The Cooligans welcome former MLS head coach and analyst Giovanni Savarese for a deep dive into the 2026 MLS season. Gio shares his predictions, breakout teams to watch, and how the league continues to evolve ahead of a massive 2026 on home soil. The conversation also turns to the USMNT, as the guys assess expectations, pressure, and what success should realistically look like at the 2026 World Cup.
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Christian and Alexis then tackle the troubling racist incident involving Vinícius Júnior during Real Madrid’s clash with Benfica. They unpack how these situations are currently handled, question whether the responsibility to stop a match unfairly falls on the player experiencing abuse, and debate what meaningful structural changes could better protect players moving forward.
Finally, it’s a jam-packed Champions League recap. Folarin Balogun shines in a statement performance against Paris Saint-Germain, Juventus suffer a shocking defeat to Galatasaray, and Bodø/Glimt pull off a stunning win over Inter Milan. The boys react to all the drama, surprises, and what these results mean going forward.
Timestamps:
(6:30) – 2026 MLS preview and predictions
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(30:00) – Gio Savarese’s USMNT World Cup outlook
(39:00) – Vinicius Junior deals with racism again: time for a rule change?
(59:00) – Folarin Balogun shines in Champions League loss to PSG
(1:04:30) – Serie A teams suffer shocking Champions League losses
The Washington Wizards released a statement Thursday saying Anthony Davis has not been cleared yet due to a hand injury, and the same goes for newly acquired point guard Trae Young, who is dealing with a knee injury.
Davis’ hand will be re-evaluated in two weeks, while Young will be out at least another week.
Wizards fans have been deprived of a certain level of star power over the past few years, watching their team come up short and not qualifying for the playoffs since the 2020-21 campaign. Bradley Beal was an All-Star that season and named third-team All-NBA. Beal also finished second in the NBA in scoring that year, averaging 31.3 points per game and finishing behind Stephen Curry.
That was also the last time Washington fans had an All-Star to call their own. So, bringing in two All-Star and All-NBA players within weeks of each other should be a cause for celebration in the nation’s capital. If Davis and Young can get on the court together in the foreseeable future, they could do some good things in Washington down the stretch of the season, but the Wizards’ front office may be more interested in getting a better draft pick.
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Washington currently holds the worst record in the NBA at 14-39.
Washington is back in action Thursday against the second-worst team in the East, Indiana, tipping off at 7 p.m. ET from Capital One Arena in Washington.
MILAN — Amber Glenn rarely masks what she’s feeling on the ice. The reigning U.S. champion can’t help but let her emotions play out all over her face, whether elation or desolation. She’s probably a terrible poker player, but a magnetic presence as a skater.
Skating in Thursday’s free skate, starting from 13th position after a disastrous short program, Glenn strode toward the ice the moment her predecessor’s notes faded away. Wearing her Team USA warmup, she looped around the ice as the many United States fans in the crowd rose to their feet and waved American flags above her. And while her poise communicated confidence, her eyes looked more than a little nervous.
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Still, she tamped down whatever anxieties were within. She handed her coach Damon Allen her jacket, clasped hands with him, and then skated to center ice. And then her music — a medley of “I Will Find You” by Audiomachine and “The Return” by CLANN — began, and there was no more time for second thoughts or anxieties.
The moment she landed her first jump — the triple axel, one that virtually no other female skater even attempts — the crowd at Assago Ice Skating Arena exploded in delirious joy, as if exhaling in relief. Glenn went on to skate a strong routine worthy of her skills. Not the routine of her life, not a perfect routine — “this close,” she said to herself over a slight bobble late in her program — but a redemptive one.
She finished with a free-skate score of 147.52 to give her a total of 214.91, good enough to claim the leader’s couch with 12 skaters left to go. And then she was left to wait to see if somehow, some way, it would be good enough to land her on the podium. It wasn’t, as a flawless Alysa Liu took gold with a score of 226.79 and Japan’s Kaori Sakamoto (224.90) and Ami Nakai (219.16) won silver and bronze, respectively. Glenn finished in fifth place.
“A lot of what-ifs,” she said of her thoughts while sitting on the leader’s couch. “I didn’t want anyone to make a mistake, but I don’t want to go back (stage, off the couch), so it’s very conflicting. I was just glad I was able to see such a fantastic event up close.”
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Glenn and her Team USA teammates Alysa Liu and Isabeau Levito arrived in Milan two weeks ago riding a surge of nationwide popularity. The “Blade Angels,” as they dubbed themselves, were a perfect trio — the heartfelt Glenn, the quirky Liu, the understated Levito. They’d shown so much talent, so much promise — all three are national champions — that talk of a podium sweep even took flight. At the very least, one of them would almost surely break the American medal drought that’s existed in women’s figure skating since 2006. It ended up being Liu after a flawless routine.
For Glenn, the first cracks started to show in the team event. Tasked with handling the free skate element — Liu had handled the women’s short program — Glenn was uncharacteristically tentative, ending her routine in third place.
“If an average person were to watch, they’d probably be like, ‘Oh, it’s fine. Just a few little things (went wrong), but as skating people we know, there were many, many, many points left out on the table,” Glenn said afterward. “I did not feel or perform the way I wanted to. I physically didn’t feel great. My legs were feeling heavy, I was tired, I just didn’t feel my best, and I’ve been practicing here incredibly.”
The United States still claimed the team gold for a second straight Olympics, but Glenn’s face betrayed her anguish and fear that she’d cost Team USA a gold right up until the final results were announced.
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“I think I had some fatigue and I need to really manage that going into the individual event,” Glenn said at the time. “But I’m really proud of the mental strength that I’ve built over the years to be able to get through some mistakes in the beginning and really fighting in the second half.”
She had no idea that much worse was yet to come. Glenn and her fellow Blade Angels had more than a week between the team event and their individual events, a long time to maintain Olympic-level intensity.
When Glenn finally took the ice for her short program, she began with a triple axel, a jump so difficult only one other skater in this year’s women’s event landed it. After another successful element, she prepared to do a triple loop, a relatively routine jump; virtually every Olympian on Tuesday’s program completed one. But a slight loss of balance meant she only did two loops instead of three, giving her zero points for the entire element.
That loss sent her plummeting down the standings; she finished the program in 13th place, more than 11 points behind leader Ami Nakai of Japan. She was visibly devastated, and left the arena after only the briefest of interviews.
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Glenn returned to the ice on Thursday night with an opportunity to rewrite her narrative. She did exactly that, and there was no mistaking how she felt once she did.
“I told myself, no matter how the program was going to go, I was going to look up and tell myself, ‘You’re at the Olympics,’ and I did that. I’m just really proud of that moment,” she said.
“ … It’s something I’ll never forget, and I’ve had the moment that I’ve always dreamed of. I’m really going to hang on to that.”
Tanking has begun. Forget April nosedives. That was a 2010s thing. March? That was so last year. The NBA’s annual tanking ritual, in all its spirited glory, is now taking place as early as February. Yes, before the All-Star break.
Last week, the NBA fined the Utah Jazz $500,000 for tanking and hit the Indiana Pacers with a $100,000 fine for their own unsavory efforts. In the news release, commissioner Adam Silver vowed: “Overt behavior like this that prioritizes draft position over winning undermines the foundation of NBA competition and we will respond accordingly to any further actions that compromise the integrity of our games. Additionally, we are working with our Competition Committee and Board of Governors to implement further measures to root out this type of conduct.”
We’ll see how they react. To figure out why the Utah Jazz were resting star players Lauri Markkanen and Jaren Jackson Jr. in fourth quarters already, it’s important to understand that this year presents the perfect storm of tanking.
(Amy Monks/Yahoo Sports Illustration)
There are three primary reasons why it’s become the topic du jour, and Silver’s fiery comments will do little to change the following realities:
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For one, it’s a frothy draft class with Cam Boozer (my favorite prospect), AJ Dybantsa, Darryn Peterson, Caleb Wilson and others making NBA executives weak in the knees. There was only one Wemby in his draft class. It was seen as a “Cooper Flagg and then everybody else” kind of class last year. This time around, there might be several prospects whom front office people could view as The One. Thus, getting a top-4 pick is akin to having the No. 1 pick in any given year — except with the low-key sweetener that you can sign that player to a cheaper rookie scale contract than that of the No. 1 guy.
Secondly, the NBA’s decision to flatten the draft lottery odds beginning in 2019 has backfired. Evidently, it has not stopped the losers’ race to the bottom; the league just opened up the race to more standings plungers. Now, a team on the fringe of the playoff race could realistically have a chance at a top-four pick, which before was nothing more than a statistical Hail Mary. Before 2019, in the previous era, the No. 10 team in the draft lottery would have a measly 4% chance at a top-four pick, but those odds more than tripled to as much as 14% in the new model. Furthermore, the odds of actually winning the lottery, in the No. 10 slot, also tripled from 1.1% to 3%.
Third, that nasty cognitive trick … good ol’ recency bias. A 3% chance at winning anything might seem on paper like a foolish pipe dream — until it happens. And happens again. The last two draft lotteries were won by teams in the No. 10 (2024) and No. 11 (2025) draft slots. A GM trying to convince an owner of a fringe play-in team that it’s in the franchise’s best interest to lose games may not have been particularly persuasive in prior years. But then the Atlanta Hawks soared from No. 10 to land the No. 1 overall pick. And then the real kicker: the 11-seeded Dallas Mavericks got Flagg.
Put it all together and we could have as many as 11 teams, over a third of the NBA, who are either already awful or outright trying to lose — and oftentimes both. More could join the party soon. So which team will be the Top Tanker? Let’s rank them based on five categories in a five-point system with a 5 being the strongest tanking power. (I’m weighting the “Draft Incentive” factor 10 points due to its huge influence on the proceedings.)
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Draft Incentive. Do they have their first-round draft pick this year? Is it protected, and by how much? Do they have urgency to tank this season because of draft-pick debt in the future?
Tanking Track Record. Are they showing symptoms of tankitis now? Does this front office have a history of tanking behavior or is it new to this party? Has its coach shown a tank-friendly willingness to “develop young players” at the cost of winning in the past?
Bill of Health. Are there players who have existing injuries or an injury-riddled past that can be weaponized in the tank? Are players already being ruled out with cryptic injuries?
Youth Movement. Is the roster filled with rookies and youngsters who can fulfill a sudden “development” phase? Or is it a veteran-laden team with players who may object to any DNP-Rest strategies?
Tankerific Roster. Do they have any winning players? Do they have any All-Stars that can hurt their quest? Is this a glorified G League team?
Got it? Without further ado, let’s get to the tank scores …
Record: 15-41 (No. 3 in draft lottery)
Injuries of note: Dejounte Murray (Achilles); Trey Murphy III (shoulder; day-to-day)
Tank Score: 15 out of 30
Draft Incentive:
0 out of 10
Tanking Track Record:
3 out of 5
Bill of Health:
4 out of 5
Youth Movement:
4 out of 5
Tankerific Roster:
4 out of 5
They’re here because they’re horrible, not because they’re horrible onpurpose. The Pelicans are losing their first-round pick no matter what happens, either to their likeliest destination of Atlanta or to Milwaukee. Against all odds, Williamson has played in 30 straight games, which is commendable. If he shows any sign of gimpiness, I’d expect them to shut him down to preserve one of their core pieces in trade talks or, you know, the franchise’s future.
Record: 26-29 (12th in draft lottery)
Injuries of note: Coby White (calf)
Tank Score: 19 out of 30
Draft Incentive:
6 out of 10
Tanking Track Record:
4 out of 5
Bill of Health:
3 out of 5
Youth Movement:
4 out of 5
Tankerific Roster:
2 out of 5
A glorious recent nine-game win streak may say otherwise, but then again the Clippers were ripping through the NBA before they quickly shifted gears and traded James Harden and Ivica Zubac. The Hornets are a Kon Knueppel injury away from having some serious organizational deliberations about the upcoming draft odds. Even still they can only move up so far in the lotto standings if they pull the plug. As of now, the Hornets are too good to tank. Emphasis on as of now.
Record: 23-30 (9th in draft lottery)
Injuries of note: Giannis Antetokounmpo (calf); Myles Turner (calf); Ryan Rollins (foot)
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Tank Score: 20 out of 30
Draft Incentive:
8 out of 10
Tanking Track Record:
2 out of 5
Bill of Health:
5 out of 5
Youth Movement:
3 out of 5
Tankerific Roster:
2 out of 5
To tank or not to tank, that is the question. Giannis’ status can swing this wide open. The Roster Quality factor goes to 5 if he’s out, but I have to be somewhat measured here about their tank potential.
It’s a common misconception that the Bucks aren’t incentivized to tank. Yes, they don’t “control” their first-round pick as they will receive the least favorable of their pick and New Orleans’ (the most favorable of those two reroutes to Atlanta). Luckily for Milwaukee, the Pelicans are dreadful, so Milwaukee has a good chance of actually benefiting from its own tank job. The Bucks can pick as high as No. 2 in this year’s draft, but if they win the draft lottery, it automatically goes to Atlanta. Everyone around the league is watching the saga that is Cream City.
Record: 15-40 (4th in draft lottery)
Injuries of note: Tyrese Haliburton (Achilles; out for season); Ivica Zubac (ankle); Obi Toppin (foot); Johnny Furphy (ACL; out for season)
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Tank Score: 21 out of 30
Draft Incentive:
10 out of 10
Tanking Track Record:
3 out of 5
Bill of Health:
4 out of 5
Youth Movement:
2 out of 5
Tankerific Roster:
2 out of 5
They must really love Ivica Zubac. The Pacers are sending their first-round pick to Hollywood if it lands anywhere from No. 5 to No. 9 on draft lotto night. Given the flattened lottery odds, Indiana can’t guarantee it keeps it, but it can certainly tilt the scales by losing a ton. We’ll see how much it’s been deterred by the commissioner’s slap on the wrist.
Record: 24-31 (10th in draft lottery)
Injuries of note: Josh Giddey (hamstring); Noa Essengue (shoulder; out for season); Isaac Okoro (knee); Jalen Smith (calf); Tre Jones (hamstring)
Tank Score: 23 out of 30
Draft Incentive:
10 out of 10
Tanking Track Record:
1 out of 5
Bill of Health:
4 out of 5
Youth Movement:
5 out of 5
Tankerific Roster:
3 out of 5
That sound you hear is the sigh of relief from Chicago fans who have been begging for this downward direction. After holding a midseason firesale for Nikola Vučević, Ayo Dosunmu and Coby White, the Bulls are finally picking ping-pong balls over purgatory. The delayed tank may not have been timely for maximizing this year’s pick, but hey, better late than never.
Record: 12-44 (No. 1 in draft lottery)
Injuries of note: Zach LaVine (finger; out for season); Domantas Sabonis (knee; out for season); Keegan Murray (ankle)
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Tank Score: 25 out of 30
Draft Incentive:
9 out of 10
Tanking Track Record:
4 out of 5
Bill of Health:
4 out of 5
Youth Movement:
3 out of 5
Tankerific Roster:
5 out of 5
Are they tanking or are they just epically bad? Who knows? The team announced both Zach LaVine and Domantas Sabonis will miss the remainder of the season with injuries, which will certainly help efforts to be the Kings of the Tank. The presence of DeMar DeRozan and Russell Westbrook could interfere with their nosedive, but it hasn’t really slowed down their unrelenting march to No. 1 on the reverse standings.
Record: 20-33 (8th in draft lottery)
Injuries of note: Ja Morant (elbow); Zach Edey (ankle); Brandon Clarke (calf); Santi Aldama (knee); Walter Clayton Jr. (knee)
Tank Score: 26 out of 30
Draft Incentive:
9 out of 10
Tanking Track Record:
3 out of 5
Bill of Health:
5 out of 5
Youth Movement:
5 out of 5
Tankerific Roster:
4 out of 5
Bluff City ain’t bluffing when it comes to their intentions. The Grizzlies stunned league insiders by trading Jaren Jackson Jr. to Utah for draft picks, signaling the Grizzlies are going for ping-pong balls, not the play-in. The Grizzlies have a ton of future draft capital so they don’t need to tank this season, but the small-market team can add top-shelf talent if it plays its cards right.
Record: 19-35 (7th in draft lottery)
Injuries of note: Cooper Flagg (foot); Kyrie Irving (out for season; ACL); Dereck Lively (out for season; foot); Caleb Martin (ankle); Daniel Gafford (ankle); Naji Marshall (foot)
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Tank Score: 27 out of 30
Draft Incentive:
10 out of 10
Tanking Track Record:
5 out of 5
Bill of Health:
5 out of 5
Youth Movement:
4 out of 5
Tankerific Roster:
3 out of 5
Mark Cuban says embrace the tank, so who are we to argue? Normally, a sighting of Cooper Flagg in a walking boot would be a nightmare scenario for the Mavericks. But in a world in which Dallas wins by losing, news of Flagg’s gimpy foot will likely help its tanking efforts. Because the Mavericks don’t control their first-round pick until 2031 after this, they receive a maximum tanking incentive score for this season.
Record: 15-38 (5th in draft lottery)
Injuries of note: Nic Claxton (hip); Noah Clowney (ankle); Michael Porter Jr. (knee)
Tank Score: 27 out of 30
Draft Incentive:
9 out of 10
Tanking Track Record:
5 out of 5
Bill of Health:
4 out of 5
Youth Movement:
5 out of 5
Tankerific Roster:
4 out of 5
There’s urgency here even though they don’t have any protections on the pick like Utah and Washington do. Brooklyn owes Houston swap rights on their 2027 first-round pick as a result of the 2020 James Harden trade. Brooklyn’s time to add a face of the franchise through the draft is now. Michael Porter Jr. remains one of the best players in the tank field, but his iffy medical history suggests Brooklyn will be ultra conservative when it comes to allowing him to play through any sort of ailments.
Record: 18-38 (6th in draft lottery)
Injuries of note: Jaren Jackson Jr. (knee; out for season); Keyonte George (ankle); Walker Kessler (shoulder; out for season)
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Tank Score: 29 out of 30
Draft Incentive:
10 out of 10
Tanking Track Record:
5 out of 5
Bill of Health:
5 out of 5
Youth Movement:
5 out of 5
Tankerific Roster:
4 out of 5
Silver dropped the hammer on the Jazz for a reason (beyond, of course, their guilt): They have the most to gain by tanking. Not only do they have to secure a top-eight protected pick, but BYU standout AJ Dybantsa is in this draft. If the pick falls outside the top eight on lotto night, it goes to OKC. With Jackson out for the rest of the season following a knee procedure, the tank path is a lot clearer now. The uncertain future of Markkanen in light of the $500,000 fine is the only reason why this isn’t a perfect 30 out of 30 score.
Record: 13-39 (No. 2 in draft lottery)
Injuries of note: Trae Young (knee); Anthony Davis (hand); Alex Sarr (hamstring); Cam Whitmore (shoulder; out for season)
Tank Score: 30 out of 30
Draft Incentive:
10 out of 10
Tanking Track Record:
5 out of 5
Bill of Health:
5 out of 5
Youth Movement:
5 out of 5
Tankerific Roster:
5 out of 5
Behold, the Washington (Tank) Commanders. Oh, you thought Trae Young was going to play anytime soon? The Wizards thought otherwise, announcing at the time of the trade that he’s out indefinitely with a knee issue. And now star newcomer Anthony Davis may be potentially sidelined for the rest of the season with a tricky hand issue.
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In related news; the Wizards lose their pick to New York if it doesn’t fall in the top eight! With that in mind, they’re sending loud signals that they’re fully committed to the tank. Beyond Trae and AD being put on ice, the Wizards have quietly sat their best players down the stretch in multiple games this season, somehow skirting any penalty from the league. Let’s see if they tempt fate again.
The Atlanta Falcons missed out on the 2025 NFL playoffs, extending their streak of missing the postseason to eight straight seasons. As a result, head coach Raheem Morris was ousted and former Cleveland Browns head coach Kevin Stefanski was brought in to replace him.
With Stefanski in place and a new offensive coordinator in Tommy Rees, Atlanta’s offense should look different schematically in 2026. Matt Harmon was joined by Nate Tice on the latest episode of the Yahoo Fantasy Forecast podcast to discuss the hire and what it could mean for top offensive weapon, RB Bijan Robinson.
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Despite being fired by the Browns, Tice believes that Stefanski is a pretty good hire for the Falcons. A two-time AP Coach of the Year winner, Stefanski brought Cleveland to the postseason twice in six seasons. Tice wants to see how the QB room shakes out this offseason with Kirk Cousins likely headed out the door and Michael Penix Jr. coming off another major injury. But this hire appears solid for Robinson.
The RB was a consensus top-three player selected in 2025 fantasy football drafts and was excellent for managers, finishing as the RB3 overall in points per game (20.3). He finished with nearly 1,500 rushing yards and seven rushing TDs, plus 79 receptions for 820 yards and another four scores. He had double-digit touches in every game this past season and Tice believes that Stefanski will get Bijan the ball plenty in 2026.
Harmon believes the shift away from a heavy zone run game under Zac Robinson, instead mixing in more duo and man gap-based concepts, could be good for Robinson and the offense under Stefanski. Harmon thinks Robinson could make the leap into the truly elite tier of fantasy performers in 2026 in this new regime, which would be pretty remarkable given how well he performed this past season.
The NBA’s anti-tanking plans are coming into focus.
The league has informed its 30 general managers it plans to make anti-tanking rule changes for next season, according to ESPN’s Shams Charania. Possible changes reportedly include:
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First-round pick protections being limited to top four or top 14;
Freezing lottery odds after the NBA trade deadline or later;
Preventing teams from picking in the top four in consecutive years and/or after consecutive bottom-three finishes;
Forbidding teams from picking in the top four after making the conference finals;
Basing lottery odds on two-year records;
Expanding the lottery to play-in teams;
And flattening the lottery odds for all teams involved.
To be clear, the NBA wouldn’t be pursuing all of those options. But even one or two of them could mark a sea change for how the league’s less competitive teams do business.
The idea of locking teams out of the top four if they made it the previous year has already been implemented in Major League Baseball’s draft lottery, and the popularity of the measure depends on which fan base you’re talking to.
Former Duke head coach Mike Krzyzewski, currently working as a senior adviser to basketball operations for the NBA, was reportedly present at the league’s GM meeting Thursday and called for an “attack” on the problem that the executives should be prepared for in the coming year.
NBA teams are tanking hard this season, for a reason
Tanking has been an accepted cost of doing business in the NBA for decades, but a litany of teams have been racing to the bottom this year, and a spate of injuries have left them unlikely to be any better for the rest of the regular season.
The reason why teams would be so committed this year is one of the most loaded draft classes in NBA history, with a remarkable collection of freshman currently making an impact at the college level. Darryn Peterson of Kansas, AJ Dybantsa of BYU and Cameron Boozer of Duke all stand out, but this is also a class where a franchise-changing talent could easily be found anywhere in the top 10, and maybe beyond.
The amount of players testing and actually doing physical activities at the NFL scouting combine has dwindled in recent years as prospects have attempted to put their best foot forward at the friendly confines of their college pro days and/or private workouts, or they’ve opted out altogether. Even among players who do test, there’s a decreasing amount of them opting in for every type of on-field drill.
This isn’t me being an old man yelling at clouds. It’s just what is happening and something I completely understand from a player’s perspective as they attempt to rein in some control of the biggest job interviews of their lives. The off-field process, which includes the literal interview portion, carries a good deal of weight as potential (and hopefully fruitful) marriages between player and franchise start to form. The NFL scouting combine has always been as much about the player-team interviews and medical testing as it has been about the on-field spectacle that has now become a prime-time event with actual live crowds.
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This class has a lot more good than great in it, and it also has a real lack of consensus among talent evaluators at just about every position. Even the ones with solidified first options, like quarterback and running back, there are plenty of arguments to be made about how the rest of their positions stack up behind them. As the NFL roadshow moves to Indianapolis for this year’s combine and draft season starts ramping up, here are a handful of players whose results I’m keeping an eye on. And that applies whether those results are with their on-field testing, medical testing, or teams making them take character tests about whether they are a cat, dog or reptile person.
Monroe Freeling, OT, Georgia
Freeling was on the fence of declaring for this year’s draft, but after the combine wraps up, he might be feeling giddy that he decided to throw his hat into the ring. Freeling’s film in the second half of the season had him shooting up draft boards, including my own. He’s a great athlete, at 6-foot-7, with a large frame that hints at his basketball-playing background. It’s a frame that he still has room to continue to grow into, too. Freeling’s strength and ability to anchor against stronger pass rushers greatly improved as the 2025 season wore on, all while he was still able to nimbly move to the second level or as a puller in space. His balance is a strong point of his game. In a wide-open offensive tackle class that has plenty of interesting names (including another one in a moment), Freeling has been labeled a project by some, but his film is much stronger than that. He has a chance to vault himself to the top of some boards with a strong display of athletic testing and during team interviews. I’m already leaning that way as it is.
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Max Iheanachor, OT, Arizona State
I had to cut myself off at just two offensive linemen because everyone should be watching this whole class, including the Utah duo of Caleb Lomu and Spencer Fano, both of whom could help themselves by showing weight gains. But both are as athletic as they’ve displayed on film (I still prefer Lomu). Kadyn Proctor is a massive tackle prospect out of Alabama, with the typically associated positives (strength and overwhelming defenders in the run game) and negatives (size limits his ability in pass protection against speedier pass rushers) for being so big. He can help himself just by having a good showing at weigh-ins.
Iheanachor is a tackle who was a JUCO transfer and a late comer to football. He had a great week of practices in Mobile at this year’s Senior Bowl, and his film is more polished than you’d assume for a player who can easily get labeled as a faraway project. He has great size with real length and flashes like an explosive athlete. I’m already viewing him as a top-30 player, and if he has a strong week of testing to back up his rise over the past several months, then his stock could keep rising.
Any tight end or running back?
Look for a big week from anybody at this position. Evaluators are all over the place about who are the second-best players at these respective positions. I’m personally interested in seeing how Georgia tight end Oscar Delp and Washington running back Jonah Coleman measure in and test (again, if they do test).
Who are a few of the most important prospects to watch next week at the NFL scouting combine? Pictured, going clockwise are Arizona State’s Max Iheanachor, Georgia’s Monroe Freeling, LSU’s Mansoor Delane, Washington’s Jonah Coleman and Auburn’s Keldric Faulk. (Taylor Wilhelm/Yahoo Sports)
Denzel Boston, WR, Washington
I’m a fan of Boston, a big receiver who has the size and catching range of a player who can consistently win in isolated situations at the next level. If he runs well (or at all) at the combine, he can help dispel any concerns about his speed and overall athleticism.
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Makai Lemon, WR, USC
Lemon is a demon from the slot who has question marks on his size and just how consistently he can align and win from the outside at the next level. Lemon shows off plenty of twitch and can play much bigger than his size at the catch point. But how he measures in terms of height, weight and arm length will do as much to solidify his stock as anything else he does on the field.
Mansoor Delane, CB, LSU
Cornerback is yet another position without a real consensus at this point in time, but Delane has done nothing but help his stock in 2025. Delane shows off a strong football IQ and understanding for concepts that he had to guard against, especially when passing things off in zone and playing high-low situations. Delane’s main question marks are more physical. He plays with loose hips and gets near the ball constantly, but just how big and athletic he is are the main hang-ups from cementing his place at the top of his position stack. If he goes off in Indianapolis, or at least has a strong showing, Delane could keep rising into the top 10.
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Keldric Faulk, Edge, Auburn
Faulk sat atop my midseason big board, but I’ve cooled a little since then as he didn’t quite make the leap I thought he might over the last month of the 2025 season. I haven’t cooled that much, though! And a monster week at the combine will help his case (and my bullishness) on Faulk’s combination of youth, length and overall athleticism. He projects as a plus run defender with a developing pass rush game, and he has some positional and scheme versatility as a bonus. If he measures well and tests like an upper-echelon athlete, teams will stay glass-half-full about how Faulk can develop at the next level.
Jermod McCoy, CB, Tennessee
McCoy has been battling to be the first cornerback selected despite not playing a game in over a year. That’s just how toolsy the tools that he flashed in 2024 were in his last season of playing. If McCoy can help assure teams that his knee is A-OK after an ACL injury in January 2025, he could keep his name high on boards. McCoy is supremely talented, but his stock has, and will be, fascinating to keep track of.
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Defensive tackles, in general
There are heaps of generously portioned defensive prospects for NFL teams to pick in this year’s draft. It’s a good year to need an interior defensive lineman, especially in the back half of the first round and into Day 2. There are a few different flavors — from maulers to run pluggers to oversized gap shooters — that can all show off something this coming week to get tabbed as the guy to help be a linchpin for defenses that are moving to more top-down play and lighter boxes, thus needing more beef up front. Prospects like Clemson’s Peter Woods, Ohio State’s Kayden McDonald, Texas Tech’s Lee Hunter, Georgia’s Christen Miller, Florida’s Caleb Banks, Iowa State’s Domonique Orange and Florida State’s Darrell Jackson Jr. can help separate themselves with big weeks.
MILAN — Hilary Knight felt the responsibility to speak up.
The previously unbeaten, unchallenged U.S. women’s hockey team was facing real game pressure for the first time at these Olympics, down a goal and running low on time with just one period left in Thursday’s gold-medal match.
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“Who’s going to be the hero?” the 36-year-old American captain said. “We need a hero. There’s a hero in this room.”
Turns out Knight was wrong about one thing . There wasn’t one hero in the U.S. locker room. There was two.
The U.S. doesn’t take gold and glory without Knight giving her team new life with a tying goal with just over two minutes left in regulation, nor without Megan Keller juking a Canadian defender out of her skates to set up the winning goal four minutes into overtime. Those are the plays that made possible a 2-1 gold-medal-clinching, come-from-behind U.S. win. Those are the plays that will live on in U.S. women’s hockey lore long after the American victory celebration comes to an end.
Hilary Knight (R) sent Thursday’s gold-medal match vs. Canada into overtime with a resounding equalizer.
(ASSOCIATED PRESS)
America’s star-spangled comeback started with a third-period faceoff in the attacking zone after coach John Wroblewski pulled his goalie with just over two minutes to go. When the puck went to defender Laila Edwards at the point, Knight thought to herself, “I better get to the front of the net. She’s going to rip that puck.”
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That quick thinking allowed Knight to redirect Edwards’ rocket past Canadian goaltender Ann-Renee Desbiens. Knight’s goal was the 15th of her career in the Olympics and broke the American record held by Natalie Darwitz and Katie King, not that she cared about that whatsoever when the puck hit the back of the net.
“I was thinking we’re going to win the game,” said Knight, who has said that this will be her final Olympics. “It was just that simple.
“You never want to run out of time, especially with a great team, so when that goal went in, I was like here we go, this is ours.”
Knight’s goal certainly galvanized the Americans, but it didn’t crush Canadian spirits. For the first 57-plus minutes of Thursday’s game, underdog Canada had taken the fight to an U.S. team that had won seven straight games in the rivalry. The Canadians had, in the words of captain Marie-Philip Poulin, played “in-your-face, relentless hockey.” So they saw no reason they couldn’t win in overtime, even if Knight had ripped away victory in regulation.
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“You live for those moments,” Poulin said. “I was excited. It would have been a hell of a story.”
The story turned in favor of the Americans four minutes into a frantic 3-versus-3 overtime. It started with Taylor Heise sending a length-of-the-ice pass to a streaking Keller.
“Meg was flying up the ice calling for the puck and I kind of wanted a change, so I chucked it up to her,” Heise said.
Keller took care of the rest. First she put a move so filthy on Canada’s Claire Thompson that it didn’t seem like it should be possible on ice. Then she didn’t waste her chance 1-on-1 with Desbiens, lashing the puck through the legs of the Canadian goaltender to secure an imperfect but resilient American victory.
“Honestly, we talked about it going into overtime, playing to win rather than playing not to lose,” Keller said. “I think a lot of times you get a little nervous trying to make a move, but I thought, ‘Why not?’ Let’s take a chance here and try to get to the net.”
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A come-from-behind victory over their bitter rivals bolsters this talented American roster’s case as the best women’s hockey team their country has ever produced. The U.S. had flattened everything in its path before the gold-medal match, outscoring its first six opponents 31-1 and not giving up a goal for 16 consecutive periods.
The only goal the U.S. surrendered before Thursday was a flukey one in its opening game of group play. Czechia’s Barbora Jurickova emerged from the penalty box at the exact same moment the U.S. coughed up possession of the puck, leading to a breakaway goal.
“I just think we cemented ourselves as one of the best U.S. teams in history,” Heise said.
She wasn’t alone in that sentiment
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“This is the best U.S. team I’ve ever been part of,” Knight said.
For decades, the hierarchy at the top of women’s hockey has been Canada, the U.S. and then everyone else. One of the North American powers has captured gold at every Olympics to feature women’s hockey and every world championships. With few exceptions, the rest of the world has essentially battled it out for third place.
Canada entered Thursday having won five of seven Olympic golds, but the U.S. has enjoyed the upper hand in the rivalry recently. First, the Americans edged the Canadians in overtime in the gold-medal match at last year’s world championships. Then they convincingly swept four Rivalry Series matchups earlier this winter. Then, in the final game of group play in Milan, they inflicted the worst beatdown on the Canadians in their brilliant Olympic history.
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The lingering question coming out of that 5-0 U.S. blowout was how much the score was a product of the absence of Poulin. Was the gap between the best two teams in the world really that wide? Or might the Canadians have been more competitive if they had the superstar who scored the game-winning goal in three previous Olympic gold-medal matches?
Maybe it was the return of Poulin. Maybe it was Canadian pride and urgency. Whatever the reason, Thursday’s gold-medal match looked nothing like the one-sided previous matchup.
Hungrier and more aggressive from the start, Canada scored first and put the favored Americans on their heels. The message to the U.S. was clear: This was not going to be another walkover.
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“Honestly, we played exactly how we wanted to,” defender Erin Ambrose said. “We kept them to the outside, we put pucks deep, we took care of the puck. Our goalie made big saves when we needed her to. We played a pretty darn good hockey game.”
That’s what made the final result so hard to stomach for the teary-eyed Canadians after the game.
They were in position to win for all but two minutes of regulation, until Knight struck. And so did Keller. And the gold belonged to the Americans.
Joe Gibbs Racing has filed a lawsuit against former competition director and crew chief Chris Gabehart, alleging that Gabehart attempted to “steal JGR’s most sensitive information” and take it to Spire Motorsports to be the team’s chief motorsports officer.
According to the suit, Gabehart had information from Joe Gibbs Racing like “comprehensive post-race audit and analyses of team and driver performance for the 2025 season,” “complete payroll details, including job titles, contract length, annual compensation, incentive compensation, and compensation plans for prior years,” sponsor revenue and the team’s pit crew analytics from the 2024 season on his personal phone and Google Photos account.
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Additionally, the team says Gabehart had a “Spire” folder on his work computer with proprietary JGR information about how the team operates and how it creates setups. JGR is asking for $8 million in damages along with attorney fees.
Gabehart was the team’s Cup Series competition director in 2025 after serving as Denny Hamlin’s crew chief for the previous six seasons. Hamlin won 22 races with Gabehart atop the pit box and made NASCAR’s title race in three of those six seasons. Before working with Hamlin in the Cup Series, Gabehart crew chiefed in the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series for the team.
Per the suit, the team parted ways with Gabehart after he asked for more control over the team’s racing decisions. When JGR said no, the parties began working on a separation agreement. After Gabehart left, the team did a routine analysis of his computer and found the folder marked with Spire’s name. The team says Gabehart saved the information on Nov. 7, the day after his meeting with team owner Joe Gibbs.
Spire has been a Cup Series team since the 2019 season and expanded to three cars in 2024. It is fielding cars for Michael McDowell, Carson Hocevar and Daniel Suarez in 2026.
MILAN — As she skated around the Assago Ice Skating Arena rink, moments before the most important routine of her life, Alysa Liu caught sight of her teammate Amber Glenn near the kiss-and-cry couch. Glenn, devastated after Tuesday night’s program, had skated a spectacular routine of her own nearly two hours before. As Liu drew close, she gave Glenn a congratulatory thumbs-up.
“What are you doing?” an exasperated Glenn replied. “Go skate!”
There are no record books to measure such things, but it’s entirely possible that no Olympian has ever smiled as much as Liu did on Thursday night, executing a brilliant, virtually flawless free skate that vaulted her from third place into first. She smiled when she stepped onto the ice, she smiled when she spotted Glenn, she smiled through her lutzes and loops and salchows, she smiled when she pointed her left finger to the sky to close out her routine. And she smiled — and giggled a triumphant laugh — when she skated right up to the rinkside camera and bellowed, “That’s what I’m f***ing talking about!”
That is the entire breadth of the Alysa Liu experience — giddiness, confidence, joy, serenity — and gold-medal-winning talent. At an Olympics where so many others have crumbled under the pressure, she literally laughed in pressure’s face.
“She’s not like us,” her coach Phillip DiGuglielmo said, beaming in the afterglow of her victory. “The rest of us here would be like, ‘Oh my God, I’m nervous. I can’t do this. I have a million voices in my head.’ She has one voice in her head and it says, ‘I got this.’”
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“The feelings I felt out there were calm, happy, confident,” she said after coming off the ice, drawing out pauses between each word. “Of course I had fun. But I’ve been having fun all the time.”
Alysa Liu won a second gold medal Thursday at the Milan Cortina Olympics and celebrated like only she can.
(REUTERS / REUTERS)
Her story remains a remarkable one: a champion at the intermediate, junior and national levels from 2016-20, she made the 2022 Olympic team … and then decided she was done with skating. Completely, thoroughly, slam-the-door done. She enrolled in classes at UCLA, she spent time with friends, she traveled the world … all parts of a normal life denied to competitive figure skaters.
Somewhere along the line, though, she decided to come back to skating, decided that this was the way she could best express her abundance of ideas, in fields far from the ice. Get her started talking about music or fashion or choreography, and she’s likely to spiral off in giddy delight about her latest inspiration or creation.
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“I think I have a beautiful life story, and I feel really lucky,” Liu said. “I’m glad that a lot of people are now watching me so I can show them everything I’ve come up with in my brain.”
Liu rediscovered a love of skating, and skating loved her back. In short order, she rose from retirement to world champion to, now, Olympic gold medalist — the first American woman to win an individual gold medal since 2002.
“I 100 percent believe that if she had not stepped away, she would not be here right now,” DiGuglielmo said. “Giving her that break — not just stepping away, she shut the door — her body got healthier, her mind …. was sparked, all those things that make you into the person you are.”
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What’s most remarkable about Liu is this: for an Olympian, she’s remarkably unfazed by the Olympics themselves. She visualizes something larger, something beyond the Olympic stage, which is truly an achievement given that she’s still 20.
“I don’t need this,” she said, holding up her gold medal. “What I needed was the stage. And I got that. So I was all good, no matter what happened. If I fell on every jump,” she said smiling, “I would still be wearing this dress.”
Someday, a few more Winter Olympics down the line, we might look back on Alysa Liu’s 2026 performance as the start of a revitalization of interest in the sport of figure skating, the way Dorothy Hamill inspired thousands of young skaters after her 1976 gold. And even if not, we’ll still have this one true memory of one perfect night on the ice.
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“When you enjoy doing something, you can excel at it,” DiGuglielmo said. “She can really show that you can do what you love, do it really well, and win the Olympics.”
Her medal around her neck, her skates swapped for sneakers, Liu paused for a thought. “I felt so connected with the audience,” she said, and then laughed. “Oh! I want to be out there again!”
