Today’s NYT Connections Answers Explained

Connections – Yellow Group

🟨 navigate through, as a river (CROSS, FORD, TRAVERSE, WADE)

WADE and FORD are similar words. A FORD is a shallow part of a river that one can WADE through. But FORD can also be a verb that means to cross a river at such a point. Slightly confusing!

Connections – Green Group

🟩 multi-time NBA MVPs (BIRD, CURRY, JAMES, JORDAN)

These refer to:

• Larry BIRD, a three-time MVP and three-time NBA champion as a member of the Boston Celtics
• Stephen CURRY, a two-time MVP and four-time NBA champion with the Golden State Warriors
• LeBron JAMES, a four-time MVP and an NBA champion with the Miami Heat (twice), Cleveland Cavaliers and Los Angeles Lakers
• Michael JORDAN, a five-time MVP and six-time NBA champion with the Chicago Bulls

Connections – Blue Group

🟦 non-palindromic words in a famous palindrome (ABLE, ELBA, SAW, WAS)

This refers to the palindrome “Able was I ere I saw Elba.” This was attributed to Napoleon Bonaparte, but it seems that he never actually spoke those words.

Connections – Purple Group

🟪 homophones of kinds of dogs, familiarly (CIAO, PALM, PEEK, PITT)

These refer to

• CIAO > chow > chow chow
• PALM > pom > pomeranian
• PEEK > pik (pronounced “peek”) > Pekingese
• PITT > pit > pitbull

Connections – Red Herrings

I initially suspected that (Dwayne) WADE could have fit with the group of NBA players. While he has three NBA titles to his name, Wade has been named NBA Finals MVP once. However, he was never a league MVP during his career.

There was also a red herring of actors:

• Brad PITT
• Idris ELBA
• Harrison FORD
• Tim CURRY
• Michael B. JORDAN

You could possibly include Simon BIRD (of The Inbetweeners) and Theo JAMES (The White Lotus, and a rumored James Bond contender) on that list too.

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I’ll be back with another set of NYT Connections hints and answers tomorrow, as well as another edition of this one, all going well. You’ll be able to find both of those on my Forbes author page when the time comes (following me there helps me out too!). As for the weekend editions of my NYT Connections hints and answers column, I’m currently doing that via my newsletter, Pastimes.