-79 in the quarterfinals on Wednesday, rallying from a seven-point fourth-quarter deficit to pull off the upset.

The U.S. had won 58 consecutive tournament games in FIBA and Olympic competition with NBA players, starting with the bronze-medal game at the 2006 world championships and continuing through every FIBA Americas, World Cup and Olympics event since. The U.S. was bidding to become the first nation to win three consecutive World Cups, after winning three straight Olympic golds in that span.

The best the Americans can do now in China is finish fifth. They're going home with a berth in the 2020 Olympics secured, but no medal.

"We came here to win gold," Gobert said. "We knew it wasn't going to be easy. A lot of people counted us out, but we got the win."

Gobert said beating the Americans wasn't the goal -- winning gold is.

"It doesn't mean anything if you don't win in the end," Gobert said.

Donovan Mitchell scored 29 points for the U.S., all of them coming in the first three quarters. The Americans came up scoreless on six consecutive possessions down the stretch, a drought that allowed the French to take control of a back-and-forth game.

"I know that people are going to focus on who we didn't have, but how about we focus on who we do have?'' Mitchell said. "Our season ended, and we came out ready to work with Coach Pop and all his coaches. It's not about who's not here. I've been saying that for a while.''

Nando De Colo scored 18 for France.

France was up 10 early in the second half. The U.S. went on a 31-14 run over the next 10 minutes to go up by seven. Then the French responded with a 15-2 run over the next five minutes, going up 82-76 on a long jumper by Frank Ntilikina with 2:05 left.

Mitchell had a chance to get the U.S. within two with about a minute left, driving against Gobert -- but the France center read what his Utah Jazz teammate was going to do perfectly, swatting the try away.

France had been 0-9 against the U.S. in major international play, most of those outcomes one-sided affairs. But the last meeting between the nations was only a 100-97 U.S. win at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics three years ago, and France returned three players -- Gobert, De Colo and Nicolas Batum -- who played in that game.

No U.S. player who played that afternoon in Rio is on this year's World Cup team.

"Doesn't matter who is on the team, and I couldn't be more proud of these 12 guys who sacrificed their summer to come here, having never played with each other before,'' coach Gregg Popovich said. "They put themselves in the arena and competed, and they deserve credit for that, just like France deserves credit for winning. It's not about, 'Well, the United States didn't have their other guys.'

"There's no such thing as other guys. These are the guys that were here, and they did a great job, and I'm very proud of them.''

France outrebounded the U.S. 21-12 in the first half, Gobert found his way to the line 10 times in the game's first 20 minutes and the Americans went into the break trailing 45-39. The U.S. had trailed for 8:25 in their first five games combined -- but trailed for 11:24 in the first half alone on Wednesday.

Fournier's layup with 7:33 left in the third gave France a 53-43 lead, and that's when Mitchell got going.

He had 14 points in the third quarter alone, and his dunk with 2:40 left pulled the U.S. into a 60-60 tie. Marcus Smart made three free throws after getting fouled by Gobert to put the U.S. back on top, and the Americans took a 66-63 lead into the fourth.

But they couldn't finish it off.

TIP-INS

France:

• Gobert played the first 12:26. The longest he went before getting his first break in a Jazz game last season was 11:30.

• Ntilikina scored 11 for France.

Team USA:

• Smart scored 11 and Kemba Walker had 10 for the U.S.

• Before Mitchell's offensive outburst Wednesday, the previous single-game scoring high for any U.S. player at this World Cup was Jaylen Brown's 20-point game against Japan in the opening group round.

• Jayson Tatum (sprained left ankle) missed his fourth consecutive game.

UP NEXT

France: Faces Argentina in semifinals at Beijing on Friday.

Team USA: Faces Serbia in consolation round at Dongguan on Thursday.

DONGGUAN, China -- The setting, style and colors are all foreign, but the nature of the FIBA basketball game often falls into the same rhythms as NCAA tournament games.

It's single elimination, the games are 40 minutes, the five-foul disqualification amplifies the role of officiating, and there's an unmistakable play-for-country aesthetic that resembles the play-for-college approach.

Team USA was thrashing around Wednesday against France in an 89-79 loss in the FIBA World Cup quarterfinals. The Americans were playing unorthodox lineups to try to deal with the best player on the floor, who was on the other team. They were undersized at almost every position and forced to substitute to try to win possessions with energy instead of execution. When they got badly behind, they relied on hero ball, hoping percentages wouldn't correct.

Suddenly there was a clarity to it all. Team USA looked like a low seed trying with all its might to upset a top seed in March, not the most powerful basketball nation in the world trying to win gold in summer.

Rudy Gobert was too big for them, France's ball movement and pick-and-rolls often just a little too good, and Gregg Popovich was deploying strategies that looked more fitting for a No. 8 seed trying to plug holes under pressure than a No. 1 seed handling its business.

France looked like the better team, more or less, for a majority of the game. There were moments of pride, such as when Donovan Mitchell scored 14 points in the third quarter with an awe-inspiring show of skill and will. But he was like Loyola going up against Michigan in the Final Four.

"I think it's a disrespectful notion to even bring something like [the stars who withdrew] up," Popovich said with an edge when he was asked about all the dropouts. "That's disrespectful to France and whoever else is in this tournament. France beat us. It doesn't matter who was on the team."

That's true. Gobert described the victory as "something I've dreamed about since I was a child" and that it "will be a moment we all talk about for the rest of our lives." Gobert's saying that was showing respect for the team he just vanquished with 21 points, 16 rebounds and 3 blocks.

For the Americans to receive respect in such a situation, they must give it. And to a man, they did.

"Of course people are going say it was a big upset because of who we are and what this team has done in the past over the years," said Kemba Walker, an All-Star who was largely outplayed by Frank Ntilikina, a perceived lottery bust whom the New York Knicks have tried to trade for months on end. "They just played well, guys played well, they made shots, they executed all night, and they came out with a huge win."

This game was not a tragedy like the loss to Greece was in 2006. It was not a product of focus issues or trust issues or lack of preparation.

This team was totally invested and worked the process, spending the past 40 days trying to assemble some cohesion and piece together a style of play that would hold up under pressure.

Their attempts were admirable and possibly even doable had everything aligned just right. But that is the reality of a Cinderella, not a champion. That's just the truth.

They didn't have enough offensive firepower, and it showed up when they went six straight possessions without scoring in the fourth quarter.

They didn't have enough big scorers, so late in the game both Mitchell and Walker were stifled at the rim. They didn't have star big men, which left them almost out of luck against Turkey and left Popovich to deploy smoke and mirrors to deal with Gobert -- trying smaller and smaller lineups that left guards like Joe Harris wrestling with Gobert for position.

And they didn't have enough depth, so losing Jayson Tatum, a vital offensively talented player with great size, couldn't be overcome.

All of these warning signs were there. They didn't have to be fatal, but they probably were going to be.

"It's tough for us. Everyone is hurting right now for sure," Harris said. "We wanted to come out here and compete for a gold medal, but we don't have anything to necessarily hang our heads about. We still played our asses off."

What's left is a clarion call. It had been 13 years since Team USA didn't win a gold medal, and the importance and the honor has slipped. America's top players have to consider their plans for next summer. The only thing this group did accomplish was locking down a spot in the Tokyo Olympics. They will go there without top billing because they will not be world champs.

Like in 2008, when the Redeem Team was on a mission to restore the country's place in the world, urgency just arrived. And this time it's not because of the losing team's failure but of an uncomfortable reality. To win, America needs more of its best.

"If [stars] didn't want to come here, that's on them. They didn't want to play? They didn't want to play," said Mitchell, who had 29 points but none in the fourth quarter. "I know how I feel, I know how those guys feel, that's where my head's at. We have 12 guys who came here to compete for America, just like every other country. It sucks that some of our country people don't feel that way about it, but we don't care. We wanted to compete and we did."

Independent doctors will be at all Premiership games from this season to help enforce concussion protocol.

They will assist club doctors with head injury assessments and have the final say on whether a player can continue.

The system has been in place for some time in international rugby and will now be at Premiership Rugby Cup and home European matches.

It has been funded by the 12 English top-flight clubs and Newcastle, who are also a Premiership shareholder.

"This new initiative continues the evolution of our player welfare strategy," said Matt Cross, Premiership Rugby's research and development manager.

"Our clubs are at the forefront of the latest player welfare initiatives and with us, will continue to drive world-class standards in the care of our players."

The latest audit - for the 2017-18 season - showed the number of concussions suffered by players in Premiership rugby games fell, although the average length of absence was higher than before.

However concussion remained the most commonly reported injury that season with 140.

The independent doctor will be responsible for decisions regarding blood and head injury replacements, overseeing assessments and collaborating with club equivalents.

The new Premiership campaign begins on Friday, 18 October when Bristol Bears host local rivals Bath.