On the starting line Crossword Clue

We have the 9-letter answer for On the starting line crossword clue, last seen in the NYT Crossword February 7, 2026 puzzle. Let us help you solve the crossword clue that has you stumped so you can finish the puzzle.

On the starting line Crossword Answer

→28.

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Helpful Hints

Hint 1: Clue Definitions

STARTING (noun)
1. a turn to be a starter (in a game at the beginning)
STARTING (adjective)
1. appropriate to the beginning or start of an event
2. (especially of eyes) bulging or protruding as with fear
LINE (noun)
1. a course of reasoning aimed at demonstrating a truth or falsehood; the methodical process of logical reasoning
2. a slight depression or fold in the smoothness of a surface
LINE (verb)
1. make a mark or lines on a surface
2. be in line with; form a line along

More NYT Crossword (2/7/2026) Answers

Across

1. Breakfast bar item

12. Summer picnic side dish

14. Homo sapiens, e.g.

16. Curio shop treasure

17. Singer with the 2016 Grammy-winning soul ballad "Cranes in the Sky"

18. Losing propositions?

19. Keep-on-keeping-on quality

21. Cause for getting stuck

22. Not, colloquially

23. Misdirect

24. Airbnb inclusion, usually

25. Some control buttons

26. Like hand-to-hand fighting

29. Over/under and point spread

31. Small squeeze from a tube

34. Dome-shaped Buddhist shrine

35. Fancy-schmancy

36. Pronoun in Texas

37. Instrument depicted in paintings by Hals and Caravaggio

38. "OMG"-evoking deed

39. Use for a yew

40. As good as it gets

42. Isle of Sappho

43. They make low digits smaller

46. What a pitcher tries to do

47. Former e-book devices, until 2014

All Answers

Down

1. Can't keep on topic

2. Sharpshooter's asset

3. Preps for surgery, perhaps

4. Wear out around the edges

5. First name in Universal horror

6. Seldom-used PC key

7. Long shot practice

8. "Save me __"

9. Pauline ___, former New Yorker film critic

10. Classic Chevy model

11. Not fair, in a way

12. Strip down the Interstate

13. Student's goal

14. "That can't possibly be right!"

15. Enjoying recognition

19. One of many in a bee, typically

20. Reptile with a colorful name

23. Having lost all its fizz

24. Isn’t keeping up

26. Michael who plays Allan in "Barbie"

27. “Divergent” author Veronica

28. Ensnare for, as some undertakings

29. A heavy drinker may be found in one

30. Woolen leggings, as worn by W.W. I soldiers

31. Physiques that have gone a little soft

32. Former veep with a Nobel Prize

33. "___ this mess"

34. Opening for a mail carrier

36. Private reply

38. One of Oberon's subjects

39. Author of "Steppenwolf"

41. Street ending at Disneyland's Sleeping Beauty Castle

42. Wrote fiction?

44. Many a professional office: Abbr.

45. The Hornets, on scoreboards

All Answers