Yahoo Sports AM: The Sweet 16 is set
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🚨 Headlines
⚽️ Nations League champs: Mexico beat Panama, 2-1, in a dramatic Nations League final to win the four-year-old competition for the first time. In the third-place game, the USMNT stumbled again with its second straight clunker in a 2-1 loss to Canada.
🏀 Coaching moves: Virginia is hiring VCU's Ryan Odom — who led UMBC over the Cavaliers in 2018's historic 16-over-1 upset — as their next head coach … Texas is hiring Xavier's Sean Miller to replace Rodney Terry, who they fired after losing to, yes, Xavier in the First Four.
🎾 Djokovic passes Nadal: Novak Djokovic keeps finding new records to break. This time, his third-round win at the Miami Open was the 411th of his career in an ATP Masters 1000 event, passing Rafael Nadal for the most all-time.
🏒 Badgers are champs again: Wisconsin won its record-extending eighth women's NCAA hockey national championship, beating Ohio State, 4-3 (OT), in their third straight title game matchup.
⚾️ What's wrong with Mookie? Dodgers superstar Mookie Betts hasn't played since before last week's Tokyo Series due to a mysterious illness that's left him unable to keep any food down. "My body's just kind of eating itself," he said, as he's fallen from 175 to 157 pounds.
🏀 Madness finally comes to March
It took almost the whole weekend, but on Sunday night the Madness finally came to March.
ICYMI: After Colorado State nailed a go-ahead three with six seconds left, Maryland's Derik Queen hit the first buzzer-beater of this year's tournament to give the Terps a 72-71 win over the Rams and send them into the Sweet 16. Oregon nearly pushed Arizona to a similar end in the final game of the weekend, but ultimately ran out of time in a thrilling loss to their former Pac-12 foe.
Powerhouses dance on: No. 12 Colorado State's loss means that this year's Sweet 16 is about as chalky as it gets, with just one team left lower than a 6-seed. And No. 10 Arkansas, an SEC program coached by Hall of Famer John Calipari, isn't exactly a Cinderella.
Speaking of the SEC: The league that sent a record 14 teams to the tournament has now sent a record seven teams to the Sweet 16, eclipsing the mark set by the ACC in 2016. That's right: half of the SEC's tournament teams are still dancing into the second weekend.
The Big Ten (four teams left), Big 12 (four) and ACC (one) are the only other conferences with a team left in the tournament, shattering the previous record for the fewest leagues represented in the Sweet 16 (seven).
Sweet 16 matchups:
Thursday: No. 1 Florida vs. No. 4 Maryland (San Francisco); No. 1 Duke vs. No. 4 Arizona (Newark); No. 2 Alabama vs. No. 6 BYU (Newark); No. 3 Texas Tech vs. No. 10 Arkansas (San Francisco)
Friday: No. 1 Houston vs. No. 4 Purdue (Indianapolis); No. 1 Auburn vs. No. 5 Michigan (Atlanta); No. 2 Tennessee vs. No. 3 Kentucky (Indianapolis); No. 2 Michigan State vs. No. 6 Ole Miss (Atlanta)
Field notes:
Streak snapped: Gonzaga's narrow loss to Houston snapped the Bulldogs' run of nine straight Sweet 16 appearances, tied with North Carolina (1985-93) and Duke (1998-2006) for the longest such streak since the tournament expanded to 64 games in 1985.
No three-peat: UConn's quest for an unprecedented three-peat ended in painful fashion, as the Huskies led top-seeded Florida for nearly the entire second half of the Gators' eventual 77-75 win.
Historic matchup coming: Kentucky has played no opponent more than Tennessee, which it has faced 241 times since 1910. But the two SEC foes have never met in the NCAA tournament… until now. That game is gonna be good.
Coach Cal's resurgence: John Calipari has more NCAA tournament wins in his first season with Arkansas (2) than he had across his final four seasons with Kentucky (1).
Title odds: Duke (+225 at BetMGM) is now the clear favorite to win the championship ahead of Florida (+350), Houston (+500) and Auburn (+525), the only other teams with better than 17-to-1 odds.
🏀 Blowouts and favorites ruled the first round
The first round of the women's tournament made all sorts of history, none of which was good for the underdogs.
Favorites flex their muscles: No team seeded 11 or lower won a first-round game for the first time since the field expanded to 64 in 1994. And the average margin of victory was 26.5 points, the highest of any round in tournament history, per ESPN's Michael Voepel.
By the numbers: Those blowouts — which included three 60-point shellackings (plus another two by 50+ and three more by 40+) — came courtesy of both high-octane offenses and lock-down defenses.
A record six teams scored at least 100 points in the first round (UConn, LSU, Notre Dame, South Carolina, Tennessee and Texas). In fact, that ties the record for the most 100-point games across an entire tournament.
Duke and USC held their opponents to just 25 points, the second-fewest in any NCAA tournament game (Howard scored 21 against South Carolina in 2022).
Things are looking up, though: With those underdogs eliminated, the second round has thus far been much more competitive. The average margin of victory across Sunday's eight games was 11.5 points, with just one decided by more than 20.
Perfect bracket tracker: Only 10 perfect brackets remain in Yahoo Sports' Women's Bracket Mayhem.
🇺🇸 Photos across America
Sun Valley, Idaho — Lindsey Vonn finished second in the super-G at the World Cup season finale on Saturday, earning her first podium since 2018 just a few months after making her comeback at age 40.
Palm Harbor, Florida — Viktor Hovland entered this weekend's Valspar Championship having missed three straight cuts; he left it with his seventh PGA Tour win after birdieing three of his final five holes to rally past Justin Thomas for a one-stroke victory.
Homestead, Florida — Kyle Larson used a late surge on Sunday to win at the Miami-Homestead Speedway, becoming the 30th driver ever to win 30 NASCAR Cup Series races.
Philadelphia* — Oklahoma State's Wyatt Hendrickson stunned Olympic gold medalist and two-time NCAA champion Gable Steveson on Saturday to win the NCAA heavyweight wrestling title, snapping Steveson's 70-match win streak and scoring the only takedown against him all season.
*Also on Saturday… Penn State's Carter Starocci became the first Division I wrestler ever to win five individual NCAA titles, moving up a weight class to 184 pounds after winning the last four championships at 174 pounds.
🌎 Photos around the world
Shanghai — McLaren's Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris finished 1-2 at the Chinese Grand Prix, giving the reigning Constructors' Champions two straight wins to open the season. Ferrari's Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc, meanwhile, were both disqualified — a new low for the Scuderia.
Nanjing, China — Norway's Jakob Ingebrigtsen made history over the weekend, joining Ethiopia's Haile Gebrselassie (1999) as the only men to win gold in both the 1500m and 3000m at the same World Indoor Championships.
Lisbon, Portugal — One of these days, Cristiano Ronaldo will stop scoring goals. But that day has not come yet, as the ageless wonder scored his 929th career goal in Portugal's 5-2 win over Denmark on Sunday, pushing them into the UEFA Nations League semifinals.
York, England — The men's Six Nations Championship ended last week, but the women's edition is just getting started. England, seeking their seventh straight title, opened with a dominant win over Italy. Elsewhere, France beat Ireland and Scotland beat Wales.
📺 Watchlist: Closing out the second round
The second round of the women's tournament ends today, and the eight-game slate features two unanimous first-team All-Americans (UConn's Paige Bueckers and USC's JuJu Watkins), the nation's leading scorer (FSU's Ta'Niya Latson) and the nation's leading rebounder (LSU's Aneesah Morrow).
No. 2 NC State vs. No. 7 Michigan State (12pm ET, ESPN)
No. 1 Texas vs. No. 8 Illinois (2pm, ESPN)
No. 3 Oklahoma vs. No. 6 Iowa (4pm, ESPN)
No. 4 Maryland vs. No. 5 Alabama (5pm, ESPN2)
No. 3 LSU vs. No. 6 Florida State (6pm, ESPN)
No. 3 North Carolina vs. No. 6 West Virginia (7pm, ESPN2)
No. 2 UConn vs. No. 10 South Dakota State (8pm, ESPN)
No. 1 USC vs. No. 9 Mississippi State (10pm, ESPN)
More to watch:
⛳️ TGL: New York vs. Atlanta (9pm, ESPN2) … Opening match* in the best-of-three Finals.
🏀 NBA: Lakers at Magic (7pm, NBA); Bucks at Suns (10pm, NBA)
🏒 NHL: Wild at Stars (8pm, ESPN+) … A battle of Western Conference playoff contenders.
⚾️ Exhibition: Red Sox at Sultanes de Monterrey (9:10pm, MLB) … First of a two-game series in Mexico at Estadio de Béisbol Monterrey.
*Tonight's lineups: Justin Thomas, Billy Horschel and Patrick Cantlay (Atlanta) vs. Xander Schauffele, Rickie Fowler and Cameron Young (New York).
🏀 Tourney trivia
Virginia's historic loss to UMBC in 2018 is back in the news after the Cavaliers hired Ryan Odom, UMBC's then-head coach, to take over in Charlottesville.
Question: Who is the only other 1-seed to lose to a 16 in the NCAA tournament, and which 16 seed got the win?
Hint: 2023
Answer at the bottom.
.
.
.
.
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Trivia answer: No. 16 Fairleigh Dickinson beat No. 1 Purdue, 63-58
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.
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