Where is Team USA from? Meet the Olympians heading to Milan-Cortina 2026

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🚨 Headlines

🎾 Semifinalists in Melbourne: No. 1 Carlos Alcaraz (over No. 6 Alex de Minaur), No. 3 Alexander Zverev (over No. 25 Learner Tien), No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka (over No. 29 Iva Jović) and No. 12 Elina Svitolina (over No. 3 Coco Gauff) advanced to the Australian Open semifinals.

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🏀 SEC makes history: The conference landed a record 10 teams in the women’s AP Top 25, with No. 3 South Carolina, No. 4 Texas, No. 5 Vanderbilt, No. 6 LSU, No. 10 Oklahoma, No. 15 Tennessee, No. 17 Ole Miss, No. 18 Kentucky, No. 23 Georgia and No. 24 Alabama all in the rankings.

🏈 Rivers bows out: Philip Rivers took himself out of consideration for the Bills’ head coaching gig after being a surprise candidate for the role. Buffalo remains one of four head coaching vacancies alongside the Cardinals, Raiders and Browns.

🏀 Rising Stars: Cooper Flagg, Stephon Castle and VJ Edgecombe headline the NBA All-Star Rising Stars selections. The first- and second-year players will kick off All-Star Weekend next month in Los Angeles with a four-team tournament.

🎰 $1 million wager: Super Bowl LX officially has its first seven-figure bet, with one bettor at Circa Sports wagering $1.1 million on the Patriots moneyline at +188. If New England wins, the bettor will walk away with almost $3.2 million.

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🇺🇸 Meet Team USA

With just over a week before the 2026 Winter Olympics begin, it’s high time we meet the athletes who’ll be representing the United States in Milan-Cortina.

By the numbers: The U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee announced the 232-team roster (117 men, 115 women) on Monday, representing the largest contingent they’ve ever sent to the Winter Games.

• By hometown: Athletes hail from 32 states (plus D.C.), led by seven with at least 10 representatives: Colorado (30), Minnesota (24), California (19), Utah (17), Michigan (15), New York (14) and Massachusetts (12).

• By appearances: There are 98 returning Olympians, including seven making their fifth appearance: Lindsey Vonn (alpine skiing), Evan Bates (figure skating), Nick Baumgartner (snowboarding), Faye Thelen (snowboarding), Kaillie Humphries (bobsled), Hilary Knight (hockey) and Elana Meyers Taylor (bobsled).

• By medal count: Meyers Taylor is the team’s most decorated athlete, with five medals, but she’s still seeking her first gold. Humphries is the only three-time gold medalist, while Mikaela Shiffrin (alpine skiing) and Chloe Kim (snowboard) are the only others with two golds.

Notes:

• Youngest and oldest: Abby Winterberger (freeskiing), 15, is the youngest athlete on the team; Rich Ruohonen (curling), 54, is the oldest.

• Family affair: Team USA features four sets of siblings, including two pairs of NHL players in Matthew and Brady Tkachuk and Quinn and Jack Hughes. The others are Birk and Svea Irving (freeskiing), and Tara Peterson and Tabitha Peterson-Lovick (curling).

• School ties: 84 members (36%) are current or former NCAA varsity athletes, with no school better represented than Minnesota (7). Another seven schools have at least three athletes: Boston College (6), Wisconsin (6), Boston University (5), Michigan (4), Northeastern (4), Dartmouth (3) and Ohio State (3).

Looking ahead: The Games officially begin with the Opening Ceremony next Friday, Feb. 6, though competitions get underway two days earlier.

Further reading: Top storylines for the 2026 Winter Olympics (Jay Hart, Yahoo Sports)

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🏈 The most unlikely Super Bowl… ever?

Back in September, not many people had New England and Seattle meeting in the season finale. In fact, Patriots vs. Seahawks is the most unlikely Super Bowl matchup by preseason odds since such tracking began.

From Yahoo Sports’ Ben Fawkes:

In the months leading up to the 2025-26 NFL season, there were a variety of teams that bettors were wagering on to win Super Bowl LX. The Patriots and Seahawks weren’t very high among them.

The Seahawks entered Week 1 with 60-1 odds to win Super Bowl LX at BetMGM, and the Patriots had 80-1 odds. And there weren’t a lot of believers, either, as Seattle had the ninth-fewest wagers to win Super Bowl LX (0.9%) at BetMGM and the Patriots (1.3%) had the 11th-fewest.

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That makes this year’s title game the most unlikely Super Bowl matchup by preseason odds in at least 50 years, per Sports Odds History. The closest approximation was all the way back in 1982 when the 49ers (50-1 preseason odds) and the Bengals (60-1) met in Super Bowl XVI. The 49ers closed as 1-point favorites and won the game, 26-21.

Zoom out: Looking across the other major North American sports leagues, the only championship game/series matchup that was more unlikely based on preseason odds was the 1991 World Series between the Twins (80-1) and Braves (200–1).

🏀 How long can Miami (Ohio) stay perfect?

Two of the three undefeated teams in D1 men’s basketball are power-conference programs: No. 1 Arizona and No. 5 Nebraska. Then there’s No. 24 Miami (Ohio), the little mid-major that could, scrapping its way through a historic campaign.

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Still perfect: The RedHawks have won two straight overtime nail-biters to become just the seventh mid-major since 1990 to start 20-0, and the first ever in the MAC. That perfect start has led to their first AP ranking since 1999,* and could power them to their first NCAA tournament berth since 2007.

Is this a mirage? This Miami team is clearly special — you don’t win 20 straight on luck alone — but there’s no denying that they’ve benefited from an easy schedule.

• While they’re 24th in the AP poll, they’re just 48th in the NET Rankings and 86th in KenPom, and their strength of schedule ranks 332nd out of 365 teams.

• Their toughest opponents thus far have been Akron (16-4), Kent State (15-5) and Bowling Green (13-7), and two of their wins came against NAIA schools: Indiana East and Milligan.

Yes, but: Cupcake schedule aside, it’s worth celebrating a mid-major with a minuscule NIL budget going 20-0 in this modern era of college hoops. Credit the continuity in Oxford, where 25 players and staffers returned to run it back after Miami went 25-9 last season and showed real promise.

What they’re saying: “I think retention is everything in today’s landscape,” head coach Travis Steele told CBS Sports. “You’ve got NIL, the portal. What’s the term some coaches use, mercenaries? We don’t have that. We recruit a lot of high school guys and I’m still holding on a little bit to that old model: development, get better, we have fun together, we win and I hope that means something. I think it does to our guys.”

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Looking ahead: Only 20 teams have entered the NCAA Tournament undefeated, including just three this century (2013-14 Wichita State, 2014-15 Kentucky, 2020-21 Gonzaga). Could Miami become the 21st? They have 11 games left plus the MAC tournament, and they should be favored in every matchup the rest of the way.

• Tonight: vs. UMass (13-8)

• Jan. 31: vs. Northern Illinois (6-13)

• Feb. 3: at Buffalo (13-7)

• Feb. 7: at Marshall (13-7)

• Feb. 13: vs. Ohio (11-10)

• Feb. 21: vs. Bowling Green (13-7)

• Feb. 24: at Eastern Michigan (9-11)

• Feb. 28: at Western Michigan (8-12)

• Mar. 3: vs. Toledo (11-9)

*Flashback: That 1999 RedHawks team was led by senior Wally Szczerbiak, who was the No. 6 overall pick in that year’s NBA Draft and went on to become an All-Star with the Timberwolves.

🌎 The world in photos

🇺🇸 Washington, D.C. — A Washingtonian rides a snowboard while holding an American flag as he’s pulled on the West Front of the U.S. Capitol during this week’s massive storm.

🇦🇺 Melbourne, Australia — Carlos Alcaraz plays a forehand during his Fourth Round Australian Open victory over Tommy Paul. Can he win two more matches to complete the Career Grand Slam?

🇸🇦 Jeddah, Saudi Arabia — The third season of the E1 Series (electric powerboat racing) began this past weekend on the Red Sea. Team owners include Tom Brady, LeBron James, Rafael Nadal and Will Smith.

🇯🇵 Sapporo, Japan — Kira Mária Kapustíková of Slovakia takes to the skies during the penultimate Ski Jumping World Cup event ahead of Milano-Cortina 2026.

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📺 Watchlist: Tuesday, Jan. 27

🏀 No. 5 Nebraska at No. 3 Michigan

The Cornhuskers (20-0) will look to keep their perfect season alive tonight (7pm ET, Peacock) against the mighty Wolverines (18-1). Can Nebraska, traditionally a football school with little success on the hardwood, pull off a “reverse Indiana” this spring.

In the area? Use Gametime to grab tickets for tonight’s game at Crisler Center (Ann Arbor).

🎾 Australian Open

The quarterfinals conclude tonight in Melbourne (7:30pm, ESPN+/ESPN2), headlined by No. 2 Jannik Sinner vs. No. 8 Ben Shelton in the men’s bracket and No. 4 Amanda Anisimova vs. No. 6 Jessica Pegula in an all-American affair.

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The other matchups: No. 4 Novak Djokovic (seeking his fifth straight major semifinal) vs. No. 5 Lorenzo Musetti; No. 2 Iga Świątek vs. No. 5 Elena Rybakina (reigning WTA Finals champion).

More to watch:

• ⚽️ Friendly: USWNT vs. Chile (10pm, TBS) … The Americans take the field in Santa Barbara three days after cruising to a 6-0 win over Paraguay.

• 🏀 NBA: Bucks at 76ers (8pm, NBC); Clippers at Jazz (10pm, NBC) … Kawhi Leonard is quietly averaging a career-high 28.1 ppg.

Thinking about heading to a game tonight? Gametime is the best place to score last-minute tickets, with instant delivery to your phone. Tap in, grab seats and go.

🇺🇸 State trivia

Colorado, which boasts the most Olympians on Team USA, is part of the “Four Corners,” the only point in the U.S. where the boundaries of four states meet.

Question: Can you name the other three states?

Answer at the bottom.

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❤️ Why we love sports

Paul K. (Boca Raton, Florida) writes:

It was May 25, 1965. I was 11, my brother was 13. We begged our dad to buy us tickets for the Muhammad Ali vs. Sonny Liston heavyweight fight in our hometown of Lewiston, Maine. He said, “I’ll do better than that. I’ll pick you up at school at 11:30 for the weigh-in.”

Sure enough, we were called to the office at 11:25, and we hear the principal yelling, “You can’t take these kids out of school for a boxing weigh-in! They will miss out on a good education!”

My dad throws a right hook comeback: “These kids will get a better education at the weigh-in than they will at this school!”

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Off we go to St. Dominic’s Arena. During the weigh-in, Ali is cursing at Liston telling him, “I am going to kick your f*ing ass!”

We get in the car afterwards and my dad looks at me and asks if I learned anything. “Yeah,” I responded. “Ali is going to kick Liston’s f*ing ass!”

P.S. I still have a banner from the fight.

✍️ Submit your story: Do you have a fondest sports memory? Or an example of sports having a profound impact on your life? If you’d like to share, email me at kendall.baker@yahooinc.com. We’ll keep sharing your stories until they run out!

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Trivia answer: Arizona, New Mexico, Utah

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