Category: Sport

Kansas freshman Darryn Peterson was not listed in the injury report for Saturday’s ranked matchup against No. 13 BYU.

Peterson missed No. 14 Kansas’s last game against Kansas State after suffering an ankle injury in the second half of Tuesday’s win over Colorado. He has played in only 10 of 20 games this season after dealing with a hamstring injury and cramps.

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When Peterson is on the floor, he produces. The 19-year-old is averaging 21.6 points, 4.6 rebounds and 1.9 assists, and shooting 42% from behind the arc.

On the other side will be BYU 6-foot-9 freshman AJ Dybantsa. Dybantsa was the only freshman in the 2025 class ranked above Peterson coming out of high school.

The 19-year-old freshman is second in the country in scoring, averaging 23.6 points, and adds 6.7 rebounds and 3.6 assists per game. Last weekend, Dybantsa scored 43 points on 15-of-24 shooting and going 4 of 5 from three against Utah.

Dybantsa and Peterson also have a history of matching up against each other in high school. Peterson has won both of their two matchups. In their last matchup, Peterson stole the show with 58 points and the game-winning 3-pointer in Proflic Prep’s 88-86 win over Utah Prep. Dybantsa finished the game with 49 points.

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The two freshmen also faced off against each other in the McDonald’s All America Game. Peterson scored 18 points and was named the Co-MVP with Duke’s Cam Boozer. Dybantsa scored 13 points.

The two have been linked to one another since their days together at the U16 trials for Team USA. They are also contenders to be the No. 1 pick in the 2026 NBA Draft.

No. 3 Michigan held off a rousing second-half comeback by No. 7 Michigan State for a 83-71 road win at Friday night.

The Wolverines looked as if they would earn a decisive victory in East Lansing, finishing off the final three minutes of the first half with a 13-6 run. However, MSU’s Coen Carr may have hinted at what was to come with a thunderous dunk for the last basket of the half.

Three minutes into the second half, the Spartans began what would become a 9-0 run to cut Michigan’s lead to 46-41. That turned into an 18-9 surge that tied the score at 55-55 on a Jason Kohler 3-pointer at the 7:57 mark.

Jeremy Fears Jr. stole an Eliot Cadeau pass 30 seconds later for a fast-break layup that put Michigan State on top, 57-55. The two rivals exchanged leads twice before a Will Tschetter 3-pointer and two Morez Johnson Jr. free throws gave the Wolverines a three-point foothold.

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Michigan State twice closed to within one point, but Michigan created some distance with a Johnson dunk and Cadeau 3-pointer for a 69-63 lead. With three minutes remaining in the game, the Wolverines outscored the Spartans 6-3 to build its margin back to 10 points, 75-65. MSU couldn’t get closer than seven points the rest of the way and Michigan pulled away by knocking down eight free throws.

Yaxel Lendeborg led the Wolverines with 26 points and 13 rebounds. He converted 13 of 15 free throws to help lift Michigan to the win. Cadeau followed with 17 points and 6 assists, as Michigan improved to 20-1 (10-1 in the Big Ten) for the season.

For the Spartans, Fears scored a game-high 31 points with 5 rebounds, 7 assists and 4 steals. Kohler added 12 points and 5 boards for Michigan State, who dropped to 19-3 (9-2 Big Ten).

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Michigan lost both of its games against Michigan State last season, including a 79-62 loss in the regular-season finale in East Lansing. But the Wolverines and head coach Dusty May seemed to be better prepared for the environment at the Breslin Center.

“This was electric; I’m not saying we got a very warm welcome,” May said afterward. “But this was a good sign for our guys to be able to battle in this type of physical game, and come up with enough rebounds and loose basketballs to get over the hump against a team we struggled with last year.”

May went on to say his team didn’t adjust well to physical play against Big Ten opponents and tried to address that with recruiting players for this season.

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Following wins over No. 5 Nebraska and the No. 7 Spartans, Michigan is off until next Thursday when it hosts Penn State (9-12). Michigan State travels to Minnesota (10-11) for a Wednesday matchup.

Veteran MLB reliever David Robertson announced his retirement Friday, ending a playing career that saw him appear with eight different teams over the course of 18 years.

Nine of those years were spent with the New York Yankees, who selected him in the 17th round of the 2006 MLB Draft. He reached the majors two years later and, in his second season, won his only World Series ring with the Yankees’ 2009 champion team.

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Robertson was the only active player remaining from that 2009 team, and that creates quite the historical fact as we head into the 2026 season.

[Get more Yankees news: New York team feed]

With no Robertson in the majors, there will not be a single active player in MLB who has won a World Series ring with the Yankees. How rare is that? It’s been true for only one other MLB season since the Yankees’ first World Series title in 1922, a span of 104 years.

That season is 1995. And now 2026 is set to join it, as well as potentially 2027, and 2028, and so on.

You don’t need a baseball historian to tell you the Yankees regularly won the World Series from the 1920s to the early 1960s. Obviously, MLB had players with Yankees World Series rings throughout that time. Most of them were still playing for the Yankees, thanks to the reserve clause.

Over the course of Yankees history, the team has had three notable World Series droughts: from 1962 to 1977, from 1978 to 1996 and 2009 to present. To find a player whose career spanned the first drought, you can look up Al Downing, who received light work with the 1961 and 1962 Yankees but lasted in MLB until his retirement with the Los Angeles Dodgers in 1977.

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For 1978 to 1996, the closest any player comes is Hall of Famer Rich “Goose” Gossage, who was an All-Star on the 1978 Yankees and kept playing until 1994, his age-42 season. He did spend a season out of MLB in 1990 while playing for Japan’s Fukuoka Daiei Hawks, but that gap is covered by former teammate Willie Randolph, who played until 1992, and assorted others.

There was the mini-drought from 2000 to 2009, obviously covered by Derek Jeter, Jorge Posada, Andy Pettite and more, and then this one.

To be clear, this is just a fun little fact. The Yankees are not panicking because David Robertson retired. Still, it underscores how far the Yankees have drifted from their history over the past couple decades.

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The club had a chance to break the drought in 2024, but ran into a Dodgers team that has now usurped its status as MLB’s Big Bad. The pressure is going to keep building with every year that passes without a new set of players with Yankees rings.

Even a quarter of Stephen Curry is a high cost for the Golden State Warriors these days.

The Warriors star exited Friday’s game against the Detroit Pistons early with right knee soreness, finishing with a team-high 23 points on 7-of-16 shooting (4 of 10 from 3-point range). After the game, Warriors head coach Steve Kerr said he didn’t believe Curry’s knee injury was “anything major,” but the team will know more on Saturday.

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Curry went to the locker room near the end of the third quarter, grimacing and limping slightly after some awkward contact on an and-1. He remained in the locker room at the beginning of the fourth quarter, and the Warriors soon ruled him out for the rest of the game.

The Warriors managed to hang around despite Curry’s injury, cutting the deficit to three points midway through the fourth quarter, but ended up losing 131-124 to the East-leading Pistons.

Curry had been dealing with a knee issue over the course of this week. He reportedly first felt something in his knee on Saturday and was listed as questionable with right knee soreness for Sunday’s game, but still played that day. However, he did miss Monday’s game against the Portland Trail Blazers, the second leg of a back-to-back.

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He went on to play 28 minutes against the Utah Jazz on Wednesday and didn’t carry an injury designation going into Friday’s game, but clearly the injury resurfaced.

As usual, a significant Curry injury would be the last thing the Warriors need right now. The team is still learning how to navigate life without Jimmy Butler, who was knocked out for the season by a torn ACL last week.

Friday’s loss means Golden State is now 2-4 since Butler’s injury, with losses to the Toronto Raptors and Dallas Mavericks. For now, they remain in eighth place in the Western Conference at 27-33, with a 3.5-game cushion to avoid the second play-in game.

A day after a crash that threatens her availability for the Winter Olympics, Lindsey Vonn withdrew from her scheduled World Cup super-G race on Saturday but provided no definitive update on her status for next week’s Games.

Vonn injured her left knee after a fall during Friday’s World Cup downhill race in Crans-Montana, Switzerland. She posted on Instagram on Saturday that she would not be racing in the super-G.

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“Doing my best right now,” she wrote in the post.

Vonn has yet to rule herself out from competing in the Olympics despite the injury. After a social media account that tracks prediction markets declared, “Lindsey Vonn being airlifted days before the Winter Games is a brutal market correction. The public had bet on the narrative, but physics had the final say,” Vonn offered a terse reply: “Physics had the final say? No, I have the final say.”

Early in Friday’s run, Vonn lost balance following a jump and skidded into safety nets while on her back. After being tended to for several minutes by medical personnel, she stood up by using her poles to steady herself while grabbing at her left knee.

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Vonn skied slowly to the finish line, stopping several times, before limping into a medical tent. She was then airlifted out via helicopter.

In a post on her Instagram, Vonn said Friday she’s “discussing the situation with my doctors and team and will continue to undergo further exams.

“This is a very difficult outcome one week before the Olympics… but if there’s one thing I know how to do, it’s a comeback. … My Olympic dream is not over.”

The 41-year-old Vonn was the third skier to crash in the World Cup race in Crans-Montana. The race was canceled following Vonn’s run due to poor visibility.

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“The main reason is the safety of the athletes,” said Women’s World Cup Race Director Peter Gerdol. “The visibility was getting worse and worse, they couldn’t see the race line properly and it caused mistakes. We saw six athletes starting and all six had some mistakes. This was a sign that it was a high-risk situation. We know that our sport is a risky sport, but the feeling was too much risk. That’s why the Jury decided to stop the race.”

Vonn retired in 2019, but felt her competitive spark return after watching the 2022 Olympics in Beijing. She underwent knee replacement surgery in 2024 and in December won her first World Cup race in nearly six years to validate her comeback. She won again earlier this month.

Vonn won gold in the downhill and bronze in the super-G at the 2010 Vancouver Olympics and picked up another bronze medal in downhill at the 2018 Games in Pyeongchang.

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The Olympic women’s downhill will take place on Feb. 8 at Tofane Alpine Skiing Centre in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy.

Nikola Jokić returned to the court Friday night at home, and in his first game back from a knee injury that sidelined him for a bit more than a month, he recorded 31 points and 12 rebounds on a minutes restriction, leading the Denver Nuggets to a 122-109 win over the Los Angeles Clippers.

In 25 minutes of action, he made 8-of-11 attempts from the field and 13-of-17 shots from the free-throw line, as the Nuggets (33-16) took down the Clippers (22-25), who had won 16 of their previous 19 games, including nine of their last 10.

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The three-time NBA MVP had been out since he suffered a bone bruise while hyperextending his left knee on Dec. 29.

Jokić had missed 16 straight games. But because he returned when he did, the standout center’s in position to be eligible for the league’s end-of-season awards.

While there are some exceptions, a player generally must play a minimum of 65 regular-season games to be considered for those awards, per a league rule that was instituted ahead of the 2023-24 season in an attempt to combat load management.

Jokić has now appeared in 33 outings this season, and the Nuggets have 33 games remaining, meaning that he’ll likely have one absence to spare the rest of the way.

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Jokić is averaging 29.7 points, 12.2 rebounds and career-high 10.8 assists per game while shooting 60.8% from the field, including a career-high 43.9% from 3.

[Get more Nuggets news: Denver team feed]

The Nuggets went 10-6 in Jokić’s absence, the longest of his 11-season career. They are currently third in the Western Conference standings.

He sustained the injury during a loss to the Miami Heat.

Late in the first half, Jokić’s left knee buckled in the paint after his teammate, Spencer Jones, accidentally stepped back onto the big man’s left foot. Jones was trying to guard the Heat’s Jaime Jaquez Jr. at the time.

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Jokić hit the deck and rolled around in pain. He eventually limped off the court.

The Nuggets managed to stay afloat without their best player. They got a boost from their supporting cast. Namely, wing Peyton Watson averaged 22.1 points in the 15 games he played without Jokić. For reference, he posted 10.7 points per game in his previous 30 contests this season.

Even with Jokić back, Watson kept that up Friday versus the Clippers, chipping in 21 points. Denver also got 22 points off the bench from Tim Hardaway Jr.

But Jokić’s comeback was timely.

The Nuggets announced Thursday that forward Aaron Gordon will be re-evaluated in four-to-six weeks after aggravating the right hamstring strain that previously sidelined him this season. Gordon is averaging a career-high 17.7 points per game, third best on the Nuggets in his 12th year in the league.

The Buffalo Bills took a chance on Jim Leonhard after he didn’t hear his name called during the 2005 NFL Draft. Buffalo brought aboard the undrafted, undersized former walk-on Wisconsin safety, and that’s where he began his 10-year NFL playing career and ultimately spent four seasons.

More than a decade later, he’s reportedly headed back, this time as a 43-year-old coach after serving as the Denver Broncos’ defensive passing-game coordinator the past two seasons.

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The Bills are hiring Leonhard as their new defensive coordinator, per multiple reports. Leonhard, who doubled as Sean Payton’s assistant head coach in 2025, will now be Joe Brady’s DC in Buffalo.

Leonhard joined the Broncos’ staff ahead of the 2024 season, during which he also coached a defensive-back room that featured NFL Defensive Player of the Year Patrick Surtain II, now a three-time All-Pro cornerback.

He last held a DC gig at his alma mater. Not long after wrapping up a 431-tackle, 14-interception NFL career, Leonhard was Wisconsin’s defensive coordinator from 2017-22. The Badgers clocked out top 20 in scoring defense in five of those six seasons, placing top 10 four times. He finished the 2022 campaign as Wisconsin’s interim head coach.

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This coaching cycle, Leonhard interviewed with the Los Angeles Chargers and Baltimore Ravens as well, according to NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport, but Leonhard will be responsible for a Bills defense that allowed the 12th-fewest points per game (21.5) this season yet ranked 28th against the run, giving up 136.2 yards per game on the ground.

[More Bills news: Buffalo team feed]

Leonhard will replace Bobby Babich, who was the Bills’ DC under Sean McDermott from 2024-25. McDermott was fired after Buffalo’s turnover-ridden, 33-30 defeat to the Broncos in the AFC divisional-round of the playoffs.

The hiring of Leonhard is an important one, given that Brady’s forte is offense and the Bills have struggled to come up with key stops in the postseason in recent years.

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Earlier this week, Buffalo promoted Brady from OC to head coach. Brady, 36, has been on the Bills’ staff since he arrived as quarterbacks coach in 2022. He’s now building a staff of his own.

That includes Leonhard, plus another former Broncos assistant, Pete Carmichael Jr. Carmichael, a longtime New Orleans Saints offensive coordinator, reunited with Payton in Denver, where he spent the past two seasons as a senior offensive assistant. He’s an OC again in Buffalo.

A handful of years removed from college, Brady worked under Carmichael in 2017-18 as a Saints offensive assistant. Payton hired Brady back then.

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“So proud of him,” Payton said of Brady on Tuesday. “Just spoke to him two days ago. You want to see guys that come in and work that are part of your staff.

“You want to see them have success, not the other way around.”

Leonhard’s one of those guys, too.

The NBA suspended Philadelphia 76ers forward Paul George 25 games without pay for violating the league’s anti-drug program. In a statement to ESPN on Saturday, George admitted to taking “improper medication” for a mental health issue.

“Over the past few years, I’ve discussed the importance of mental health, and in the course of recently seeking treatment for an issue of my own, I made the mistake of taking an improper medication,” George said in the statement.

“I take full responsibility for my actions and apologize to the Sixers organization, my teammates and the Philly fans for my poor decision making during this process.”

George added: “I am focused on using this time to make sure that my mind and body are in the best condition to help the team when I return.”

George’s suspension will begin Saturday night, when the Sixers host the New Orleans Pelicans, the league announced. When he’s eligible to return, the Sixers will have a mere 10 games remaining in the regular season, starting with a March 25 home matchup against the Chicago Bulls.

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In his 16th NBA season, the 35-year-old George is averaging 16 points, 5.1 rebounds and 3.7 assists per game on 42.4% shooting for a Philadelphia team that’s 26-21 and sixth in the Eastern Conference.

The nine-time All-Star and six-time All-NBA selection is in his second season with the Sixers after signing a maximum four-year, $212 million contract with the franchise in the summer of 2024.

George’s suspension could have an impact on Philadelphia’s trade-deadline approach. His 25-game ban will cost him $11,742,294, according to NBA salary cap analyst Yossi Gozlan, who reported Saturday that, in turn, the Sixers will receive a luxury tax credit worth half that amount.

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As a result, per Gozlan, the Sixers will be only $1.3 million above the luxury tax line. In saving more than $5 million in luxury tax payments, it will be easier for the Sixers to duck out of the tax before the deadline without disrupting a roster that has Philadelphia back in playoff contention, after last season’s injury-riddled nosedive saw the team miss the postseason for the first time since 2016-17.

“Obviously, we’ve been ducking the tax the last couple of years, so hopefully we keep the same team,” Sixers star center Joel Embiid told reporters after a 113-111 win over the Sacramento Kings on Thursday, per ESPN. “I love all the guys that are here. I think we got a shot.

“I don’t know what they’re going to do, but I hope that at least we got a chance to just go out and compete because we got a good group of guys in this locker room, and vibes are great.”

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While George is the Sixers’ third-leading scorer this season, his availability in Philadelphia has been a concern since he arrived. The 6-foot-8 wing played 74 games in 2023-24, his final season with the Los Angeles Clippers, but he hadn’t played more than 56 games in any of his prior four seasons.

After joining Embiid and then-reigning NBA Most Improved Player Tyrese Maxey to form a “Big 3” in Philly, George appeared in just 41 games for the Sixers last season.

He missed the start of the 2024-25 campaign with a bone bruise in his hyperextended left knee. Not long after he returned, he missed more time with a similar injury. Then he missed games with a finger injury in January.

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By mid-March, the Sixers shut down George due to both a left adductor muscle injury and a left knee injury. At that point, Embiid was already done for the season, too.

George didn’t make his debut this season until Nov. 17 after he underwent offseason knee surgery, which sidelined him for the first 12 games.

The Sixers teamed up Embiid and Maxey with George in an attempt to finally get over the Eastern Conference semifinals hump. That trio has shared the court together this season for a total of 365 minutes over 17 games, per ESPN.

It really doesn’t feel like the Luka Dončić trade was only one year ago Sunday. It just can’t be 12 months since the Dallas Mavericks pulled the most shocking trade in NBA history, a move that permanently altered the course of two franchises. It can’t be 365 days since the news broke in the middle of the night that, yes, Nico Harrison really did that.

And yet, it is. We have reached the anniversary of the deal that sent Dončić (plus Markieff Morris and Maxi Kleber) to the Los Angeles Lakers in exchange for Anthony Davis, Max Christie and a first-round pick in 2029.

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You probably know how that worked out.

It might feel long ago because the trade has already been chiseled into NBA lore as a complete catastrophe, a story of hubris and jealousy ripped from the theater of ancient Greece. There is already a beginning (the trade), a middle (the surprise hope of Mavs rookie Cooper Flagg after a disappointing end to the season) and an end (Harrison’s firing).

It is easy to say with the benefit of hindsight that trading Dončić — and trading Dončić in the way the Mavericks did, in the dead of night with no teams to bid against the Lakers — was a stupid move.

The funny thing is no one needed the benefit of hindsight to call that move dumb the second it was reported. Immediate reactions to the trade ranged from shocked to dumbfounded to enraged, with little support for the Mavs’ side of the deal.

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There was, of course, one proponent of the deal for Dallas. Harrison defended the trade for months, right up until his firing in November. He acted like a man with “Fargo’s” “What if you’re right and they’re wrong?” poster hanging in his office.

Unfortunately, this is a case where they (meaning everyone) were right and Harrison was wrong.

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To understand just how wrong Harrison was about this trade, let’s revisit his stated justifications for the trade, as well as the ones leaked by a Mavericks front-office employee who may or may not have been Harrison. The reasons broke down into the following points:

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We could interrogate those further, and also note that a personality clash/turf war between Harrison and Dončić very much seems to be the real reason, but let’s keep this simple. Complaining about Luka Dončić, who had just led you to the NBA Finals, being injury-prone and not the right centerpiece for your franchise and replacing him with 31-year-old Anthony Davis, of all people, was a fireable offense from the moment the trade got sent to the NBA office.

Harrison thought he had made a savvy move, and then watched the world be so shocked he would do such a thing that several people honestly believed ESPN’s Shams Charania had been hacked when he broke news of the trade. The idea of an NBA insider’s password leaking was more believable than, “No, the Mavericks really just traded Luka Dončić.”

That group included NBA players:

An overwhelming majority of Mavericks fans immediately hated the trade, to the point of fan protests, vandalism, “Fire Nico” signs, “Fire Nico” chants at a college basketball game and increased security at Mavericks games and Harrison’s home.

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Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes, one of the team’s most famous fans, wasn’t happy either.

Former Mavericks majority owner Mark Cuban, who hired Harrison and then got sidelined after new controlling owner Patrick Dumont took over, immediately made clear he had no part in it.

Cuban later said he “didn’t agree” with the trade and chastised the team he still owns a stake of for not even looking for a better return. That was the most criticized aspect of the trade.

You don’t want Dončić anymore? Fine. Most executives — perhaps every GM in the league but one — would have then reached out to teams and tried to start a bidding war, which would have almost certainly netted a plethora of draft picks as well as a player you can start building around. Mikal Bridges got the Brooklyn Nets five first-round picks. Rudy Gobert got the Utah Jazz four firsts, a pick swap and Walker Kessler. James Harden got four first-round picks and four pick swaps. Paul George got five firsts and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.

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That path, however, presented a problem for Harrison. He clearly knew what the reaction would have been, and perhaps didn’t like his odds of pulling it off had word reached Dončić or Cuban. So he did it with as little movement as possible, reaching out to the Lakers and nailing down the trade.

Many media members, and executives, couldn’t believe the Mavericks really did it.

Dozens of NBA players blasted the trade in private in a Sports Illustrated article:

“It’s one of the worst basketball decisions I’ve ever seen.”

“I don’t think they should have traded him. No way. And this is just the short term right now. We’ll see where it’s at five years from now. But you just can’t do that. No way.”

“Dallas did Luka Dončić wrong.”

“Terrible decision. If (Dončić) came in weighing 500 pounds, so what? He’s still averaging damn near a 30-point triple-double.”

“(I) didn’t agree with it. You don’t trade somebody like Luka, regardless of the stuff you want to say about him. You turn the other cheek. There are some players you just don’t trade, I don’t care.”

Some politely tried to see it from the Mavs’ side, with some caveats:

“Thought it was a win-win, short term. I thought Dallas won it short term, even though, obviously in hindsight, Anthony got hurt. I think the Lakers won long term. In actuality, the Lakers won short term and long term, the way that it happened. (But) you’ve got to have some people that defend to win a championship. I think that’s what Dallas was looking at, and we know Luka’s not that.”

And some were clearly members of the Lakers:

“I think it’s phenomenal decision. So smart. Wise. I’m a Nico Harrison fan.”

“Thank you. I love it.”

For the fan perspective, here’s an assortment of top comments from this Reddit thread:

Anyone would get laughed the f*** out of here for proposing this

28 other GMs just found out Luka was available

f*** outta here. No way this can be real. No way you trade a top 5 player if you dont have to

If this is real the Mavs need to be investigated because this is maybe the worst deal in NBA history

Even AD is thinking, wow, am I that good?

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There’s really no other way to cut it. No one with a notable platform supported the trade as a clear win for Dallas. At best, some were cautiously curious about what could happen if Davis, Kyrie Irving and Klay Thompson all stayed healthy for the playoffs. That obviously and predictably didn’t happen, and it now looks like it will never happen.

Harrison went on to express some contrition about the trade that will define his career. In April, he admitted he didn’t realize “what level” his fan base loved Dončić. He tried to project confidence, laughably bragging that “fans can finally start to see the vision” after winning the Flagg pick on a 1.8% shot in the NBA Draft lottery. He kept hearing the chants.

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Meanwhile, Cuban was once again in Dumont’s ear, as were the fans. As the Mavericks’ chances of contending unsurprisingly nosedived this season with Davis hurt again and Irving still out, the team’s ultimate decision-maker saw what everyone else saw that fateful night.

Novak Djokovic, who has won the Australian Open tennis tournament ten times since 2008, is aiming for his 11th title this year. Djokovic defeated defending champion Jannik Sinner in a thrilling men’s semifinal match that lasted five sets and over four hours. Djokovic will play No. 1 seed Carlos Alcaraz in the final. Alcaraz, who defeated Alexander Zverev in a 5+ hour semifinal, has never won an Australian Open title; if he does this year, he’ll complete his career Grand Slam.

The men’s match airs live on Sunday at 3:30 a.m. ET on ESPN and streaming on ESPN Unlimited. Here’s what you need to know about the Alcaraz vs. Djokovic men’s final at the 2026 Australian Open live, and when it will re-air if you don’t plan to wake up in the middle of the night to watch.

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How to watch Carlos Alcaraz vs. Novak Djokovic in the Australian Open men’s final:

Date: Sunday, Feb. 1

Time (estimated): 3:30 a.m. ET, re-air at 9 a.m. and 10 p.m. on ESPN2

Location: Rod Laver Arena

TV channel: ESPN, ESPN Deportes, re-air on ESPN2

Streaming: ESPN Unlimited, DirecTV, Fubo and more

When is the Carlos Alcaraz vs. Novak Djokovic match at the 2026 Australian Open?

The men’s final between Carlos Alcaraz and Novak Djokovic at the Australian Open will be on Sunday, Feb. 1.

Carlos Alcaraz vs. Novak Djokovic match start time:

The match between Carlos Alcaraz and Novak Djokovic will start at 3:30 a.m. ET on Sunday. The match will be available live on ESPN Unlimited and ESPN, and the match will re-air on ESPN2 at 9 a.m. and 10 p.m. on Sunday.

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Australian Open channel:

In the U.S., the men’s final will air on ESPN and will stream on ESPN Unlimited.

How to watch the 2026 Australian Open:

Where to watch the 2026 Australian Open without cable:

If you want to catch every match of the Australian Open and don’t currently subscribe to ESPN+, cable or a live TV streaming service, in Australia a majority of the action will be streaming free with ads on 9Now.

Don’t live in the land down under? Don’t worry, you can still stream like you do with the help of a VPN. A VPN (virtual private network) helps protect your data, can mask your IP address and is perhaps most popular for being especially useful in the age of streaming. Whether you’re looking to watch Friends on Netflix (which left the U.S. version of the streamer back in 2019) or tune in to tennis coverage without a cable package, a VPN can help you out. Looking to try a VPN for the first time? This guide breaks down the best VPN options for every kind of user.

9Now. Plus it’s Engadget’s pick for the best premium VPN. ExpressVPN offers three tiers of subscriptions: The Basic Plan (starting at $3.49/month), the Advanced Plan (starting at $4.49/month) and the Pro Plan (starting at $7.49/month).

ExpressVPN also offers a 30-day money-back guarantee, in case you’re nervous about trying a VPN.

Australian Open 2026 schedule:

All times Eastern

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Sunday, February 1

• (Day 15) Men’s Final: 3:30 a.m.

Who is playing in the 2026 Australian Open?

The top 10 seeded players for the singles draws are listed below.

Men’s singles seeds for the Australian Open 2026

1. Carlos Alcaraz

2. Jannik Sinner

3. Alexander Zverev

4. Novak Djokovic

5. Felix Auger-Aliassime

Women’s singles seeds for the Australian Open 2026

1. Aryna Sabalenka

2. Iga Swiatek

3. Amanda Anisimova

4. Coco Gauff

5. Elena Rybakina

Australian Open prize money:

For 2026, the men’s and women’s singles winners of the Australian Open each get $4,150,000, with the runner-up receiving $2,150,000 and Semi-finalists $1,250,000.

More ways to watch the 2026 Australian Open:

February 22, 2026