Update on the latest sports
APCOLLEGE BASETBALL-TOURNAMENTS
Bubble watch heats up as tourneys start in power conferences
UNDATED (AP) — The suspense begins to build Wednesday for teams on the NCAA Tournament bubble as more of the major conferences begin postseason play.
While the Atlantic Coast Conference began its tournament Tuesday, the Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12, Southeastern Conference and Big East all open tournament competition Wednesday.
The Big 12 Tournament begins Wednesday night with a pair of first-round games at T-Mobile Center in downtown Kansas City, Missouri. It figures to be one of the toughest tournaments in years with seven of the 10 schools ranked in the latest Top 25. Among them are second-ranked Baylor, No. 13 Texas and No. 20 Texas Tech, all of whom are hoping to become the first school from the state of Texas to win the championship.
Tipping off the tournament are eighth-seeded TCU and No. 9 seed Kansas State. The nightcap features seventh-seeded and No. 25 Oklahoma against the defending champion, and No. 10 seed Iowa State.
The Big Ten hasn’t won an NCAA Tournament title since Tom Izzo coached Michigan State to the 2000 championship. But the league rarely has boasted as much strength as it does now. Big Ten schools make up three of the top five teams in the latest Top 25: No. 3 Illinois, No. 4 Michigan and No. 5 Iowa. Ohio State is ranked ninth. That gives the league plenty of confidence going into the Big Ten Tournament in Indianapolis.
It begins Wednesday night with two games: Minnesota-Northwestern and Nebraska-Penn State.
Connecticut returns to the Big East Tournament in a familiar position after an eight-year absence. Highly seeded and maybe the hottest team in the conference, the Huskies head to Madison Square Garden as one of the favorites to win it all. The tournament starts Wednesday with three games: Georgetown vs. Marquette, Butler vs. Xavier and DePaul vs. Providence. The top teams join the fun Thursday, including third-seeded UConn.
The SEC Tournament will start with one game thanks to Auburn, the last team to win this event in 2019, self-imposing a postseason ban. Vanderbilt, which played the last game a year ago, will open against Texas A&M, the No. 13 seed after COVID issues kept the Aggies off the court all of February.
Oregon had to battle through two COVID-19 pauses, injuries to two of its best players and a long stretch of inactivity. Once the Ducks got rolling, it was tough for any team to stop them. Oregon closed a difficult season with a flourish, winning its final five games to earn a second straight Pac-12 regular-season championship. Now the Ducks head to T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas this week as the No. 1 seed in the Pac-12 Tournament.
The tournament opens with Washington State facing Arizona State, followed by Washington vs. Utah and Stanford vs. Cal.
COLLEGE BASKETBALL-BIG EAST-PLAYER AWARDS
3 share Big East Player of the Year honors for 1st time
NEW YORK (AP) — For the first time in the 42-year history of the Big East Conference, three players will share the league’s player of the year award.
Seton Hall’s Sandro Mamukelashvili and Villanova’s Jeremiah Robinson-Earl and Collin Gillespie tied in the voting by the league’s coaches, who were not permitted to vote for their own players.
St. John’s Posh Alexander was named the league’s freshman of the year and his coach, Mike Anderson, was selected coach of the year.
Seton Hall junior center Ike Obiagu was named the men’s basketball scholar-athlete. The selection was made by the conference’s Academic Affairs Committee.
The awards were announced Wednesday as the conference opened its tournament with three games at Madison Square Garden.
IOC-BACH RE-ELECTED
Thomas Bach re-elected as IOC president until 2025
GENEVA (AP) — Thomas Bach has been re-elected as president of the International Olympic Committee. His final four-year term has an immediate focus on this year’s delayed Tokyo Games.
The German lawyer was unopposed and won the vote 93-1 following an opening eight-year mandate dominated by the Russian doping scandal and the first Olympics to be postponed in peacetime.
Bach says Tokyo is “the best prepared Olympic city ever” and the games will open on July 23 despite the COVID-19 pandemic. He says the question is not whether the Olympics will take place but how.
