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🚨 Headlines
🏒 Comeback for the ages: The Canucks did the unthinkable in Dallas, becoming the first team in NHL history to erase a three-goal deficit in the final minute of regulation and go on to win the game. Final score: Canucks 6, Stars 5 (OT).
🏀 (Another) comeback for the ages: The Bucks went on a 34-3 run in the fourth quarter to stun the Timberwolves. Giannis Antetokounmpo had his third straight triple-double (23-13-10) in Milwaukee’s 110-103 home victory.
⚽️ Arsenal, Inter win openers: The Champions League quarterfinals began with Arsenal beating Real Madrid in London (3-0), and Inter beating Bayern in Munich (2-1). Madrid and Milan will host next week’s second legs, where Final Four spots will be on the line.
⛳️ The ratings are in: LIV Golf made its major broadcast TV debut over the weekend and drew 484,000 viewers on Fox during Sunday’s final round in Miami. For comparison: The final round of the PGA Tour’s Valero Open drew 1.75 million viewers on NBC.
🏀 Horned Frogs add Miles: If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em. Olivia Miles, the nation’s top transfer, is leaving Notre Dame for TCU, the team that beat the Irish in last week’s Sweet 16. Miles was the projected No. 2 pick in the WNBA draft but opted to stay in school.
📸 No phones, just cameras
Cell phones are strictly prohibited at the Masters,as are most devices. But Augusta National makes a notable exception for cameras, permitting their use during all three practice round days (Monday-Wednesday) in the lead-up to the tournament (Thursday-Sunday).
A tradition unlike any other: Every 12 months, thousands of golf fans dust off cameras they forget they owned and descend on Augusta with technology from yesteryear. “We bought that for the birth of our child, and we’ve used it five times in the last 11 years,” said one 2022 patron, who was rocking a discontinued Canon Vixia from 2009. “It’s still bitchin’, though,” added his wife.
A collection of cameras: The practice rounds are perhaps “the world’s greatest collection of old and, frankly, bad cameras,” writes Golf Magazine’s Sean Zak. From the classic disposables (Fuji QuickSnap, Kodak FunSaver), to the compact gadgets of the early 2000s (Canon PowerShot, Olympus C-2), it’s a nostalgic trip through photo-taking history.
A journey back in time: The lack of phones, combined with the ubiquity of digital cameras, harkens back to a very specific era. Every year at the practice rounds now feels like circa 2010 at the practice rounds (pictured above) — back when digital cameras were everywhere, not just at the Masters, and only 23% of Americans owned a smartphone. That number is now 98%.
🏀 NBA shocker: Nuggets clean house
The Nuggets sent shockwaves throughout the NBA on Tuesday when they fired head coach Michael Malone and general manager Calvin Booth with just three games left in the regular season, and with Denver (47-32) sitting in fourth place.
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Malone, 53, is the winningest coach in Nuggets history and led the franchise to its first championship in 2023. Less than two years later, he’s gone and assistant David Adelman (son of longtime NBA coach Rick) will replace him.
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Booth, 48, played 10 seasons in the NBA before embarking on a front office career. He joined the Nuggets in 2017 and was promoted to GM in 2022 after Tim Connelly left for the Timberwolves. Denver won the title in his first season at the helm.
Behind the scenes: The discord between Malone and Booth has been known for quite some time around league circles, but the tension began to mount over the past week with the Nuggets struggling on the court (four straight losses) and losing ground in the playoff race, notes Yahoo Sports’ Vincent Goodwill:
Throughout the season, sources said Booth was critical of Malone’s handling of the Nuggets’ headliners, and for not asking for more from players like Jamal Murray — especially as the team’s defense has faltered, dropping all the way to 20th in defensive rating.
League sources said the firings happened so quickly Tuesday that Nikola Jokić wasn’t involved in them. It was an impulsive decision from ownership, which was fed up with the infighting.
Sources told Yahoo Sports in January it was likely Malone would move on from the Nuggets after the season due to the deteriorating relationship with Booth, who couldn’t come to an agreement on a contract extension before the season began.
In a sense, this was built to be a last run for the franchise’s two leaders, but it couldn’t even last for a final playoff run. Now one wonders where the Nuggets go from here — in every direction.
Another one bites the dust: Four of the past six head coaches to win an NBA title have been fired, with Malone joining Nick Nurse (Raptors 2019), Frank Vogel (Lakers 2020) and Mike Budenholzer (2021 Bucks).
🎓 NCAA settlement inches closer to finish line
The settlement that has loomed over college sports for the past year, and will eventually lead to schools directly paying their athletes, is inching closer to the finish line. But not without a few last-minute hiccups.
Catch up quick: Federal judge Claudia Wilken held a hearing on Monday in a small Oakland courtroom, where about 75 people — including attorneys for the plaintiff (college athletes) and defendant (the NCAA and power conferences) — gathered for a seven-hour proceeding to settle three antitrust cases involving athlete compensation, Yahoo Sports’ Ross Dellenger reports.
The key terms of the settlement:
-
Revenue-sharing: Division I schools may share up to 22% of their annual revenues (roughly $20.5 million in the first year) directly with their athletes.
-
Back pay: The NCAA will pay $2.8 billion to Division I athletes who played between 2016-2024 and weren’t entitled to the full benefits of NIL.
-
Roster limits: Scholarship limits will be replaced with roster limits, which will allow every athlete to be eligible for a scholarship while cutting the number of spots available.
What’s the hold up? Those roster limits are a major sticking point for Wilken, who was clear: Make changes or risk not having her approve the settlement. One concept she specifically said she wants to see added: a phase-in period to “grandfather in” current rostered athletes.
The roster cap, explained: Most NCAA sports have a scholarship limit but few have a limit on how many athletes they can roster. Under this new policy, they do, which would represent a drastic change for some sports. Consider cross country, where many teams have 30+ runners (many not on scholarship). The new formal roster limit would be 17.
What’s next: Lawyers from both sides have been asked to report back in one week to determine if revisions can be made, though they’ve already been granted more time if needed. “We’ve got to talk to our clients about it,” said an NCAA attorney. “We think we can get it over the finish line,” said one of the lead plaintiff attorneys.
⚾️ Victory at last!
Two D-III baseball teams took the field on Tuesday having lost a combined 141 consecutive games. By day’s end, the two longest active losing streaks in college baseball had been snapped.
The backdrop: Yeshiva University, a modern Orthodox Jewish school in Manhattan, brought a 99-game losing streak into their doubleheader against the Bronx’s Lehman College, which was riding its own 42-game losing skid.
The result? Everyone left happy. Lehman won the opener, 7-6, for their first victory since May 9, 2023. Then Yeshiva took the nightcap, 9-5, to record their first win since Feb. 27, 2022 and end their streak of futility at 100.
Who owns the longest losing streak ever? That would be the D-III Caltech Beavers, who lost 228 straight games (2003-2013) before they, too, won the back end of a doubleheader. Even crazier: The Beavers went 29 years (1988-2017) without winning a single conference game.
📺 Watchlist: Luka returns to Dallas
Luka Dončić returns to Dallas tonight(7:30pm ET, ESPN) for the first time since the Mavericks traded him to the Lakers.
And in the nightcap: The Nuggets visit the Kings (10pm, ESPN) in Denver’s first game since firing head coach Michael Malone.
More to watch:
-
⛳️ The Masters: Par 3 Contest (12pm, ESPN+; 2pm, ESPN) … One more day until the season’s first major tees off.
-
⚽️ Champions League: PSG vs. Aston Villa (3pm, Paramount+); Barcelona vs. Borussia Dortmund (3pm, Paramount+) … Quarterfinals, first leg.
-
⚽️ Champions Cup: Inter Miami (0-1) vs. LAFC (8pm, FS1); Pumas UNAM (1-1) vs. Vancouver Whitecaps (10:30pm, FS1) … Quarterfinals, second leg.
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🏒 NHL: Flyers at Rangers (7:30pm, TNT); Blues at Oilers (10pm, TNT) … St. Louis and Edmonton (93 points each) are both on the doorstep of clinching a playoff berth.
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⚾️ MLB: Yankees at Tigers (1:10pm, Prime) … New York has scored just two runs in their last two games after scoring 76 in their first nine.
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🏒 Women’s Hockey Worlds: USA vs. Finland (9am, NHL) … The group stage* begins in Czechia.
*How it works: The 10 teams were split into groups by seeding, with the top five in Group A (USA, Canada, Finland, Czechia, Switzerland) and the bottom five in Group B (Germany, Sweden, Japan, Hungary, Norway). After group play, all of Group A and the top three in Group B will qualify for the quarterfinals.
⛳️ Masters trivia
Holes 10 through 18 on a golf course are typically referred to as the “back nine.” What does Augusta National call them?
Answer at the bottom.
📸 Photo finish: The boys are back
Top picture: The Columbia University men’s basketball coaching staff in March 2014. From left to right: Kevin Hovde (assistant), Kyle Smith (head coach), Carlin Hartman (associate head coach), Todd Golden (assistant) and Mike Magpayo (director of basketball operations).
Bottom picture: That same group at this year’s Final Four. Hovde is now the head coach at Columbia, Smith is the head coach at Stanford, Hartman is the associate head coach at Florida, Golden is the head coach at Florida and Magpayo is the head coach at Fordham.
Bonus read: This is incredibly random and has nothing to do with sports, but the headline of this story reminded me of maybe the best article ever written and I simply had to share. Please enjoy: “I Played ‘The Boys Are Back in Town’ on a Bar Jukebox Until I Got Kicked Out.”
Trivia answer: The “second nine” (here’s why)
We hope you enjoyed this edition of Yahoo Sports AM, our daily newsletter that keeps you up to date on all things sports. Sign up here to get it delivered to your inbox every weekday morning.
Yahoo Sports AM is our daily newsletter that keeps you up to date on all things sports. Sign up here to get it every weekday morning.
🏒 Comeback for the ages: The Canucks did the unthinkable in Dallas, becoming the first team in NHL history to erase a three-goal deficit in the final minute of regulation and go on to win the game. Final score: Canucks 6, Stars 5 (OT).
Advertisement
🏀 (Another) comeback for the ages: The Bucks went on a 34-3 run in the fourth quarter to stun the Timberwolves. Giannis Antetokounmpo had his third straight triple-double (23-13-10) in Milwaukee’s 110-103 home victory.
⚽️ Arsenal, Inter win openers: The Champions League quarterfinals began with Arsenal beating Real Madrid in London (3-0), and Inter beating Bayern in Munich (2-1). Madrid and Milan will host next week’s second legs, where Final Four spots will be on the line.
⛳️ The ratings are in: LIV Golf made its major broadcast TV debut over the weekend and drew 484,000 viewers on Fox during Sunday’s final round in Miami. For comparison: The final round of the PGA Tour’s Valero Open drew 1.75 million viewers on NBC.
🏀 Horned Frogs add Miles: If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em. Olivia Miles, the nation’s top transfer, is leaving Notre Dame for TCU, the team that beat the Irish in last week’s Sweet 16. Miles was the projected No. 2 pick in the WNBA draft but opted to stay in school.
Cell phones are strictly prohibited at the Masters, as are most devices. But Augusta National makes a notable exception for cameras, permitting their use during all three practice round days (Monday-Wednesday) in the lead-up to the tournament (Thursday-Sunday).
A tradition unlike any other: Every 12 months, thousands of golf fans dust off cameras they forget they owned and descend on Augusta with technology from yesteryear. “We bought that for the birth of our child, and we’ve used it five times in the last 11 years,” said one 2022 patron, who was rocking a discontinued Canon Vixia from 2009. “It’s still bitchin’, though,” added his wife.
A collection of cameras: The practice rounds are perhaps “the world’s greatest collection of old and, frankly, bad cameras,” writes Golf Magazine’s Sean Zak. From the classic disposables (Fuji QuickSnap, Kodak FunSaver), to the compact gadgets of the early 2000s (Canon PowerShot, Olympus C-2), it’s a nostalgic trip through photo-taking history.
A journey back in time: The lack of phones, combined with the ubiquity of digital cameras, harkens back to a very specific era. Every year at the practice rounds now feels like circa 2010 at the practice rounds (pictured above) — back when digital cameras were everywhere, not just at the Masters, and only 23% of Americans owned a smartphone. That number is now 98%.
The Nuggets sent shockwaves throughout the NBA on Tuesday when they fired head coach Michael Malone and general manager Calvin Booth with just three games left in the regular season, and with Denver (47-32) sitting in fourth place.
Advertisement
-
Malone, 53, is the winningest coach in Nuggets history and led the franchise to its first championship in 2023. Less than two years later, he’s gone and assistant David Adelman (son of longtime NBA coach Rick) will replace him.
-
Booth, 48, played 10 seasons in the NBA before embarking on a front office career. He joined the Nuggets in 2017 and was promoted to GM in 2022 after Tim Connelly left for the Timberwolves. Denver won the title in his first season at the helm.
Behind the scenes: The discord between Malone and Booth has been known for quite some time around league circles, but the tension began to mount over the past week with the Nuggets struggling on the court (four straight losses) and losing ground in the playoff race, notes Yahoo Sports’ Vincent Goodwill:
Throughout the season, sources said Booth was critical of Malone’s handling of the Nuggets’ headliners, and for not asking for more from players like Jamal Murray — especially as the team’s defense has faltered, dropping all the way to 20th in defensive rating.
League sources said the firings happened so quickly Tuesday that Nikola Jokić wasn’t involved in them. It was an impulsive decision from ownership, which was fed up with the infighting.
Sources told Yahoo Sports in January it was likely Malone would move on from the Nuggets after the season due to the deteriorating relationship with Booth, who couldn’t come to an agreement on a contract extension before the season began.
Advertisement
In a sense, this was built to be a last run for the franchise’s two leaders, but it couldn’t even last for a final playoff run. Now one wonders where the Nuggets go from here — in every direction.
Another one bites the dust: Four of the past six head coaches to win an NBA title have been fired, with Malone joining Nick Nurse (Raptors 2019), Frank Vogel (Lakers 2020) and Mike Budenholzer (2021 Bucks).
The settlement that has loomed over college sports for the past year, and will eventually lead to schools directly paying their athletes, is inching closer to the finish line. But not without a few last-minute hiccups.
Advertisement
Catch up quick: Federal judge Claudia Wilken held a hearing on Monday in a small Oakland courtroom, where about 75 people — including attorneys for the plaintiff (college athletes) and defendant (the NCAA and power conferences) — gathered for a seven-hour proceeding to settle three antitrust cases involving athlete compensation, Yahoo Sports’ Ross Dellenger reports.
The key terms of the settlement:
-
Revenue-sharing: Division I schools may share up to 22% of their annual revenues (roughly $20.5 million in the first year) directly with their athletes.
-
Back pay: The NCAA will pay $2.8 billion to Division I athletes who played between 2016-2024 and weren’t entitled to the full benefits of NIL.
-
Roster limits: Scholarship limits will be replaced with roster limits, which will allow every athlete to be eligible for a scholarship while cutting the number of spots available.
What’s the hold up? Those roster limits are a major sticking point for Wilken, who was clear: Make changes or risk not having her approve the settlement. One concept she specifically said she wants to see added: a phase-in period to “grandfather in” current rostered athletes.
The roster cap, explained: Most NCAA sports have a scholarship limit but few have a limit on how many athletes they can roster. Under this new policy, they do, which would represent a drastic change for some sports. Consider cross country, where many teams have 30+ runners (many not on scholarship). The new formal roster limit would be 17.
Advertisement
What’s next: Lawyers from both sides have been asked to report back in one week to determine if revisions can be made, though they’ve already been granted more time if needed. “We’ve got to talk to our clients about it,” said an NCAA attorney. “We think we can get it over the finish line,” said one of the lead plaintiff attorneys.
Two D-III baseball teams took the field on Tuesday having lost a combined 141 consecutive games. By day’s end, the two longest active losing streaks in college baseball had been snapped.
The backdrop: Yeshiva University, a modern Orthodox Jewish school in Manhattan, brought a 99-game losing streak into their doubleheader against the Bronx’s Lehman College, which was riding its own 42-game losing skid.
Advertisement
The result? Everyone left happy. Lehman won the opener, 7-6, for their first victory since May 9, 2023. Then Yeshiva took the nightcap, 9-5, to record their first win since Feb. 27, 2022 and end their streak of futility at 100.
Who owns the longest losing streak ever? That would be the D-III Caltech Beavers, who lost 228 straight games (2003-2013) before they, too, won the back end of a doubleheader. Even crazier: The Beavers went 29 years (1988-2017) without winning a single conference game.
Luka Dončić returns to Dallas tonight (7:30pm ET, ESPN) for the first time since the Mavericks traded him to the Lakers.
Advertisement
And in the nightcap: The Nuggets visit the Kings (10pm, ESPN) in Denver’s first game since firing head coach Michael Malone.
More to watch:
-
⛳️ The Masters: Par 3 Contest (12pm, ESPN+; 2pm, ESPN) … One more day until the season’s first major tees off.
-
⚽️ Champions League: PSG vs. Aston Villa (3pm, Paramount+); Barcelona vs. Borussia Dortmund (3pm, Paramount+) … Quarterfinals, first leg.
-
⚽️ Champions Cup: Inter Miami (0-1) vs. LAFC (8pm, FS1); Pumas UNAM (1-1) vs. Vancouver Whitecaps (10:30pm, FS1) … Quarterfinals, second leg.
-
🏒 NHL: Flyers at Rangers (7:30pm, TNT); Blues at Oilers (10pm, TNT) … St. Louis and Edmonton (93 points each) are both on the doorstep of clinching a playoff berth.
-
⚾️ MLB: Yankees at Tigers (1:10pm, Prime) … New York has scored just two runs in their last two games after scoring 76 in their first nine.
-
🏒 Women’s Hockey Worlds: USA vs. Finland (9am, NHL) … The group stage* begins in Czechia.
*How it works: The 10 teams were split into groups by seeding, with the top five in Group A (USA, Canada, Finland, Czechia, Switzerland) and the bottom five in Group B (Germany, Sweden, Japan, Hungary, Norway). After group play, all of Group A and the top three in Group B will qualify for the quarterfinals.
Holes 10 through 18 on a golf course are typically referred to as the “back nine.” What does Augusta National call them?
Answer at the bottom.
Top picture: The Columbia University men’s basketball coaching staff in March 2014. From left to right: Kevin Hovde (assistant), Kyle Smith (head coach), Carlin Hartman (associate head coach), Todd Golden (assistant) and Mike Magpayo (director of basketball operations).
Advertisement
Bottom picture: That same group at this year’s Final Four. Hovde is now the head coach at Columbia, Smith is the head coach at Stanford, Hartman is the associate head coach at Florida, Golden is the head coach at Florida and Magpayo is the head coach at Fordham.
Bonus read: This is incredibly random and has nothing to do with sports, but the headline of this story reminded me of maybe the best article ever written and I simply had to share. Please enjoy: “I Played ‘The Boys Are Back in Town’ on a Bar Jukebox Until I Got Kicked Out.”
Trivia answer: The “second nine” (here’s why)
We hope you enjoyed this edition of Yahoo Sports AM, our daily newsletter that keeps you up to date on all things sports. Sign up here to get it delivered to your inbox every weekday morning.
