Tigers

Pete Maravich Assembly Center

Recently, LeBron James <a href="https://www.basketballnews.com/stories/ifwhen-the-nba-adds-a-team-in-las-vegas-lebron-james-wants-to-own-it" target="_blank" rel="noopener">made headlines</a> when he said that he wants to own an NBA team in Las Vegas.
Well, he's not the only one.
Floyd Mayweather just revealed that he has been in talks with "certain individuals" at the NBA about bringing a franchise to Vegas and owning said team.
"I've been talking to certain people for the last six months," Mayweather <a href="https://www.reviewjournal.com/sports/boxing/mayweather-working-behind-the-scenes-to-bring-nba-to-las-vegas-2591937/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">told reporters</a>. "That's something I've been working on behind the scenes, but I've never come out to publicly talk about it with the media. My team and I have been working behind the scenes with the NBA. I can't say exactly where, but I'm working on getting a team."
Mayweather has said that his net worth is over $1.2 billion. This week, Forbes <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/mattcraig/2022/06/12/billion-dollar-ballers-these-athletes-tiger-woods-lebron-james-federer-messi-ronaldo-mayweather-have-earned-more-than-1-billion-apiece/?sh=2e6bb0e74501" target="_blank" rel="noopener">estimated</a> that James' net worth is roughly $1.16 billion and they have Mayweather's estimated net worth at $1.08 billion.
NBA commissioner Adam Silver has said that Las Vegas "has shown itself to be a great sports market" and that when the league seriously explores expansion, there is "no doubt Vegas will be on the list."&nbsp;
And Las Vegas is doing all of the right things to be ready when that day comes, as our Tommy Beer <a href="https://www.basketballnews.com/stories/ifwhen-the-nba-adds-a-team-in-las-vegas-lebron-james-wants-to-own-it" target="_blank" rel="noopener">wrote earlier this week</a>:
Earlier this year, the Oak View Group&nbsp;<a href="https://www.si.com/nba/2022/03/30/las-vegas-nba-arena-rumors-sports-entertainment-district-oak-view-group" target="_blank" rel="noopener">announced</a>&nbsp;that it had purchased 25 acres of land in Vegas to build a $3 billion sports and entertainment district that will include a 20,000-seat arena.
"The arena will be world-class,"&nbsp;<a href="https://www.si.com/nba/2022/03/30/las-vegas-nba-arena-rumors-sports-entertainment-district-oak-view-group" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said CEO Tim Leiweke</a>.&nbsp;"It will be for music, it'll be for sports, it'll be for cultural activities, and should the NBA decide to come &mdash; and by the way, there's no certainty or no guarantees that the NBA is ever coming to Vegas but should they come &mdash; we certainly will be NBA-ready and make sure that we hit all of their standards."
The arena will be located 10 minutes from the strip and it's expected to break ground sometime in 2023.

Floyd Mayweather says he has been "working behind the scenes with the NBA" to bring a franchise to Las Vegas.

Floyd Mayweather 'working with NBA' to bring a team to Las Vegas

It's that time of year when NBA trade machines and insider gossip hijack basketball discourse. Trade deadline season means absolute chaos for just about anyone involved in basketball from a management, player or media perspective. For better or for worse, I'm pulling the "we live in a society" card and conforming.
The Tank-O-Meter is back for the second time this season to assess how seriously teams should consider folding for the remainder of 2021-22. Teams are rated on a scale from 1 (playoffs or bust) to 10 (do not even think about winning a game again) based on how much a rebuild helps the long-term franchise outlook.
A key part of any good rebuild is maximizing selling out at the trade deadline. It makes sense to get a read on what teams should do before Thursday to build their chests of assets and get out of the limbo of a weak postseason push. You'll see a Tank-O-Meter reading for each of these 10 squads, plus the usual Sour Rankings.
If you're new to the Sour Rankings, here's a refresher: Unlike the typical "power rankings" that repeat themselves throughout sports media, Sour Rankings are a bizarro-world counter. These rankings highlight the top-10 most frustrating NBA franchises throughout the season, and they will be updated every week to match the twists and turns of the league.&nbsp;
This is not merely a bottom-10 of your typical best-to-worst outlooks. You will see championship contenders and playoff hopefuls mixed in with struggling squads. Teams well under .500 may never touch the Sour Rankings because they are on track with their respective processes. Injuries, drama, transactions and generally underwhelming play will earn you a spot on this list.
The central question is ultimately this: How good should you feel about the direction of each franchise? Let's get going.
Escaping the Sour Rankings:&nbsp;The New Orleans Pelicans got Brandon Ingram back from injury and immediately started winning. They're currently on a three-game stampede and have even moved into the Play-In tier of the Western Conference standings. Boston is also rolling on a five-game win streak with perhaps the hottest defense in basketball, suddenly tied with Toronto and Brooklyn for sixth in the Eastern Conference.
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10. Charlotte Hornets (28-26) &mdash; Tank-O-Meter reading: 2/10
The Hornets sink into the Sour Rankings as they tough out a four-game losing streak with defeats against the Los Angeles Clippers, Boston Celtics, Cleveland Cavaliers and Miami Heat. Their run to the All-Star break is daunting; it features 6 games in 11 days and includes matchups against the Toronto Raptors, Chicago Bulls, Memphis Grizzlies, Minnesota Timberwolves and Heat (again). According to <a href="https://heavy.com/sports/boston-celtics/nba-trade-rumor-josh-richardson/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Heavy's Steve Bulpett</a>, Charlotte is also looking to trade PJ Washington, which still doesn't make much sense to me.
Charlotte shouldn't consider bottoming out as long as the team has confidence in its young core. The Hornets have the pieces to either become buyers or sellers at the deadline, and are right in the thick of a competitive East playoff race. At the absolute minimum, this is great experience for guys like LaMelo Ball and Miles Bridges, and the Hornets are still a threatening offense on a nightly basis.
(Last week: Unranked)
9. Detroit Pistons (12-41) &mdash; Tank-O-Meter reading: 9/10
Easy reading for Detroit &mdash; the franchise has already been near the bottom of the league all season. The Pistons can really supercharge the current rebuild with how they approach the trade deadline regarding veterans like Jerami Grant and Cory Joseph.
But Detroit still cracks the Sour Rankings, because even in the scheduled losses, it just feels like there's been too much uninspired basketball. Honestly, what young talents on the roster do you feel better about from the start of the season besides Cade Cunningham? I'd say there's an argument for Saddiq Bey and... that's about it. Detroit still has several questions to answer about the team's identity, and those questions can be answered even in losses.
(Last week: Unranked)
8. Utah Jazz (32-21) &mdash; Tank-O-Meter reading: 1/10
Utah battled to a win against the Denver Nuggets and dismantled the flailing Nets this week, bringing some stability after a five-game skid. However, reports are back (this one from <a href="https://www.deseret.com/2022/2/4/22916919/utah-jazz-donovan-mitchell-on-reports-relationship-with-rudy-gobert-has-deteriorated-thats-not-true" target="_blank" rel="noopener">ESPN's Brian Windhorst</a>) that Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert are "at each other's throats." Mitchell once again denied the rumors, and who knows at this point what's grounding the reports. But it's never good to hear.
No, the Jazz should not tank &mdash; they're still fourth in the West standings even in this rough patch.
(Last week: 6)
7. Indiana Pacers (19-36) &mdash; Tank-O-Meter reading: 9/10
The Pacers <a href="https://www.basketballnews.com/stories/reaction-caris-levert-fills-blended-need-for-cavs-as-pacers-reset" target="_blank" rel="noopener">dealt Caris LeVert to the Cavaliers yesterday in a trade</a> that brought back an expiring (and injured) Ricky Rubio, a lottery-protected first-round pick that will likely convey this season and two additional second-rounders. That's not a bad return for a team that simply needs young talent in waves, and draft picks always add some trade flexibility.&nbsp;
Moving LeVert for that package signals a rebuild is on the way. It's long overdue. Now, the Pacers have to get what they can for Myles Turner, Justin Holiday and their other vets. I do not think Domantas Sabonis is a "must-trade" due to his sheer skill. But Indiana also can't be afraid to accept a good offer. They're one of the primary teams to watch ahead of Thursday.
(Last week: 4)
6. Portland Trail Blazers (21-33) &mdash; Tank-O-Meter reading: 8/10
Here's another team giving off "rebuild" vibes. The Trail Blazers traded Norman Powell and Robert Covington to the Clippers this week for Eric Bledsoe, Justise Winslow, Keon Johnson and a future second-round pick. That return feels underwhelming considering Portland gave up two very good rotation players. But if they like the uber-athletic Johnson, so be it.
With no Damian Lillard return in sight, Portland should really sell at this deadline. What does being in a Play-In race even mean for this franchise? Young trade pieces and the NBA Draft are the best way to find game-changing talent. CJ McCollum and Jusuf Nurkic have been involved in trade rumors recently. I wouldn't be surprised if both had new homes by Thursday evening.
(Last week: 7)
5. New York Knicks (24-29) &mdash; Tank-O-Meter reading: 7/10
One day, Deuce McBride and Immanuel Quickley will join the starting lineup and everything will be alright in New York. For now, the Knicks remain a woefully inconsistent basketball team that can't be trusted &mdash; but can't be counted out &mdash; on any night. If I had my way, Tom Thibodeau would commit to playing the youth; Quentin Grimes, Quickley and McBride would see serious playing time increases, and New York would head into the offseason with a good draft pick and an enticing young core. Then again, it's Thibs.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-theme="dark">
Julius Randle got into it with a coach on the bench against the Lakers. 😬 (h/t <a href="https://twitter.com/AhnFireDigital?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@AhnFireDigital</a>) <a href="https://t.co/NNhrE2XgVt">pic.twitter.com/NNhrE2XgVt</a>
&mdash; theScore (@theScore) <a href="https://twitter.com/theScore/status/1490765945396244482?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 7, 2022</a></blockquote>

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By the way, read this <a href="https://www.basketballnews.com/stories/julius-randle-and-the-george-costanza-problem" target="_blank" rel="noopener">excellent piece from Mat Issa</a> that further highlights how the Knicks are leaving Julius Randle out to dry.
(Last week: 5)
4. Sacramento Kings (20-35) &mdash; Tank-O-Meter reading: 9/10
<a href="https://theathletic.com/3113791/2022/02/07/detroit-pistons-nba-trade-deadline-guide-what-im-hearing-about-jerami-grant-trade-tiers/?article_source=search&amp;search_query=jerami%20grant" target="_blank" rel="noopener">James L. Edwards III of&nbsp;The Athletic</a>&nbsp;says that the Kings have reported interest in Jerami Grant. This comes after all the will-they-won't-they drama surrounding a Ben Simmons trade and the availability of De'Aaron Fox and Tyrese Haliburton. Of course, smokescreens exist in trade gossip, but I still can't rationalize most of the reported targets for Sacramento.
This is a bad basketball team. The Kings have the second-worst offensive rating in the NBA over the past few weeks in addition to their perenially-porous defense. Sacramento may be two games out of 10th place, but the team would have to unseat several better squads in the San Antonio Spurs, Trail Blazers and Pelicans. As repetitive as selling is for this squad, it's the logical step.
(Last week: 2)
3. Los Angeles Lakers (26-28) &mdash; Tank-O-Meter reading: 1/10
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-theme="dark">
&ldquo;more from an off-ball perspective&rdquo; from TALEN HORTON-TUCKER is just- <a href="https://t.co/LO3LSpvuxR">https://t.co/LO3LSpvuxR</a>
&mdash; Nekias (Nuh-KY-us) Duncan (@NekiasNBA) <a href="https://twitter.com/NekiasNBA/status/1490191241878851589?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 6, 2022</a></blockquote>
I audibly chuckled reading this reaction from Nekias Duncan on Frank Vogel's rationale benching Russell Westbrook late against the Knicks. L.A. won that game in overtime, but it sure wasn't thanks to either player. Even though the Lakers went 2-1 this week, the lasting image will be the game-winner from Clippers guard Reggie Jackson on Thursday. The purple and gold are now down to ninth in the Western Conference.
The Tank-O-Meter reading remains the same: You don't tank with a healthy LeBron James.
(Last week: 3)
2. Washington Wizards (24-28) &mdash; Tank-O-Meter reading: 5/10
Washington's downward spiral continued last week with two one-sided losses to the Bucks and Suns. The Wizards did manage a 106-103 win over Philadelphia, but they've now been usurped by the Atlanta Hawks for the final Play-In bid. Does being on the outside looking in change anything from a directional perspective?
I think the Wizards are at the most polarizing trade deadline crossroads of any NBA team. They could make a desparation play for a star to help Bradley Beal and <a href="https://twitter.com/JakeLFischer/status/1488860395683168259?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1488860395683168259%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&amp;ref_url=https%3A%2F%2F8points9seconds.com%2F2022%2F02%2F03%2Findiana-pacers-domantas-sabonis-trade-wizards%2F" target="_blank" rel="noopener">swing on someone like Domantas Sabonis.</a> Or, Washington could send out its solid veterans in return for young talent or draft assets &mdash; at the risk of losing Beal this offseason. Moves have to be made by Thursday, but I couldn't honestly say what the right direction is.
(Last week: 1)
1. Brooklyn Nets (29-24) &mdash; Tank-O-Meter reading: 1/10
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-theme="dark">
Harden effort thread because I watched the film back and, my god, it's pathetic. Clip 1: just blatantly not caring. <a href="https://t.co/NbCccj2Ntt">pic.twitter.com/NbCccj2Ntt</a>
&mdash; Erik Slater (@erikslaterNR) <a href="https://twitter.com/erikslaterNR/status/1489287381031297027?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 3, 2022</a></blockquote>

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Whew... An eight-game losing streak, complete with some epic meltdowns, has the Nets in the Play-In tournament. And that's not even the worst part amidst the firestorm of rumors surrounding James Harden's potential availability. Whether or not he gets traded, Harden is showing visible disinterest at a critical point in Brooklyn's season. It's hard to consider the Nets a legitimate title contender with the way they've played over the past three weeks.
(Last week: 8)
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Ethan Fuller looks at which struggling teams should sell ahead of Thursday's trade deadline.

NBA Sour Rankings: Tank-O-Meter readings ahead of the trade deadline

The reboot has officially begun in Orlando. After trading away Nikola Vucevic and Aaron Gordon at last season&rsquo;s trade deadline, the Magic are finally embracing the long-term build compared to wallowing in no-man&rsquo;s land.
Although the Magic put together an intriguing core led by Vucevic and Gordon, it just wasn&rsquo;t good enough within an Eastern Conference that was ripe for the taking over the years. The best Orlando could muster was a bottom-tier playoff seed, which inevitably reached an easy answer. The definition of insanity is continuously running back the same team with no real room for improvement, and Orlando finally realized this midway through last season when Gordon and Vucevic were shipped off for multiple draft assets and young prospects.
Lottery luck once again wasn&rsquo;t on the Magic&rsquo;s side, but they still were one of the biggest winners from the 2021 NBA Draft in hindsight. Snagging Jalen Suggs at No. 5 overall was a home-run scenario, an immediate franchise-changing prospect with an immensely high ceiling. Then, thanks to the Vucevic trade, Orlando used the Chicago Bulls&rsquo; top-10 pick at No. 8 overall to acquire another high-floor prospect in versatile forward Franz Wagner from Michigan. Adding Suggs and Wagner into the mix of an already bountiful core of under-25 talent in Orlando is an exciting development.
All of the following players projected in Orlando&rsquo;s rotation for the 2021-22 season are age-24 or under: Jonathan Isaac, Chuma Okeke, Markelle Fultz, Mo Bamba, Wendell Carter Jr., Cole Anthony, R.J. Hampton, Suggs and Wagner. That&rsquo;s right &mdash; eight of the Magic&rsquo;s rotational contributors are still at this stage of their careers.
Orlando is just now beginning what the team should have done a few years ago with its roster, but it's the right route when you realize how much young talent can be stockpiled when picks hit.
Isaac is coming off a torn ACL with an extensive recovery; however he&rsquo;s already flashed real two-way potential featuring All-Defense upside in the near future. If the offense clicks for Isaac, he will quickly climb the ranks of <a href="https://www.basketballnews.com/stories/top-10-players-under-age25-for-the-202122-season" target="_blank" rel="noopener">under-25 talent in the Association</a>.
Carter, whom Orlando landed in the Vucevic trade, has flashed on a few different occasion that he&rsquo;s a legitimate rotational big with some untapped upside of his own. Anthony, Fultz and Hampton are darts throws at the guard position, a situation that will sort itself out this season in regards to who will be featured alongside Suggs throughout the upcoming years.
Okeke and Bamba bring more depth to the Magic&rsquo;s frontcourt, although the former Auburn Tiger figures to be a mainstay in Orlando longer than the 2018 No. 5 overall pick.
When trying to picture all of this young core figuring it out, the primary building blocks still crystalize: Isaac, Suggs, Wagner. Although the latter two haven&rsquo;t played in the NBA, the Magic using their most draft capital in recent memory on <a href="https://www.basketballnews.com/stories/magic-kickstart-rebuild-drafting-jalen-suggs-and-franz-wagner" target="_blank" rel="noopener">two of the "safest" prospects</a> says a lot about where they view their long-term future. They want to improve, but it&rsquo;s not going to be rushed. Suggs and Wagner should be connective-tissue pieces that help accentuate what is already in place for Orlando. If everything forms together as planned, Orlando is a team who could make some noise two or three years from now.
So, with that type of timeline, it&rsquo;s fair to assume veteran wings Terrence Ross and Gary Harris are not long to stay on the roster. Rumors bubbled up around the draft mentioning Ross&rsquo; availability around the league. Harris helped match salaries for Denver in the Gordon trade, but he hasn&rsquo;t shown much to the Magic or even Denver over the last few seasons, seemingly stagnating due to injury and inconsistent scoring capabilities.
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In the East, Orlando is well behind the pack for a potential surprise run. (The team is tied for the NBA&rsquo;s worst over-under win total projection with the Oklahoma City Thunder at 23.5.) Orlando potentially landing the No. 1 pick in the 2022 NBA Draft could be another crucial moment to helping the Magic finally stabilize a future winner. Long gone are the years of Shaquille O&rsquo;Neal and Penny Hardaway, plus the Dwight Howard era.
There&rsquo;s not much buzz around the Magic right now, and for good reason. It&rsquo;s a lot of unproven talent that isn't even close to hitting their prime years. However, new head coach Jamahl Mosley is the right man to help steer the ship in the right direction for an organization in desperate need of it. Mosley was instrumental in helping Luka Doncic develop into the MVP favorite that he is entering his fourth NBA season. If Mosley can repeat his rapid development curves as he did in Dallas with Orlando&rsquo;s roster, it will become a perfect marriage. Imagining Suggs being coached by Mosley is an exciting proposition, potentially one where we see the No. 4 overall pick make a run for 2021-22 Rookie of the Year.
Let&rsquo;s take a look at the Magic&rsquo;s rotation for the upcoming season:
Starters: Markelle Fultz, Gary Harris, Terrence Ross, Jonathan Isaac, Wendell Carter Jr.
Second Unit: Jalen Suggs, Cole Anthony, R.J. Hampton, Franz Wagner, Chuma Okeke, Mo Bamba
Suggs will quickly push his way into the starting lineup. The question is, does Orlando pull the trigger quickly enough to put Suggs in the ROY race? When the Magic are likely trying to boost the trade values for Harris and Ross early in the regular season, it will be something to continuously monitor.
Orlando is years away from being where it just was as a scrappy, competitive, lower-tier seed in the East playoffs. However, this method of team-building is the way it should have been done all along.
With so much young talent stockpiling on top of one another, the dust will eventually settle itself and help Orlando put together a young core ready to grow together for years to come.

Orlando has officially reset its organization. Now, it's time to let the dust settle for an intriguing young Magic core.

Magic finally hit the reset button for a bright future

Since the NBA MVP award was introduced following the 1955-56 season, there have been 34 different players to earn the honor. Of those 34 MVP winners, 26 have been inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. The only ones who haven&rsquo;t been selected to the Hall of Fame are either still active or not yet eligible (Dirk Nowitzki). 
Of the eight guys not yet inducted, seven of them are presumptive locks. There&rsquo;s no doubt that LeBron James, Kevin Durant, Stephen Curry, Russell Westbrook, James Harden, Giannis Antetokounmpo, and Nowitzki will receive the call and be named among the game&rsquo;s immortal when their times come.&nbsp;
But that leaves us with one remaining player: Derrick Rose. Is Rose a future Hall-of-Famer?
Rose is one of the most polarizing players of the last 20 years. At his peak, Rose was certainly one of the game&rsquo;s best. While there&rsquo;s debate in hindsight about whether he was deserving of the 2011 NBA MVP &ndash; the vote would likely look much different today &ndash; there is no question that Rose was on a path of ascension toward becoming one of the NBA&rsquo;s best. He dominated games with his mind-blowing athleticism, and his high-flying dunks looked out of this world for a player his size. He was the key cog on the Bulls at the start of the 2010s. Chicago became a contender for the first time since Michael Jordan retired, mostly because of how good Rose was at such a young age.&nbsp;
There&rsquo;s certainly a case for Rose to be in the Hall of Fame, but there&rsquo;s also a case against him being enshrined with the greatest players of all-time. Let&rsquo;s break down both.&nbsp;
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THE CASE FOR ROSE&rsquo;S INDUCTION
Rose was a player who undeniably changed basketball. He brought back an era of uber-athletic point guards, and showed that it was possible to be a successful team with the best player being 6-foot-3 and lightning fast. Rose was able to accomplish so much at such a young age.&nbsp;
In 2011, he became the youngest NBA MVP in league history at just 22 years old. This is where the argument that Rose belongs stems from.&nbsp;
Is it really right to keep out a guy who was considered to have the best season in the league at just 22 years old? Especially when there had to be an amendment to the NBA&rsquo;s collective bargaining agreement to fairly compensate a young player who&rsquo;s that good, that quickly (known as <a href="https://www.si.com/nba/2019/01/28/anthony-davis-trade-rumors-pelicans-derrick-rose-rule-explained-designated-player">&ldquo;the Derrick Rose Rule&rdquo;</a>)?
No one should be making the argument that Rose was ever the best player on the planet; he wasn&rsquo;t (and if you&rsquo;re making this argument, you&rsquo;re foolish). But he certainly belonged in the league&rsquo;s top-five.
In Rose&rsquo;s first four seasons in the NBA, he averaged 21.0 points, 6.8 assists, and 3.8 rebounds per game. And because he&rsquo;s still playing, he could continue to bolster his case. For example, if he added a late-career championship or two to his resume (like Dwight Howard last year), that could help him.
THE CASE AGAINST ROSE&rsquo;S INDUCTION
Just because Rose won the MVP award doesn&rsquo;t automatically make him a Hall-of-Fame player. Just because everyone that won the award before him is a Hall-of-Famer, and every player that has won it after him will be in the Hall of Fame, does not mean that he belongs, too. There&rsquo;s almost always an exception to every rule, and it seems as if Rose is the exception to this one.&nbsp;
Rose&rsquo;s flame burned so bright at its brightest, but it also burned out so quickly. Yes, injuries are the reason for that, but that doesn&rsquo;t mean he gets a pass for peaking at 22 years old and never returning to form. Rose does have that MVP award, and is a three-time All-Star, but he also doesn&rsquo;t have much playoff success to speak of to date.
What Rose has been able to do in the latter stages of his career makes for a great revitalization story. Rose has been a useful player on mediocre teams in Minnesota and Detroit, and this year&rsquo;s surprise New York squad. All this has happened after Rose was cast aside and essentially out of the league following a stint in Cleveland and being cut by the Utah Jazz after a trade in 2018. He&rsquo;s finished in the top-10 of NBA Sixth Man of the Year voting in each of the last three seasons, but that&rsquo;s not something that&rsquo;s ever said about guys that belong in the Hall of Fame. (This year, he received a first-place vote for MVP and it turned out to be the fan ballot; Rose has always had an enormous, passionate fanbase).
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Keep him mind, it&rsquo;s the Basketball Hall of Fame, not the NBA Hall of Fame. If Rose had some Olympic gold medals or an NCAA Championship on his resume, that would help his case. Instead, his two Team USA medals came during the FIBA World Cup, and while he played for the National Championship as a freshman at Memphis, the Tigers lost, and that entire season was later vacated by the NCAA after an investigation found that Rose's SAT scores were invalidated.
The truest indicator that Rose doesn&rsquo;t belong in the Hall of Fame is that if his first four NBA seasons are removed from his stat line, he looks just like a good-not-great player. From 2014 until now, Rose has averaged 16.5 points per game on 45% shooting to go along with 3.0 rebounds and 4.4 assists, while being a liability on the defensive end of the floor. That&rsquo;s hardly a stat line that deserves to be enshrined amongst the game&rsquo;s greats.&nbsp;
THE VERDICT
Ultimately, what Rose was able to do for his hometown team as a youngster was a story that you&rsquo;d expect on the big screen. But that early stretch of his career isn&rsquo;t great enough to justify how short it was. Had Rose gone two or three more great years before injuries got in the way, this would be a different conversation, but ultimately that&rsquo;s the reality of the situation.&nbsp;
Basketball Reference has <a href="https://www.basketball-reference.com/leaders/hof_prob.html">a Hall-of-Fame-Probability tool</a> that takes each player&rsquo;s stats, awards and achievements into consideration, and it tends to be pretty accurate when determining a player&rsquo;s Hall-of-Fame likelihood. It currently gives Rose an 11.9% chance to become a Hall of Famer, and that feels right.

Every other NBA MVP is either in the Hall of Fame or a lock to get inducted. Will Derrick Rose be enshrined with the game's all-time greats?

Is Derrick Rose a future Hall-of-Famer? The case for and against

Ethan Fuller gauges which NBA teams should be zeroing in on Cade Cunningham.

NBA Sour Rankings: Cade-O-Meter 2.0

Ethan Fuller breaks down the NBA landscape with over half the league hovering close to a .500 record.

NBA Sour Rankings: How to understand the spectrum of mediocrity

Ethan Fuller analyzes the NBA landscape amid a period of astounding parity.

NBA Sour Rankings: When do we panic?

Ethan Fuller evaluates the NBA landscape at the quarter mark of the season.

NBA Sour Rankings: Back to the rumor mill

Ethan Fuller breaks down the NBA hierarchy and analyzes some way-to-early Cade Cunningham fits.

NBA Sour Rankings: Introducing the Cade-O-Meter

Ethan Fuller takes a look at how the James Harden trade and other weekly events have affected the NBA landscape.

NBA Sour Rankings: Life After a Blockbuster

Fresh off of signing a five-year, $12.5 million contract extension with the Memphis Tigers, Penny Hardaway sat down with me on my show, &ldquo;The Rematch.&rdquo;&nbsp;
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He talked about being a Memphis native, pouring resources back into the community, how he got into coaching, how he actually cares about his players and their well-being and the life lessons he teaches them. He also discussed his playing days, stint in Orlando alongside Shaquille O&rsquo;Neal, the injuries he dealt with, his AAU days and more.
However, one topic he didn&rsquo;t shy away from was the NCAA&rsquo;s treatment of his star player, James Wiseman, who played only three games with Memphis last season before being ruled ineligible by the NCAA. He discussed how unfair that ruling was and how it sent Wiseman spiraling into depression.&nbsp;
Hardaway didn&rsquo;t hold back at all -- even when I interjected that I didn&rsquo;t want to get him in trouble with the NCAA. He was eager to get this off his chest and break down exactly what happened. Here&rsquo;s a transcript of our conversation (and you can watch the full interview above):
Etan Thomas: &ldquo;What happened with James Wiseman being suspended? As much as you can say, of course. It seemed to me like he was kind of an innocent bystander in this whole thing, but he got the bulk of the punishment. That's what I saw, but can you explain to me what happened?&rdquo;
Penny Hardaway: &ldquo;First of all, you're a former athlete, just like I am. &lsquo;Melo built the practice facility at Syracuse, right?&rdquo;
Etan: &ldquo;Right. The Melo Center.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Penny: &ldquo;Okay, so Melo built the practice facility at Syracuse out of the kindness of his heart. He won a national championship, showing Syracuse all kinds of love. If Melo wanted to be the head coach of Syracuse, everybody that plays on his AAU team, Team Melo, is not eligible to go to Syracuse, and why's that? Because he gave that practice facility. I gave $1 million to the university to build the athletic department offices -- out of the kindness of my heart, [I] never had anything to do with the school. I became a high school coach and gave to my community. When I became the head coach, they said that I was deemed a booster. And when you're a booster, you can't deal with athletes.&rdquo;
Etan: &ldquo;Wow.&rdquo;
Penny: &ldquo;And James got caught up in that wash because I helped him and his mom move from Nashville to Memphis when I was a high school coach, and they intertwined all of that together. And that's how he became ineligible. How hard is that as an athlete where you played the game and a school gave you a scholarship, and you said, &lsquo;Man, you know what? I'm going to bless the school and give them money back.&rsquo; As soon as you do that, if you're thinking about being a coach, then you can't be a coach at your alma mater, you gotta go to another school.&rdquo;
Etan: &ldquo;Yeah, that's a terrible rule.&rdquo;
Penny: &ldquo;That's horrible. It needs to be thrown away, man.&rdquo;
Etan: &ldquo;And the NCAA, in essence, pushed him out of college, because he wanted to play. I mean, he wanted to play for you.&rdquo;
Penny: &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo;
Etan: &ldquo;Talk about how much he struggled and anguished over that whole situation, because a lot of people don't know. They know he got suspended and then there was a period of time, then he announced that he was leaving. But there was a lot that went on in between that, with you dealing with him personally and how it personally affected him.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Penny: &ldquo;Man, we saw him spiraling downward fast. It sent him into depression. He was really depressed. He was not happy; he didn't understand why he was being punished. It was something that was so innocent that got taken advantage of. There are so many ways that I can look at that, and any coach around the country would say, from top to bottom, low-major, mid-major, high-major, that was the biggest disappointment ever with a player and a coach.&rdquo;
<img src="https://basketballnews-media.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/images/story/body/jameswiseman5_lg.jpg" alt="" width="791" height="AUTO" />
Etan: &ldquo;That&rsquo;s really messed up.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Penny: &ldquo;I didn't do anything wrong on the collegiate level at all. All I did was give my hard-earned money that I broke bones for back to the university, and then went back to help my community. And because it quote-unquote looked like I paid James Wiseman to come to Memphis, to go to Memphis, that's unheard of. That's what they deemed. It's not what they knew, it's just what they thought. Like, &lsquo;Maybe that's what happened&hellip;&rsquo; or, &lsquo;We thought that's what happened,&rsquo; and now we're going to penalize them.&rdquo;
Etan: &ldquo;That's terrible. What do you think of the new rule that Governor Gavin Newsom instituted? The one that allows college students to profit off of their likeness, get endorsements and things of that nature. Do you think that helps the NCAA, or do you think that hurts them?&rdquo;
Penny: &ldquo;No, it helps, because kids were going to start going to the G League -- a lot of these top kids. Not every kid; every kid can't go. But all the top kids that college [basketball] needs to kind of promote what NCAA is all about. You need five-star players who need to be seen on TV, which promotes the NCAA. The NCAA did themselves a disjustice by not allowing James Wiseman to play, because the kid left. Even though it ended up being the COVID situation and not doing the conference tournaments and the NCAA tournament, this kid would've been all over ESPN and he would've been overshadowing anything that was going on with the NBA, because that's how ESPN works. Unfortunately for him first, and then for the NCAA second, that happened. But the name, image and likeness situation is going to help the NCAA, because kids are going to want to go to college that aren't ready for the NBA. And they're going to be able to get paid, and that helps them.&rdquo;
Etan: &ldquo;But even from a business standpoint, that just didn't seem like it was a wise move for the NCAA. I mean, they know that each situation is different. I don't want to get you in trouble. I don't know how much you can say and can't say, but it was just unfortunate that he had to be used as an example for a rule that didn't apply here and had different circumstances in the first place. So I thought that was just unfortunate, and these types of situations are causing young people to want to bypass the NCAA completely. You see LaMelo Ball going overseas, you see Darius Bazley, who was supposed to go to Syracuse, but he just worked out for a year basically and then went in the first round of the draft. You see guys wanting to take different routes. Do you see that becoming more of the norm, or do you see this new rule with guys being able to get endorsements and profit off their likeness helping curb that new wave? What do you think?&rdquo;
Penny: &ldquo;I think it will curb it some, but most guys just don't want to deal with the NCAA. Period. When you start hearing what happened to James, you see things of that nature, it scares you, it makes you not want to go. It'll make you sit out a whole year like Darius did. Darius was in Memphis pretty much that whole year that he sat out, working out down here. And you get guys that'll just go and work out [individually] or go overseas, and they'll still be a top pick because the league wants them. And that'll be a shame on the NCAA because every kid, to me, should experience college, man. College is the most fun time of your life before you get to that next level, if you're able to go -- even if it's just for one year.&rdquo;
Etan: &ldquo;Yeah, it was a blast. I was blessed to go to Syracuse, where I met my wife and started my whole... everything. So, I loved it. But I do see the economic exploitation, and I do see these situations like what happened to Wiseman that make it apparent that there's definitely a lot that the NCAA needs to change and improve on. And I hope they keep improving for the sake of the players and college basketball as a whole.&rdquo;

Penny Hardaway gets candid about James Wiseman being ruled ineligible last season and criticizes the NCAA for their "horrible" rule.

Penny Hardaway calls out NCAA for treatment of James Wiseman

All of the attention will be paid to Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving playing their first regular-season game together tonight in Brooklyn, as the 2020-21 season opens with the Nets playing host to the Golden State Warriors.
Aside from a couple preseason appearances that were televised regionally, this will be the first chance the basketball world at large has to see this superstar pairing together on the East&rsquo;s new superteam (apologies to Jimmy Butler and the Miami Heat, who everyone outside of Florida seems to have forgotten made it to the NBA Finals in the bubble.)
But there are other things to watch for during tonight&rsquo;s TNT doubleheader, which begins at 7 p.m. EST with the Nets-Warriors game and then moves on to the locked down city of Los Angeles for the latest installment of Clippers-Lakers.
Here are five:
What does James Wiseman look like? The last time the Golden State rookie played in an actual basketball game was Nov. 12, 2019, when the Memphis Tigers lost to the Oregon Ducks at home. Wiseman had 14 points and 12 rebounds. From there, thanks to an ineligibility decision by the NCAA, his college career came to an abrupt end, and Wiseman would then devote all of his time to preparing for the NBA draft. Steve Kerr has kept him sidelined throughout the preseason, but tonight he may line up against Jarrett Allen for the opening tip. "James is going to be our starting center before too long,&rdquo; <a href="https://theathletic.com/2272737/2020/12/19/draymond-green-james-wiseman-warriors/?source=rss" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Kerr said</a> to The Athletic. &ldquo;It might happen Tuesday. But clearly, he is our long-term starting center. When we feel he&rsquo;s ready for that, we&rsquo;ll put him out there.&rdquo; Wiseman scrimmaged with the starters twice Saturday. &ldquo;His conditioning looked really good,&rdquo; Kerr said. &ldquo;I was very impressed given that he&rsquo;d only had the one 12-minute scrimmage. He went two full quarters. He played with the starters just so I could get a look at him with Steph [Curry] and Andrew [Wiggins] and Kelly [Oubre Jr.], and he had a really good day. He just looked like he picked up a lot of things in the last few days and is progressing nicely.&rdquo;
Will Draymond Green defend former teammate Durant? That looks unlikely. Green injured his foot over at practice over the weekend, and Kerr said:&nbsp; &ldquo;He&rsquo;s doubtful for Tuesday. But it&rsquo;s not a long-term thing. We feel very confident that even if he doesn&rsquo;t play on Tuesday or Christmas (against the Bucks), he&rsquo;ll be on the trip and we think he&rsquo;ll be available quickly.&rdquo; Here&rsquo;s hoping that TNT figures out a way to get a live microphone on Green from the sidelines so we can at least hear what he&rsquo;s saying if he starts yapping at KD. Green was a TNT commentator during the bubble games, so he owes the Turner folks a favor.
Will James Harden be traded during the doubleheader? All has been relatively quiet on the Harden trade talk front, aside from Philadelphia publicly <a href="https://www.basketballnews.com/stories/nba-philadelphia-76ers-daryl-morey-we-are-not-trading-ben-simmons-houston-rockets-james-harden" target="_blank" rel="noopener">shooting down rumors that Ben Simmons had been offered</a>, and word leaking out of Miami that the Heat had pulled out of the discussions after doing their due diligence. Commissioner Adam Silver weighed in on the topic Monday in a conference call with reporters: &ldquo;In terms of James Harden, I don&rsquo;t believe he made a public trade demand. I know that a lot has been written about his situation, and I believe the last thing he said publicly is that he&rsquo;s focused on the game and being in Houston at the moment. I guess in a general way, though, because I recognize those reports didn&rsquo;t come out of thin air, that to the extent that a player is unhappy with his team or a team is unhappy with a player, it&rsquo;s always the league&rsquo;s strong view that those matters get handled behind closed doors. I mean, we recognize that it&rsquo;s part of the dynamic of any relationship, and employer-employee relationship, that occasionally things go sideways, and especially when there are changes around a franchise. But again, the expectation is that everyone is professional and that team personnel have an opportunity to speak directly to each other, including having in some cases difficult conversations with each other. But those conversations, those disputes be handled privately. James is a great player in this league. But he&rsquo;s also a player under contract, and there&rsquo;s responsibilities that come with agreeing to a long-term contract. He&rsquo;s very well aware of that. Again, I&rsquo;m hoping that things settle down as we go into the season and that he has another great year.&rdquo;
Will we see a dropoff in LeBron James&rsquo; assists? The 35-year old (he turns 36 on Dec. 30) led the NBA in assists last season, but Dennis Schroder was the starter at point guard in his two preseason appearances, and we have not seen a large enough body of evidence to determine whether Schroder will have the bulk of the ball-handling duties when the two are on the court together. James played sparingly in the preseason, accumulating eight turnovers in his final game against the Suns, so do not be stunned if he appears a little rusty. The same cannot be said of Anthony Davis, who went off for 35 points against the Suns in his final preseason game and is one of the leading candidates -- ahead of James at many sportsbooks -- to be the next MVP (although Luka Doncic of Dallas is the favorite).
Have we seen the end of load management with the Clippers? Back when they were blowing a 3-1 lead against the Denver Nuggets in the playoffs and frittering away double-digit leads in Games 5, 6 and 7, the Clippers looked lost and had almost no chemistry &ndash; a byproduct of using 33 different starting lineups over the course of the season. Doc Rivers has moved on to Philadelphia and Ty Lue is the new man in charge, but Kawhi Leonard played just 22 minutes and George played just 26 in the Clippers&rsquo; final preseason game, a 22-point loss to Utah as they finished the preseason 0-3 (as did the Bucks, Pacers and Spurs. Only the Suns were worse, going 0-4). Lue will use the triangle offense in a few sets this season at Leonard&rsquo;s behest, but we are not going to see Kawhi&rsquo;s team at full strength tonight. Marcus Morris (injured right knee) has been out all preseason, and Nicolas Batum is expected to start in his place.

Chris Sheridan shares a number of storylines to pay attention to as the NBA kicks off Tuesday night in Brooklyn.

Five things to watch for on NBA Opening Night

Ethan Fuller breaks down the state of each NBA franchise and ranks the most frustrating teams ahead of the 2020-21 NBA season.

NBA 'Sour' Rankings: Preseason Prelude

The Iowa Hawkeyes are headed back to the Final Four following a sensational performance from women&rsquo;s college basketball superstar Caitlin Clark.
Clark poured in 41 points, 12 assists, and 7 rebounds to lead the Hawkeyes past the defending champions LSU Tigers in the Elite Eight of the NCAA Tournament&rsquo;s March Madness 2024 at the MVP Arena in Albany New York.
The NCAA&rsquo;s all-time leading scorer in either men&rsquo;s or women&rsquo;s division played all 40 minutes, draining 9 threes. In the process, Clark broke yet another set of records including career D1 3-pointers made, career tournament 3-pointers made, and career tournament assists.
This Elite Eight win allows Clark and Iowa to avenge their loss in the national championship game last year to LSU. Clark notably scored 41 points to beat the then-undefeated South Carolina Gamecocks in the Final Four before succumbing to LSU in the title game.
Despite the loss, the Tigers dominated the boards 54-37 led by their own star Angel Reese&rsquo;s 20 rebounds on top of 17 points, 4 assists, 2 steals, and 3 blocks for an all-around brilliant game.&nbsp;
Kate Martin stepped up big time for the Hawkeyes to supplement Clark&rsquo;s production with 21 points while Tigers freshman and HS no.2 overall recruit Mikaylah Williams tallied 18 points and 7 rebounds in a losing effort.
Iowa now await the winner of the UConn vs USC matchup for their Final Four opponent at the Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse in Cleveland, Ohio next weekend.

The Iowa Hawkeyes are headed back to the Final Four following a sensational performance from superstar Caitlin Clark.

Caitlin Clark drops 41 points, Iowa beats LSU to advance to Final Four

Four of the top superstars in women&rsquo;s college basketball are set to face off on the biggest stage.
Angel Reese and the defending-champion LSU Tigers will go up against leading National Player of the Year candidate Caitlin Clark and her Iowa Hawkeyes at the MVP Arena in Albany, New York. 
Then, Paige Bueckers and the Connecticut Huskies will face off against top-ranked freshman JuJu Watkins and the USC Trojans at the Moda Center in Portland, Oregon.
Angel Reese and Caitlin Clark set for rematch in the Elite Eight
Reese and LSU are trying to defend the title that they won last year against Clark and Iowa. LSU has had a fairly dominant tournament this year, winning their previous three games by double-digits. Reese was named the Most Outstanding Player of last year's NCAA Tournament.
Clark, who became the NCAA&rsquo;s all-time leading scorer this season, will try to lead Iowa to the Final Four and avenge last year's loss against LSU. Like the Tigers, the Hawkeyes have dominated their opponents in this year&rsquo;s tournament run, beating each team by 10 or more points.
This star-studded matchup will surely be fiery considering the stakes and a little bit of history between these teams. Reese and Clark had some words for each other last year and have developed a rivalry.
JuJu Watkins, Paige Bueckers vie for Final Four spot&nbsp;
Reese vs. Clark isn't the only star-studded matchup on tonight's game. Watkins vs. Bueckers will also be must-see TV. Watkins is making waves in March Madness as a freshman, while Bueckers is determined to prove she's still one of the best players in the nation.
Watkins, the sensational first-year player from USC, will try to lead the Trojans further into the Big Dance after just recently surviving a scare against the Baylor Bears in the Sweet Sixteen. Watkins has been the nation&rsquo;s second-leading scorer, averaging over 27 points a game behind only the prolific Clark, but she will have her hands full against a UConn team that's led by legendary coach Geno Auriemma.
On the other hand, Bueckers and UConn aim to reclaim the glory that has evaded them for the past few seasons. Despite winning the NCAA Player of the Year award as a freshman and reaching the championship game that year, Bueckers has been plagued with knee injuries over her last two seasons. Now, she's hoping to show the world what she&rsquo;s capable of again on the biggest stage.
All eyes will be on Watkins and Bueckers as they face each other for the first time and try to lead their respective teams to Cleveland for the Final Four.

Elite 8 Preview: Caitlin Clark vs. Angel Reese and Paige Bueckers vs. JuJu Watkins

The Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame announced today at NBA All-Star Weekend 2024 the selection of 14 finalists from the following committees: North American, Women&rsquo;s, Men&rsquo;s Veterans, Women&rsquo;s Veterans, International, and Contributors.
The finalists will then be put forward to the Honors Committee to be considered for election as members of the Class of 2024. The new class will be announced in Phoenix on April 6 at the NCAA Men&rsquo;s Final Four.
North American Committee Finalists (in alphabetical order):
<ul style="font-weight: 400;">
<li>Chauncey Billups</li>
<li>Vince Carter</li>
<li>Michael Cooper</li>
<li>Walter Davis</li>
<li>Bo Ryan</li>
<li>Charles Smith</li>
</ul>
Women's Committee Finalists:
<ul style="font-weight: 400;">
<li>Seimone Augustus</li>
<li>Marian Washington</li>
</ul>
Men&rsquo;s Veteran Committee Finalist:
<ul style="font-weight: 400;">
<li>Dick Barnett</li>
</ul>
Women's Veteran Committee Finalist:
<ul style="font-weight: 400;">
<li>Harley Redin</li>
</ul>
International Committee Finalist:
<ul style="font-weight: 400;">
<li>Michele Timms</li>
</ul>
Contributors Committee Finalists:
<ul style="font-weight: 400;">
<li>Doug Collins</li>
<li>Herb Simon</li>
<li>Jerry West</li>
</ul>
"Being named a Finalist for the Class of 2024 Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame is a testament to the highest echelons of achievement in the sport,&rdquo; said Jerry Colangelo, Chairman of the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame. &ldquo;It's an honor that reflects not only individual greatness but also the long-lasting impact on the game itself. From the strategic brilliance of coaches to the unmatched abilities of players and the influential roles of a coach/broadcaster, an esteemed owner, and a dynasty-building executive, each Finalist embodies the pinnacle of basketball excellence. Their inclusion underscores the diverse contributions that have shaped and enriched the sport, making this recognition truly exceptional."
The Class of 2024 will be enshrined during festivities in Springfield, Mass., on August 16-17. VIP packages for the 2024 Hall of Fame Enshrinement Weekend are now available. Single-event tickets will go on sale on April 6, following the 2024 Class Announcement.
North American Committee Finalists:
CHAUNCEY BILLUPS&nbsp;[Player]&nbsp;&ndash; Nicknamed "Mr. Big Shot" for his ability to deliver crucial plays in pivotal moments, Billups was a five-time NBA All-Star and the 2004 Finals MVP after leading the Detroit Pistons to their third NBA championship. During his 17-year career, Billups&rsquo; averaged 15.2 points and 5.4 assists per game, while his&nbsp; 89.4&nbsp; free throw percentage is sixth best in NBA/ABA history. Billups was drafted third overall in 1997 by the Boston Celtics after earning Second Team All-American honors at Colorado. He is the current head coach of the Portland Trail Blazers.
VINCE CARTER&nbsp;[Player]&nbsp;&ndash; Renowned for his high-flying dunks, the former North Carolina standout was an eight-time All-Star in his 22 NBA seasons (1998-2020). Carter, who won the 2000 Slam Dunk Contest, was named the 1998-99 Rookie of the Year and is the only player in NBA history to play in four different decades. Carter averaged 16.7 points per game (21.3 as a starter) and also played a pivotal role in the success of the 2000 Sydney Olympics, clinching a gold medal with the U.S. Men's Basketball Team. He currently holds the single-season franchise scoring record for the New Jersey/Brooklyn Nets and Toronto Raptors.
MICHAEL COOPER&nbsp;[Player]&nbsp;&ndash;&nbsp;Cooper was named to eight NBA All-Defensive Teams, taking home First-Team accolades five times and winning Defensive Player of the Year honors in 1987. The former third-round draft pick (60th overall) out of the University of New Mexico spent his entire 12-year NBA career (1978-90) with the Los Angeles Lakers, winning five championships while routinely matching up with the opponent&rsquo;s top shooter. Following his playing career, Cooper entered the coaching ranks and earned WNBA Coach of the Year accolades in 2000 with the Los Angeles Sparks before winning back-to-back WNBA titles in 2001-02.
WALTER DAVIS&nbsp;[Player]&nbsp;&ndash;&nbsp;The all-time leading scorer in Phoenix Suns&rsquo; history was a six-time All-Star (1978-81, &lsquo;84, &lsquo;87) during his 15-year NBA career with the Suns (1977-88), Denver Nuggets (1988-92) and Portland Trail Blazers (1991). Before Phoenix chose Davis with the fifth pick in the 1977 draft, the standout player from North Carolina won a gold medal in the 1976 Summer Olympics. He then averaged 24.2 points per game in his first NBA season and was named the 1978 Rookie of the Year. The late Davis had&nbsp;his No. 6 retired by the Suns, and in 2004, he was enshrined in the team's Ring of Honor.
BO RYAN&nbsp;[Coach] &ndash;&nbsp;Ryan went 747-233 (.762) in 32 seasons as a collegiate head coach with the University of Wisconsin-Platteville (1984-89), University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (1999-2001) and University of Wisconsin (2001-15), including a 364-130 (.737) ledger in 14-plus seasons in Madison. Ryan, honored four times as the Big Ten Coach of the Year, led Wisconsin to unprecedented success, clinching four Big Ten regular-season titles, winning three Big Ten tournament championships, and making back-to-back Final Four appearances (2014-15). The four-time Division III champion (1991, &lsquo;95, &lsquo;98-99) was inducted into the College Basketball Hall of Fame in 2017.
CHARLES SMITH&nbsp;[Coach] &ndash; Smith is Louisiana's all-time winningest high school head coach, surpassing the previous mark of 1,071 in 2020. With eight state championships to his name, Smith&rsquo;s coaching tenure at Peabody Magnet High School began in 1985 after starting as a math teacher in 1975. He guided the Warhorses to a pair of perfect seasons, going 41-0 in 2004 and 2010 and earning national top-five rankings. Smith, ESPN&rsquo;s National Coach of the Year in 2010, was inducted into the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame in 2019 and the National High School Athletic Coaches Association Hall of Fame in 2021. In addition, Smith served as a head coach at the McDonald&rsquo;s All-American game in 2020.
Women&rsquo;s Committee Finalists:
SEIMONE AUGUSTUS&nbsp;[Player]&nbsp;&ndash;&nbsp;Augustus, who was selected first overall in the 2006 WNBA Draft, was a four-time champion and eight-time All-Star during her 15-year WNBA career (2006-2020). The cornerstone player for the Minnesota Lynx, where she spent 14 of her 15 seasons, averaged 15.4 points per game and was named the 2006 Rookie of the Year and 2011 Finals MVP. At LSU, Augustus led the Tigers to three straight Final Four appearances and won the Naismith College Player of the Year and Wooden Awards in back-to-back campaigns (2005-06).
MARIAN WASHINGTON&nbsp;[Coach] &ndash; Washington led the University of Kansas women&rsquo;s basketball team for 31 seasons (1973-2004) and recorded a school-record 560 wins. The Jayhawks made 11 NCAA tournament appearances under her guidance, including two trips to the Sweet 16 (1996, &lsquo;97). Washington, who also served as Kansas&rsquo; director for women&rsquo;s athletics from 1974-79, was named her conference&rsquo;s Coach of the Year on three occasions (Big Eight: 1992, &rsquo;96; Big 12: 1997). She was a pioneer on the international stage, becoming one of the first two African American women to compete in basketball internationally at the 1971 World Championships and the first black woman to coach a United States team in international play at the 1982 R. William Jones Cup. Washington, who was the first female president of the Black Coaches Association, was inducted into the Women&rsquo;s Basketball Hall of Fame in 2004.
Men&rsquo;s Veteran Committee Finalist:
DICK BARNETT&nbsp;[Player] &ndash;&nbsp;Barnett first gained prominence at Tennessee A&amp;I University, where he led the Tigers to three straight NAIA national championships (1957-59), the first historically black school to claim a men&rsquo;s basketball title. The &ldquo;Skull&rdquo; played 14 NBA seasons with the Syracuse Nationals (1959-61), Los Angeles Lakers (1962-65) and New York Knicks (1965-73), winning a pair of titles in the Big Apple (1970, &lsquo;73) and making his lone All-Star team in 1968. The Knicks retired his No. 12, and the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame honored his 1957&ndash;59 Tigers squad in 2019.
Women&rsquo;s Veteran Committee Finalists:
HARLEY REDIN&nbsp;[Coach]&nbsp;&ndash;&nbsp;Redin went 431-66 in 18 seasons leading Wayland Baptist&rsquo;s women&rsquo;s basketball program and captured six AAU National Championships. He coached the Flying Queens to two undefeated women&rsquo;s seasons (1956, &lsquo;57), 17 top-five finishes, and went 110-2 during his first four campaigns at Wayland Baptist. Redin also coached the Women&rsquo;s U.S. National Team in 1959, the 1971 Pan-American Games, and the 1963 World Tournament in Peru. He was the recipient of the Jostens-Berenson Service Award by the Women&rsquo;s Basketball Coaches Association for his lifetime of service to women&rsquo;s basketball in 1992, inducted into the Women&rsquo;s Basketball Hall of Fame in 1999, and honored with the Naismith Award for Outstanding Contribution to the game of women&rsquo;s basketball in 2000.
International Committee Finalist:
MICHELE TIMMS&nbsp;[Player]&nbsp;&ndash;&nbsp;A trailblazer in Australian women&rsquo;s basketball, Timms became well-known as one of the best point guards in the world, representing the Australian national team throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Timms won a pair of Olympic medals with the Opals, winning bronze in 1996 and silver in 2000, and was the first Australian, male or female, to play professional basketball internationally when she suited up for Lotus M&uuml;nchen in Germany. In addition, Timms spent five seasons with the Phoenix Mercury, guiding the team to a berth in the 1998 WNBA Finals and earning an All-Star selection in 1999. The Sport Australia Hall of Fame inducted her in 2003, the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame in 2008, and the FIBA Hall of Fame in 2016. The Mercury retired her No. 7 jersey in 2002.
Contributor Committee Finalists:
DOUG COLLINS&nbsp;[Coach/broadcaster]&nbsp;&ndash;&nbsp;Collins' versatile career in basketball is marked by significant achievements in roles ranging from player to coach to broadcaster, underscoring his wide-ranging impact on the sport. Following an NBA career where he was a four-time All-Star with the Philadelphia 76ers, he transitioned into coaching and accumulated over 400 wins with the Chicago Bulls (1986-89), Detroit Pistons (1995-98), Washington Wizards (2001-03) and 76ers (2010-13). Collins, who coached Hall of Famer Michael Jordan in both Chicago and Washington,&nbsp;also served as an analyst for various NBA-related broadcasts for CBS, NBC, TNT, TBS, and ABC/ESPN, along with working for NBC at the 2008 and 2012 Summer Olympics.
HERB SIMON&nbsp;[Owner] &ndash; Simon, the longest-tenured governor in the history of the NBA, purchased the Indiana Pacers, along with his late brother Mel, back in 1983. Under Simon&rsquo;s stewardship, the Pacers won numerous Central Division titles and made the franchise&rsquo;s first NBA Finals in 2000. Throughout his ownership period, the Pacers have been home to legendary players like Jermaine O&rsquo;Neal, Rik Smits, and Reggie Miller (Class of 2012). Beyond ownership, Simon's influence extends deeply into the heart of the Pacers&rsquo; organization, shaping its identity and impact both on and off the court through his philanthropic endeavors and civic engagement.
JERRY WEST&nbsp;[Executive] &ndash; Enshrined as a player in 1980, West then went on to establish himself off the court as one of the most successful executives in the sport&rsquo;s history. West played a pivotal role as the architect of a pair of Los Angeles Lakers&rsquo; dynasties during the 1980s and 2000s, drafting key players like Magic Johnson and James Worthy, acquiring Kobe Bryant, signing free agent Shaquille O'Neal, and hiring head coach Phil Jackson. He totaled eight NBA championships in Los Angeles (1980, &lsquo;82, &lsquo;85, &lsquo;87-88, 2000-02) and was named Executive of the Year twice (1995, 2004). Following his time in the Lakers&rsquo; front office (1979-2000), West served as GM of the Memphis Grizzlies from 2002-07 before earning two additional NBA championships as an executive with the Golden State Warriors (2015, &lsquo;17).

The Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame announced the 14 finalists for the class of 2024 including Vince Carter and Chauncey Billups.

Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame announces 14 finalists in class of 2024

With the NBA&rsquo;s 2023 free-agency period pretty much wrapped up, why not take a look at how projecting next year's free-agent market? Obviously, a lot can change between now and then, but let&rsquo;s examine each team&rsquo;s cap situation and how much cap room they project to have next summer.&nbsp;
Next year&rsquo;s free-agency class could feature some big names, including Kawhi Leonard, Pascal Siakam, Tyrese Maxey (restricted), Paul George, LeBron James, James Harden, Jrue Holiday, OG Anunoby and DeMar DeRozan.&nbsp;
For the purposes of this exercise, I&rsquo;m going to separate teams into four spending-power tiers: Cap Space Teams, Non-Tax MLE Teams, Luxury Tax Teams and Second Apron Teams. Also, let's assume that the salary cap will be set at $149,623,000 and the luxury tax will come in at $181,823,000, the maximum 10% jump from this upcoming season set under the new CBA.
CAP SPACE TEAMS
Teams in this tier are currently projected to have cap space next summer. They have spending access to their cap space, Bird Rights, the Room Exception (projected at $8,495,000) and the Veteran Minimum Exception.
San Antonio Spurs ($77,195,776 under the cap) If Victor Wembanyama is 70% as good as he&rsquo;s hyped up to be entering this season, one would figure that the Spurs will spend big or at least make a meaningful impact on the free-agent market next summer. They project to have an enormous amount of cap space, so it&rsquo;s very possible we&rsquo;ll see San Antonio take on some more bad contracts in trades to give them even more draft capital. Also, they&rsquo;ll want to retain Devin Vassell, who will be a restricted free agent next offseason once the Spurs extend his qualifying offer.
Philadelphia 76ers ($73,034,842 under the cap) The Sixers are perhaps the most interesting team in terms of their 2024 offseason outlook. By letting Tyrese Maxey hit restricted free agency next summer rather than extending him this year, Philadelphia gave themselves serious cap flexibility. Tobias Harris and James Harden both have expiring contracts, so the Sixers will have to use their cap space to replace their production. A Harden trade would obviously change their projected cap room, but it remains to be seen what they&rsquo;ll get back for the former MVP and how much it&rsquo;ll impact their books.
Toronto Raptors ($60,339,034 under the cap) After losing Fred VanVleet, the Raptors are walking a tightrope when it comes to whether they&rsquo;ll compete or rebuild. They face some tough decisions. Pascal Siakam and OG Anunoby are both set to hit free agency next summer, so Toronto needs to decide whether they want to extend or trade their best players. Not to mention, Precious Achiuwa and Gary Trent Jr. also need new contracts.
Orlando Magic ($58,010,944 under the cap) Orlando has a lot of options for next summer, but the Magic may start with retaining many of their own players. Franz Wagner will likely receive a big contract extension, while Markelle Fultz and Cole Anthony will be up for new contracts. Given that Orlando has a logjam in their backcourt &ndash; with Fultz, Anthony, Jalen Suggs and Anthony Black &ndash; it&rsquo;ll be interesting to see what they do with Fultz and Anthony. The Magic will still have plenty of room to add quality talent for yearly average values over the NTMLE.
Detroit Pistons ($57,781,166 under the cap) Detroit may approach the 2024 offseason similar to how Houston approached this summer, as a young team hoping to use its massive cap space on good veterans in order to take bigger steps toward playoff contention. With that said, the first priority for the team will be agreeing to a contract extension with Cade Cunningham.
Utah Jazz ($50,315,319 under the cap) The Jazz find themselves in a unique position where they could go in two directions. After committing a three-year deal to Jordan Clarkson, they can use their cap space to give 2023 Most Improved Player Lauri Markkanen a contract extension. If they want to have significant cap space for next summer instead, they can hold off on giving Markkanen an extension until free agency is settled.
Washington Wizards ($47,123,801 under the cap) Despite their cap space next year, don&rsquo;t expect Washington to be a big player in 2024 free agency. In the beginning stages of a rebuild, the Wizards will probably keep their sights on collecting more draft capital. They do have an interesting decision coming up with recent trade acquisition Tyus Jones, whom they&rsquo;ll likely want to keep long-term.&nbsp;
Charlotte Hornets ($41,300,515 under the cap)&nbsp; They may lose some 2024 cap space if they eventually re-sign PJ Washington this offseason, but watch out for Charlotte to be one of the many small-market teams with money to spend next summer. With LaMelo Ball in the first year of his max contract extension, Charlotte may cash in on a marquee player to keep their young star happy.
Brooklyn Nets ($33,048,185 under the cap) The Nets do have the potential to have significant cap space next summer if they choose not to re-sign most of their own free agents. However, the Nets will more than likely focus on exploring the trade market and retaining big man Nic Claxton before reaching next year&rsquo;s free agency. Spencer Dinwiddie and Royce O&rsquo;Neale will also hit free agency next offseason.
Indiana Pacers ($20,488,005 under the cap) Indiana could get to an even higher number in cap space if they decline Bruce Brown&rsquo;s $23 million team option next season. If Brown has a good year, the Pacers would likely keep him on a long-term deal that would consume a good chunk of their space. Other impending free agents they might like to keep include Obi Toppin, Aaron Nesmith and Jalen Smith.
Oklahoma City Thunder ($10,264,814 under the cap) The Thunder will likely continue to utilize the strategy of taking on short-term, bad-money contracts in exchange for draft capital. As they inch closer to contention, they will be looking at some big-money extensions for many of their young pieces, including one for Josh Giddey next year.&nbsp;
NON-TAX MLE TEAMS
Teams in this tier are currently projected to be over the salary cap but under the luxury tax. They have spending access to Bird Rights, the Non-Taxpayer Mid-Level Exception (projected at $13,644,000), the Bi-Annual Exception (projected at $4,968,000) unless used in 2023-24, and the Veteran Minimum Exception.
Chicago Bulls ($19,465,689 under the cap) The Bulls could potentially operate as a cap-space team if they elect to let DeMar DeRozan and Patrick Williams walk in free agency, but that seems unlikely. In addition, the Bulls could potentially create more space if Lonzo Ball&rsquo;s knee injury is considered career-ending by an NBA/NBPA-appointed physician. (Ball would still be paid, it just wouldn&rsquo;t count against the cap).&nbsp;
Sacramento Kings ($210,669 under the cap) The Kings used up most of their cap space by signing Domantas Sabonis to a big four-year extension that ties him with the team through 2028. As long as they are competitive, they will likely pursue quality pieces with their Non-Tax MLE to support Sabonis and De&rsquo;Aaron Fox. They will also likely try to keep Malik Monk and look at extension options for Davion Mitchell.
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New Orleans Pelicans ($487,911 over the cap) The Pelicans are fairly set with their core of CJ McCollum, Zion Williamson and Brandon Ingram under contract through 2025. Ingram and McCollum are both extension-eligible this offseason, but the Pelicans may wait on dishing out extensions to maintain flexibility under the tax. New Orleans must also monitor Jonas Valanciunas&rsquo; free agency and a possible extension for Trey Murphy III.&nbsp;
Atlanta Hawks ($1,658,172 over the cap) Similar to the Kings, the Hawks wiped away their cap space when they signed Dejounte Murray and De&rsquo;Andre Hunter to four-year, $120 million and four-year, $90 million extensions, respectively. Already pushing past the salary cap, the Hawks may face a money crunch as they broach the luxury tax line. Retaining restricted free agents Onyeka Okongwu and Saddiq Bey next offseason may be tricky.
Los Angeles Clippers ($5,018,261 over the cap) The Clippers are in an interesting spot with George and Leonard both needing new deals, which they will likely get despite their inability to stay on the floor. Many veterans with big salaries will come off the books next year, like Marcus Morris, Nic Batum and Robert Covington. The question is whether the Clippers will continue to commit significant capital to a roster that hasn&rsquo;t met its lofty expectations.
Miami Heat ($7,751,630 over the cap) The Miami Heat are in a holding pattern with their roster as they engage in a Mexican standoff with the Blazers on a Damian Lillard trade, which could see them skyrocket into the deep tax. Outside of the Dame situation, Jimmy Butler will likely look for another big extension this offseason, which will pay him max money deep into his late 30s. They will also have to contend with potentially losing Caleb Martin, who has a player option for 2024-25.
Houston Rockets ($8,734,919 over the cap) The biggest spenders of this past offseason, the Rockets made big moves for Fred VanVleet and Dillon Brooks. Houston could get back into the cap-space tier again if they choose to part ways with Kevin Porter Jr. and his non-guaranteed $15.9 million salary. Jalen Green and Alperen Sengun will also be up for extensions.&nbsp;
Cleveland Cavaliers ($11,399,749 over the cap) The Cavs are pretty set going into the 2023-24 season and beyond with two max guys (Darius Garland and Donovan Mitchell) and key guys on fairly big deals (Jarrett Allen, Caris LeVert and Max Strus). They will likely give Evan Mobley a big extension next offseason, which could push them into the luxury tax in the near future. For next offseason, their only notable free agent is Isaac Okoro.
New York Knicks ($11,400,861 over the cap) This morning, the Knicks inked Josh Hart to a four-year contract extension that pushed them over the cap for 2024-25. Their main concerns for next summer are Immanuel Quickley and Isaiah Hartenstein, who are both up for new contracts. They will likely be able to avoid the tax by declining their team option on Evan Fournier or trading his expiring contract for another expiring deal.
Dallas Mavericks ($13,566,153 over the cap) The Mavericks are not likely to seek pathways to cap space next summer after doubling down on their trade for Kyrie Irving by re-signing him to a three-year, $120 million deal. They should look to retain Josh Green, who will be a restricted free agent. Luka Doncic&rsquo;s happiness looms over all of the Mavs&rsquo; moves, as ESPN&rsquo;s Tim McMahon <a href="https://www.basketballnews.com/stories/mavs-fear-luka-doncic-may-request-trade-unless-they-build-contender">reported in April</a> that the Mavericks are worried about Doncic potentially seeking a trade elsewhere as soon as next year.
Los Angeles Lakers ($15,380,636 over the cap) The Lakers had a pathway to almost two max slots in the unlikely scenario that they decided to pivot from the LeBron-AD era. However, that option is out the window with them inking Davis to a three-year supermax extension that will keep him with the team through 2028. LeBron James&rsquo; decision to stay with the team or leave will ultimately dictate how the Lakers approach spending next offseason.
Portland Trail Blazers ($20,567,876 over the cap) Portland is in the midst of turning the page to a new era as they look to accommodate franchise cornerstone Damian Lillard&rsquo;s trade request. If they do end up trading Lillard, expect their cap numbers to come down slightly, but not enough to get any meaningful space. Whether Lillard is traded for the Miami package or something else, Portland shouldn&rsquo;t be a major player in free agency for a while.&nbsp;
LUXURY TAX TEAMS
Teams in this tier are currently projected to be over the salary cap and luxury tax. They have spending access to Bird Rights, the Taxpayer Mid-Level Exception (projected at $5,500,000), and the Veteran Minimum Exception.
Minnesota Timberwolves ($14,474,085 under the tax) The Timberwolves have paid the luxury tax only once since 2007. They should be a tax team once again, with Karl-Anthony Towns' supermax extension and Anthony Edwards' max extension kicking in. In addition, Minnesota will need to use significant capital to keep players like Jaden McDaniels, Mike Conley and Kyle Anderson, all of whom will be free agents in 2024.
Golden State Warriors ($9,696,462 under the tax) While the Warriors are currently under the tax, they are likely going to re-sign 2024 free agent Klay Thompson to a long-term deal at a lower number or at least use his Bird Rights to acquire another piece at a similar number. Golden State can cut some costs by releasing Chris Paul after the season, as his $30 million salary for 2024-25 is non-guaranteed.
Milwaukee Bucks ($6,142,529 under the tax) The Bucks re-signed Khris Middleton and Brook Lopez to big-money deals, committing to the players who won them the 2021 title. Another one of those players, Jrue Holiday, is set to reach free agency and will likely demand max money. In addition, Giannis Antetokounmpo becomes eligible for a supermax extension of up to three years in October and can sign a four-year supermax extension next offseason.
Denver Nuggets ($6,732,627 over the tax) The defending champs have their core of Nikola Jokic, Jamal Murray, Michael Porter Jr. and Aaron Gordon locked in through the 2025 offseason. They&rsquo;ve already lost Bruce Brown and Jeff Green this summer and will be forced to work around the edges with Kentavious Caldwell-Pope potentially heading for free agency next summer.
Boston Celtics ($7,306,800 over the tax) The trade for Kristaps Porzingis pushed the Celtics into the luxury tax for the first time since 2018, and that was before they signed Jaylen Brown to a five-year supermax extension. With Jayson Tatum&rsquo;s own supermax extension on the horizon next year, the Celtics figure to be a tax team, and potentially a second apron team, for the foreseeable future.
SECOND APRON TEAMS
Teams in this tier are currently projected to be over the salary cap, luxury tax and second luxury tax apron ($17.5 million over the tax). They have spending access to just Bird Rights and the Veteran Minimum Exception. The second apron was introduced in the new CBA and prevents teams from using the Taxpayer MLE, trading first-round picks seven years away, signing buyout free agents and taking back more salary than they send out in trades among other restrictions.
Memphis Grizzlies ($13,829,477 over the tax) For the first time under owner Robert Pera, the Grizzlies will be paying the luxury tax. While Memphis probably won&rsquo;t reach the second apron, they are not likely to have enough spare capital to use their Tax MLE and be able to fill out their roster without going over it. Their core of Ja Morant, Desmond Bane and Jaren Jackson Jr. are locked up to big money, long-term deals that will keep Memphis among the league's biggest spenders for likely the next decade-plus.
Phoenix Suns ($27,039,607 over the tax) Phoenix is by far the most limited team when it comes to spending, and they will be for the next few seasons after trading for Bradley Beal&rsquo;s behemoth contract. With four max contracts, including two supermax contracts, the Suns have blown through the second apron. Like this past offseason, the supporting cast around their core four will be mostly minimum-salary contracts.

How much cap room is your favorite NBA team projected to have next summer? Blake Stern breaks down where all 30 teams stand.

Which NBA teams project to have the most cap space in 2024?

Brendan Malone, whose coaching career spanned six decades, is the recipient of the 2023 Tex Winter Assistant Coach Lifetime Impact award, the National Basketball Coaches Association announced today.
&ldquo;Brendan Malone has been a name synonymous with NBA success for many decades,&rdquo; said Rick Carlisle, Indiana Pacers head coach and NBCA president. &ldquo;He's helped develop players and young coaches, and been a multiple NBA champion on Chuck Daly's Detroit coaching staff in 1989 and 1990. Congrats to Coach Malone on this prestigious recognition.&rdquo;&nbsp;
&ldquo;I want to thank the National Basketball Coaches Association for this award,&rdquo; Malone said. &ldquo;Tex Winter was a man I got to know and respect. I also want to thank all of the head coaches that I enjoyed working with during my 29-year career in the NBA, in particular Hubie Brown who brought me into the league; Chuck Daly and our two championships; the Van Gundys, Stan and Jeff, and Don Chaney. Lastly, I want to thank my wife Maureen and our six children for sharing my journey.&rdquo;
Wetting his whistle with a few years of coaching CYO basketball, Malone began his coaching career in 1967 at the legendary Power Memorial Academy in New York City where he won three city championships and three Coach of the Year awards.
He then moved to the college ranks in 1976 as an assistant coach at Fordham, then Yale, and then Syracuse. At Syracuse, the Orange went to the NCAA Tournament four times. Malone was a Syracuse assistant for the first five years of the Big East. He left Syracuse to become head coach at the University of Rhode Island (URI) in 1984.
While at URI in 1986, Hubie Brown recruited Malone to join him as an assistant for the New York Knicks, the beginning of his 29-year NBA career. Malone had three different tours with the Knicks, the most notable of which was the four years with head coach Jeff Van Gundy. From 1996 to 2000, the Knicks went 177-119 with two Eastern Conference Finals appearances, as well as a trip to the 1999 NBA Finals.
Malone was an assistant coach for Stan Van Gundy for five years (2007 to 2012) in Orlando. The Magic won 50-plus games four straight years, went to the Eastern Conference Finals twice, and to the 2009 NBA Finals.
Malone was also an assistant coach for Bob Hill and Rick Pitino in New York, Don Chaney in both Detroit and New York, Isiah Thomas in Indiana, Paul Silas in Cleveland and Stan Van Gundy in Detroit. He was also a scout for the Detroit Pistons.&nbsp;
But it was in Detroit with Chuck Daly that Malone made his name, orchestrating the Jordan Rules defense that helped propel the Pistons to back-to-back NBA championships in 1989 and 1990.
Malone was the first head coach of the Toronto Raptors in 1995-96 and also served as head coach of the Cleveland Cavaliers for 18 games in 2004-05.
In 27 seasons of NBA coaching, teams that Malone coached went to the playoffs 20 times, to the Conference Finals seven times, and to the NBA Finals four times, winning the title twice. His teams compiled a 1165-1001 record (.538).
Brendan and his son, Michael, who is the head coach of the 2023 NBA champion Denver Nuggets, are the only father-son coaching duo to have both won an NBA championship.
&ldquo;I want to thank the NBCA Selection Committee for acknowledging my father&rsquo;s impact and career in the NBA,&rdquo; Michael Malone said. &ldquo;His work ethic, his love of the game, and his passion for teaching were the foundation of my coaching career. This is a well-deserved honor and I feel very fortunate to be a part of this celebration.&rdquo;
Brendan Malone was enshrined in the New York Catholic High School Athletic Association Hall of Fame in 1993. In 1997, he was inducted into the Basketball Old-Timers of America Hall of Fame (which recognizes and honors individuals who have made outstanding contributions to New York City basketball). He is a 2017 enshrinee in the Power Memorial Academy Hall of Fame.&nbsp;
&ldquo;Assistant coaches generally operate behind the scenes and almost never receive enough public recognition for their team&rsquo;s success. However, any head coach will tell you that they are an indispensable part of the team equation,&rdquo; said David Fogel, NBCA Executive Director and General Counsel. &ldquo;Coach Malone&rsquo;s contributions to the accomplishments of his teams are well known inside the NBA and his contributions to the game continue through his son Michael&rsquo;s tremendous success. Congratulations to Brendan on this well-deserved honor.&rdquo;
The NBCA Tex Winter Lifetime Impact Award honors the tremendous achievements and commitment of Hall-of-Famer Tex Winter, who set a standard of innovation, integrity, competitive excellence, loyalty, and tireless promotion of NBA basketball throughout the course of his outstanding NBA coaching career.
The award is selected annually by the NBCA Selection Committee, comprised of some of the most respected coaches and executives in the game, including Rick Adelman, Hubie Brown, Doug Collins, Wayne Embry, Danny Ferry, Mike Fratello, George Karl, Doc Rivers, Rod Thorn and Lenny Wilkens.
This year&rsquo;s nominees included assistant coaches Bob Beyer, Dan Burke, Jeff Bzdelik, Gordon Chiesa, Carroll Dawson, Hank Egan, Jim Eyen, Brian Hill, Jim Lynam, Bob McAdoo, Brendan Suhr and Bob Weiss.
Prior recipients of this award are Ron Adams (2022), Dick Helm (2021), Bill Bertka (2019), Tim Grgurich (2018), Ron Rothstein (2017) and Phil Johnson (2016).

Brendan Malone is the recipient of the 2023 Tex Winter Assistant Coach Lifetime Impact award, the NBCA announced today.

Brendan Malone given Tex Winter Assistant Coach Lifetime Impact award

DENVER (AP) &mdash; All those smooth-looking, long-range jumpers Michael Porter Jr. hits have definitely been a reward for Denver.
Easy to forget just how much of a risk he was early on for the Nuggets.
They rolled the dice at No. 14 in the 2018 draft on a 6-foot-10 forward with a balky back to go with a tremendous set of skills. He&rsquo;s gone through three back procedures since college and missed basically two of his five NBA seasons, but still showed enough flashes of talent to earn a max extension.
Without taking that gamble on Porter, the&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/nba-finals-nuggets-jokic-murray-malone-18329e13dfecae50834ebc06d409027c">Nuggets might not be</a>&nbsp;here, starting their first NBA Finals on Thursday night with a 104-93 win over Miami. He&rsquo;s become their X factor &mdash; the third part of a hard-to-contain trio that also includes Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray. Porter had 14 points and 12 rebounds against the Heat.
&ldquo;It&rsquo;s just cool looking back on the journey,&rdquo;&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://twitter.com/pgraham34/status/1663249469264240640" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">said Porter, who</a>&nbsp;turns 25 on June 29. &ldquo;You try not to spend too much time looking back right now, just stay focused on getting this ring. But you&rsquo;ve got to take moments to just look back.&rdquo;
Rewind a few years: Porter was a senior at Nathan Hale High School in Seattle and learning from a coach who wasn&rsquo;t just a coach. This was former NBA All-Star guard Brandon Roy &mdash; someone who had been in the league and done the things Porter was hoping to do.
&ldquo;He really helped me take my game to the next level,&rdquo; Porter said.
A top recruit, he chose Missouri. It was home, with Porter growing up in Columbia. His brother, Jontay, joined him at Missouri. His dad&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://mutigers.com/sports/mens-basketball/roster/coaches/michael-porter-sr-/927" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">was added to the staff</a>&nbsp;after coaching at the University of Washington.
But his time with the Tigers was cut short by his ailing back. Two minutes into his inaugural college game, he went out. He later underwent microdiscectomy&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://mutigers.com/news/2017/11/21/mens-basketball-statements-michael-porter-jr.aspx" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">surgery to fix herniated discs</a>&nbsp;but made it back for the SEC Tournament &mdash; a loss to Georgia &mdash; and then the NCAA Tournament, where the Tigers fell to Florida State.
Despite his back issues, the Nuggets selected him in a draft that included Deandre Ayton (No. 1), Luka Doncic (No. 3) and Trae Young (No. 5).
Porter missed his first season in Denver after undergoing another back procedure. The following year, he showed what he could do in the 2020 NBA bubble when the Nuggets made it to the Western Conference finals before losing to the Los Angeles Lakers. In 2020-21, he averaged 19 points in the regular season over 61 games.
Last season, though, brought another road block for Porter and his back. After nine games, he was shut down for a third surgery.
On the sideline with him was Murray, who was coming back from a torn ACL. Watching Porter work in rehab made Murray appreciate the accomplishments of Porter in these playoffs all the more.
Porter is averaging 14.6 points and 8.3 rebounds through the playoffs, while also holding his own on the defensive end of the floor. He had two blocked shots against Miami.
&ldquo;He&rsquo;s done amazing,&rdquo; Murray said. &ldquo;Just playing a more complete game throughout the game.&rdquo;
Porter also has been dealing with serious family matters.
Earlier this year, younger brother Coban, a&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://denverpioneers.com/sports/mens-basketball/roster/coban-porter/3562" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">basketball player at the University of Denver,</a>&nbsp;was charged with&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/denver-nuggets-sports-crime-coban-porter-michael-jr-ebfaffc1725e926851ff20c794b928fa">felony counts of vehicular homicide and vehicular</a>&nbsp;assault stemming from a suspected drunken-driving crash that killed a 42-year-old woman. Coban Porter has a status conference and a preliminary hearing scheduled for Tuesday in Denver. Game 3 is Wednesday in Miami.
Anytime Porter needs advice or feedback on his game, he rings up his mentor Roy.
&ldquo;He definitely means the world to me,&rdquo; said Porter, who signed a five-year deal in 2021 worth up to&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/nba-sports-basketball-denver-denver-nuggets-609d666320914d3c84632879628e8e2c">$207 million</a>. &ldquo;He was my coach in high school, so he sees kind of how my game has evolved since my injuries and things.&rdquo;
Nuggets coach Michael Malone has seen Porter&rsquo;s unabashed confidence steadily returning.
&ldquo;When you&rsquo;re not healthy and you can&rsquo;t move and do the things that you&rsquo;re accustomed to doing, that really makes it hard to go out there and be confident in your game and what you&rsquo;re able to do,&rdquo; Malone said. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s in a very good place right now.&rdquo;
And now, Porter loathes being taken out of games. He&rsquo;s known to shoot assistant coach Ryan Saunders a mean stare when a sub replaces him.
&ldquo;Like, &lsquo;I can&rsquo;t believe you&rsquo;re taking me out,&rsquo;&rdquo; Malone recounted. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s closed a lot of games for us lately because he&rsquo;s 6-10, he&rsquo;s defending well and he&rsquo;s rebounding at a high level. He&rsquo;s confident, he&rsquo;s aggressive and he&rsquo;s had a huge impact on this team.&rdquo;
Porter keeps a gratefulness journal. Just little reminders he&rsquo;s taken to heart: Stay hungry. Keep working. Never let up. Reflect.
&ldquo;To get back here and be competitive in a playoff series, man, it&rsquo;s a great feeling,&rdquo; Porter said. &ldquo;Especially considering everything I&rsquo;ve been through.&rdquo;

Michael Porter Jr. has been incredible for Denver. It's easy to forget just how much of a risk he was early on for the Nuggets.

Once a risky pick, Michael Porter Jr. turns in big rewards for Nuggets

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) &mdash; Wayne &ldquo;Big Daddy&rdquo; Sims, who played in four NCAA Tournaments with LSU from 1987-1991, died Wednesday at age 54.
LSU&rsquo;s athletic department confirmed Sims&rsquo; death. No cause of death was immediately disclosed. Sims&rsquo; coach at LSU was Dale Brown, and his teammates included Shaquille O&rsquo;Neal, Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf and Vernel Singleton. During Sims&rsquo; senior season, LSU won the Southeastern Conference championship. &ldquo;He brought the best out in players, and everyone liked him,&rdquo; Brown said. &ldquo;He was a team player &mdash; didn&rsquo;t get the credit maybe he deserved for the great run they had, but he was a wonderful person.
&ldquo;He was never a flashy guy that needed stardom, but he was the base to our team.&rdquo;
Wayne&rsquo;s son Wayde, also played for two seasons for the Tigers before he was fatally shot during an off-campus altercation on the eve of LSU&rsquo;s first scheduled practice before the 2018-19 season.
Following their son&rsquo;s death, Wayne Sims and his wife, Fay, set up the Baton Rouge-based Wayde Sims Foundation.
&ldquo;He and Fay worked tirelessly to keep Wayde&rsquo;s memory alive,&rdquo; said McNeese State coach Will Wade, who was Wayde Sims&rsquo; coach at LSU. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll never forget Wayne and Fay saying that God will find a way to save lives through Wayde&rsquo;s death.&rdquo;
Wayne Sims, listed at 6-foot-7, 247 pounds during his playing days, appeared in 117 games for LSU, starting 74, and scoring 1,107 career points and grabbing 603 rebounds. He is one of 21 LSU players to reach 1,000 career points and 500 rebounds, and one of nine players in program history to appear in four NCAA Tournaments.
Sims scored 24 points in one of LSU&rsquo;s most memorable upset victories, an 82-80 triumph over No. 2 Georgetown on Jan. 28, 1989 &mdash; a game played in the Superdome in New Orleans in front of a crowd of 54,321.
Sims grew up in Deridder, Louisiana, and was a two-time All-State selection at Deridder High School, where he averaged 21.9 points and nine rebounds as a senior.
Funeral arrangements are pending.

Wayne “Big Daddy” Sims, who played in four NCAA Tournaments with LSU from 1987-1991, died Wednesday at age 54.

Former LSU basketball player Wayne Sims dead at 54

Louisville&rsquo;s Hailey Van Lith has entered the transfer portal.
The star guard, who finished 12th all-time in scoring at the school with 1,553 points, will graduate in May, earning her degree in finance in three years. She has two years of eligibility left because of the COVID year.
&ldquo;We thank Hailey for her contributions to this program, this school and this community,&rdquo; Louisville coach Jeff Walz said Saturday. &ldquo;She has done everything we have asked of her over the past three years, and we wish her the very best in her final collegiate season and beyond.&rdquo;
Van Lith&rsquo;s final game was close to her home in Washington, where the Cardinals lost to Iowa in the Elite Eight. Van Lith scored 27 points in that 97-83 loss. She averaged 19.7 points, 4.5 rebounds and 3.2 assists per game this season.
&ldquo;It&rsquo;s been an honor over the last three years to have had the opportunity to pour my passion and heart into Louisville,&rdquo; Van Lith wrote on Instagram. &ldquo;This city has impacted my life in so many ways and helped shape me into the person I am today. The Louisville community has given to me selflessly. I will never forget your unwavering support.&rdquo;
Louisville picked up transfer guard Jayda Curry from Cal earlier this week. Aneesah Morrow of DePaul, who was a second-team All-American, announced her plans to transfer on social media. She averaged 25.7 points and 12.2 rebounds this season.
Van Lith, Morrow and Curry are three of the big names that have entered the portal this year. There are just under 1,000 Division I women&rsquo;s basketball players in the portal as of Saturday morning, a person familiar with the situation told The Associated Press. The person spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity because many of the players haven&rsquo;t publicly announced their decisions to transfer.
Stanford&rsquo;s Lauren Betts, who was the consensus No. 1 high school recruit last year, is one of those players in the portal who hasn&rsquo;t publicly announced her decision to transfer. The 6-foot-7 center played in 33 of the Cardinal&rsquo;s 35 games this season, averaging 5.9 points and 3.5 rebounds in just under 10 minutes a game.
Transfers had a big impact on the NCAA Tournament that was won by LSU last Sunday. Angel Reese, who was named the Final Four Most Outstanding Player, transferred to the Tigers from Maryland and Alexis Morris came to LSU in 2021 after spending time at Baylor, Rutgers and Texas A&amp;M.

Lith finished 12th all-time in scoring at Louisville with 1,553 points and has two years of eligibility left due to the COVID year.

Louisville guard Hailey Van Lith enters transfer portal

AUBURN, Ala. (AP) &mdash; High-scoring transfer guard Denver Jones has landed at Auburn.
Auburn announced the signing Sunday of the former Florida International shooting guard. Jones averaged 20 points and 3.8 rebounds as a sophomore last season.
The 6-foot-4, 190-pounder was rated the No. 26 overall transfer in the country by 247Sports. He shot 35.7% from 3-point range, 86.4% from the free throw line and 43.4% from the field. as a sophomore.
Jones is originally from New Market, Alabama. He started 27 games last season after transferring from Garden City Community College in Kansas. Jones averaged 19.1 points in a season at Garden City.

Jones averaged 20.0 points and 3.8 rebounds for the Panthers as a sophomore last season.

Auburn lands high-scoring transfer Denver Jones from FIU

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) &mdash; LSU star forward Angel Reese sat in the back of an orange convertible Corvette, waving to thousands of fans lining the roadside &mdash; and also waving her hand in front of her face from time to time, repeating a gesture that caused a stir at the end of the national championship game.
The Tigers paraded across campus and into the Pete Maravich Assembly Center on Wednesday night for ceremonies to honor their first NCAA women&rsquo;s national championship, captured Sunday with a 102-85 victory over Iowa in Dallas.
&ldquo;I&rsquo;m trying not to cry,&rdquo; said coach Kim Mulkey, a Louisiana native who left behind the three-time national champion powerhouse she&rsquo;d built at Baylor two years ago to take over at LSU.
&ldquo;This is my home,&rdquo; she said, noting that her mother was in the arena.
Reese was not among the players who spoke at the event. But she has been outspoken on several topics this week.
She was unapologetic when questioned about waving her hand in front of her face while staring down Caitlin Clark during the game. Clark, The Associated Press Player of the Year, made a similar gesture to no one in particular during Iowa&rsquo;s victory over Louisville in the Elite Eight.
Reese also has said she would not accept an apology from First Lady Jill Biden for suggesting that both LSU and runner-up Iowa be invited to the White House. President Joe Biden did not follow through on that idea, inviting only LSU and men&rsquo;s national champion Connecticut.
LSU star guard Alexis Morris, an outgoing senior who aspires to play in the WNBA, was among the players who addressed the crowd inside the arena.
&ldquo;LSU, thank you. I appreciate your love, your unwavering support and for believing in us,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;I just want you all to know I love you with all my heart.&rdquo;
Mulkey, who won a national title as a player for Louisiana Tech, said it was her goal to win a national title with the flagship university of her home state. But she said she never put a timetable on that.
Holding up a page of notes from a preseason meeting with her players, Mulkey said, &ldquo;Nowhere on here does it say, &lsquo;Win a national championship.&rsquo;&rdquo;
She said the goals she&rsquo;d written down were to win 90% of nonconference games, finish in the top four of the SEC, win one game in the SEC Tournament and remain ranked in the AP Top 25 throughout the season.
She also told the team, &ldquo;If you will play defense and if you will rebound the ball, you may surprise yourself.&rdquo;
Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards was among the speakers following the parade.
&ldquo;Louisiana always had faith in you, but more importantly, you had faith in yourself and were smart enough not to listen to all the experts who said you didn&rsquo;t have a chance,&rdquo; Edwards told LSU&rsquo;s players.
As for Mulkey, Edwards said, &ldquo;We all knew she could do it, but what she has done to elevate this program and all of women&rsquo;s sports is truly remarkable.&rdquo;
Baton Rouge Mayor Sharon Weston Broome presented Mulkey with a key to the city.

The Tigers paraded across campus to honor their first NCAA women’s national championship.

LSU’s national championship women’s team honored with parade

First lady Jill Biden&rsquo;s walk-back of her suggestion that runner-up Iowa should join NCAA women&rsquo;s basketball champion LSU for a visit to the White House didn&rsquo;t sit well with Tigers star Angel Reese.
Prompted by a discussion of Biden&rsquo;s comments during her Wednesday appearance on &ldquo;The Paper Route Podcast,&rdquo; Reese said the Tigers should celebrate their title with former President Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama rather than President Joe Biden and first lady Jill Biden.
Jill Biden, at an appearance in Denver on Monday, had praised Iowa&rsquo;s sportsmanship and congratulated both teams. She also said that as part of the longstanding tradition of having champions visit the White House, Iowa should come as well &ldquo;because they played such a good game.&rdquo;
The Tigers defeated Iowa 102-85 for the title in Dallas on Sunday.
Reese on Monday called Jill Biden&rsquo;s suggestion &ldquo;a joke.&rdquo;
Joe Biden invited LSU and men&rsquo;s champion Connecticut to the White House on Tuesday with no mention of Iowa. Vanessa Valdivia, a spokesperson for Jill Biden, said the first lady had meant no disrespect to LSU and that her comments were intended to applaud the historic game and all women athletes.
&ldquo;I&rsquo;m not gonna lie to you, I don&rsquo;t accept the apology because of, you said what you said. I said what I said. And like, you can&rsquo;t go back on certain things that you say,&rdquo; Reese told podcast hosts Brandon Marshall and Ashley Nicole Moss.&nbsp;
&ldquo;I mean, you felt like they should&rsquo;ve came because of sportsmanship, right?&rdquo; Reese added. &ldquo;They can have that spotlight. We&rsquo;ll go to the Obamas. We&rsquo;ll see Michelle. We&rsquo;ll see Barack.&rdquo;
Some social media commenters noted the racial dynamics involved, saying that only winners should be rewarded with a White House visit and that hosting both teams would detract from the achievement by LSU&rsquo;s team, which is predominantly Black. The Iowa team is largely white. Others noted the important role of Black women in Democratic Party politics.
Following LSU&rsquo;s victory, coach Kim Mulkey said she would go to the White House if invited. Reese said Wednesday she was uncertain if she would go.
Reese faced criticism on social media for waving her hand in front of Iowa star Caitlin Clark&rsquo;s face while staring down Clark during the game. Clark, The Associated Press Player of the Year, made a similar gesture to no one in particular during Iowa&rsquo;s victory over Louisville in the Elite Eight.
Reese said she didn&rsquo;t think LSU, had it lost to Iowa, would have gotten the same praise from Jill Biden as the Hawkeyes did.
&ldquo;If we were to lose, we would not be getting invited to the White House,&rdquo; she added. &ldquo;I remember she made a comment about both teams should be invited because of sportsmanship. And I&rsquo;m like, &lsquo;Are you saying that because of what I did?&rsquo; Stuff like that, it bothers me because you are a woman at the end of the day. White, Black, it doesn&rsquo;t matter, you&rsquo;re a woman, you&rsquo;re supposed to be standing behind us before anything.&rdquo;

Reese on Monday called Jill Biden’s suggestion to invite Iowa to the White House “a joke.”

LSU’s Angel Reese on White House flap: ‘We’ll go to the Obamas’

HOUSTON (AP) &mdash; UConn&rsquo;s Jordan Hawkins made this year&rsquo;s NCAA championships a family affair Monday night when he picked up a title a day after his cousin Angel Reese led LSU to the women&rsquo;s crown.
And he had a message for those who&rsquo;ve criticized Reese for waving her hand in front of her face while staring down Iowa star Caitlin Clark before pointing toward her finger where a championship ring might be while walking toward the Iowa star.
&ldquo;We&rsquo;re national champions. They&rsquo;re not,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;So, at the end of the day, they can say whatever they want.&rdquo;
Reese, who was named Most Outstanding Player, was unapologetic over her actions after social media went wild with opinions on her trash talk in the closing minutes of LSU&rsquo;s 102-85 victory Sunday.
&ldquo;All year, I was critiqued about who I was,&rdquo; Reese said Sunday. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t fit in a box that y&rsquo;all want me to be in. I&rsquo;m too hood. I&rsquo;m too ghetto. But when other people do it, y&rsquo;all say nothing. So this was for the girls that look like me, that&rsquo;s going to speak up on what they believe in. It&rsquo;s unapologetically you.&rdquo;
Hawkins raved about his cousin after scoring 16 points to help UConn claim its fifth title with a 76-59 win over San Diego State.
&ldquo;I&rsquo;m so proud of her,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;She works so hard.&rdquo;
Then he was asked who would win a friendly family game of one-on-one between the two national champions.
&ldquo;Probably me, now. I would probably win,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;But there was a time I would probably lose to her.&rdquo;

“We’re national champions. They’re not,” Hawkins said to Reese. “So, at the end of the day, they can say whatever they want.”

Cousins Jordan Hawkins, Angel Reese claim titles on consecutive days

NEW YORK (AP) &mdash; Iowa standout Caitlin Clark said there&rsquo;s no reason for LSU&rsquo;s Angel Reese to be criticized on social media for waving her hand in front of her face while staring down Clark during the women&rsquo;s NCAA championship game.
Clark, The Associated Press Player of the Year, made a similar gesture to no one in particular during Iowa&rsquo;s victory over Louisville in the Elite Eight.
&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think Angel should be criticized at all. No matter which way it goes, she should never be criticized for what she did. I&rsquo;m just one that competes &mdash; and she competed,&rdquo; Clark said Tuesday on ESPN&rsquo;s &ldquo;Outside the Lines, &rdquo; adding: &ldquo;I think everybody knew there was going to be a little bit of trash talk in the entire tournament. It&rsquo;s not just me and Angel.&rdquo;
Reese, who was named the Final Four&rsquo;s Most Outstanding Player, waved her hand in front of her face as if to say &ldquo;you can&rsquo;t see me&rdquo; while staring down Clark in the final moments of LSU&rsquo;s 102-85 win on Sunday, then pointed toward a finger as if to indicate a ring was coming.
Social media was divided on Reese&rsquo;s gesture, with some saying it was just part of the game and others saying Reese lacked grace in victory. Reese, who also made what appeared to be a &ldquo;you&rsquo;re too small&rdquo; gesture several times after scoring in a 79-72 semifinals victory over Virginia Tech, was unapologetic Sunday night.
&ldquo;All year, I was critiqued about who I was,&rdquo; said Reese, who is Black; Clark is white. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t fit in a box that y&rsquo;all want me to be in. I&rsquo;m too hood. I&rsquo;m too ghetto. But when other people do it, y&rsquo;all say nothing. So this was for the girls that look like me, that&rsquo;s going to speak up on what they believe in. It&rsquo;s unapologetically you.&rdquo;
Clark was asked on ESPN whether there was a difference in how people think women&rsquo;s players should act compared with men&rsquo;s.

Clark: “I don’t think Angel should be criticized at all. No matter which way it goes, she should never be criticized for what she did."

Iowa's Caitlin Clark: Don’t criticize LSU's Angel Reese for gesture

WASHINGTON (AP) &mdash; First lady Jill Biden said Monday that she wants the defeated Iowa women&rsquo;s basketball team to be invited to the White House in addition to the national title winner Louisiana State University. She watched LSU&rsquo;s 102-85 victory over Iowa from the stands on Sunday night.
Biden, speaking at the Colorado state capital in Denver, praised Iowa&rsquo;s sportsmanship and congratulated both teams on their performance.
&ldquo;I know we&rsquo;ll have the champions come to the White House, we always do. So, we hope LSU will come,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;But, you know, I&rsquo;m going to tell Joe I think Iowa should come, too, because they played such a good game.&rdquo;
The White House didn&rsquo;t immediately respond to a request for comment about whether President Joe Biden would also extend a White House invite to Iowa &mdash; and whether it would be a joint visit with LSU or a separate engagement.
Following LSU&rsquo;s victory, Tigers coach Kim Mulkey said she would go to the White House if the team was invited.
LSU star Angel Reese tweeted a link to a story on Jill Biden&rsquo;s remarks on Monday. &ldquo; A JOKE,&rdquo; she wrote, along with three rolling-on-floor-laughing emojis.
Reese &mdash; the Final Four&rsquo;s Most Outstanding Player &mdash; has gotten a lot of attention on social media during the past 24 hours, ever since she waved her hand in front of her face while staring down Iowa star Caitlin Clark in the final moments of LSU&rsquo;s win, then pointed toward her finger as if to say a ring was coming.&nbsp;
Clark set the record for points scored in an NCAA Tournament with 191 in six games. If she saw Reese&rsquo;s gestures, Clark didn&rsquo;t seem concerned about them.
Social media lit up in the aftermath, with some believing it was trash talk that&rsquo;s just part of the game while others condemned her for lacking grace in victory. Reese was unapologetic.
&ldquo;All year, I was critiqued about who I was,&rdquo; Reese said. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t fit in a box that y&rsquo;all want me to be in. I&rsquo;m too hood. I&rsquo;m too ghetto. But when other people do it, y&rsquo;all say nothing. So this was for the girls that look like me, that&rsquo;s going to speak up on what they believe in. It&rsquo;s unapologetically you.&rdquo;
Reese is Black while Clark is white.
Clark, the scoring sensation who was the first with consecutive 40-point games in an NCAA Tournament, made a similar face-waving gesture to no one in particular during Iowa&rsquo;s Elite Eight victory over Louisville.
Iowa did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the invitation.
In her remarks, Biden also marveled at how far women&rsquo;s sports in the U.S. have come since Title IX in 1972 gave women equal rights in sports at schools that receive federal funding.
&ldquo;It was so exciting, wasn&rsquo;t it,&rdquo; the first lady said. &ldquo;It was such a great game. I&rsquo;m old enough that I remember when we got Title IX. We fought so hard, right? We fought so hard. And look at where women&rsquo;s sports have come today.&rdquo;&nbsp;
___
AP Sports Writers David Brandt, Schuyler Dixon and Eric Olson contributed to this story.

First lady Jill Biden wants the defeated Iowa women’s basketball team to be invited to the White House in addition to champion LSU.

Jill Biden wants champions LSU — and Iowa — at White House

BRISTOL, Conn. (AP) &mdash; LSU&rsquo;s 102-85 victory over Iowa in Sunday&rsquo;s national championship game was the most-viewed NCAA women&rsquo;s basketball game on record, with 9.9 million viewers on ABC and ESPN2 according to fast national numbers by Nielsen.
The total audience is a 103% jump over last year, when South Carolina defeated UConn and averaged 4.85 million on ESPN and ESPN2. The audience on Sunday at one point peaked at 12.6 million.
LSU&rsquo;s first national title in women&rsquo;s basketball was the first on network television since UConn&rsquo;s win over Tennessee in 1995. That game averaged 7.4 million on CBS.
ESPN took over the rights to the entire tournament the following year. The previous network high for a women&rsquo;s national championship game was in 2002, when UConn beat Oklahoma.
The record ratings come as the NCAA is deciding whether to separate the women&rsquo;s tournament or keep it as part of the championships TV package that includes at least 24 sports. That contract expires next year, with the NCAA expected to decide the next steps in negotiations by the fall.

The 9.9 million viewers on ABC and ESPN2 made for a 103% jump over last year, when South Carolina defeated UConn (4.85M).

Sunday’s NCAA women’s title game draws record TV audience

DALLAS (AP) &mdash; LSU&rsquo;s Angel Reese waved her hand in front of her face while staring down Caitlin Clark, then pointed toward her finger as if to say a ring was coming while walking toward the Iowa star.
The gestures late in the Tigers&rsquo; 102-85 victory in the NCAA championship game Sunday lit up social media, with comments supporting the &ldquo;Bayou Barbie&rdquo; for trash talk that&rsquo;s just part of the game and condemning her for lacking grace in victory.
The bubbly junior from Baltimore, who transferred from Maryland to join flamboyant LSU coach Kim Mulkey, was unapologetic in the postgame news conference.
&ldquo;All year, I was critiqued about who I was,&rdquo; Reese said. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t fit in a box that y&rsquo;all want me to be in. I&rsquo;m too hood. I&rsquo;m too ghetto. But when other people do it, y&rsquo;all say nothing. So this was for the girls that look like me, that&rsquo;s going to speak up on what they believe in. It&rsquo;s unapologetically you.&rdquo;
Clark, the scoring sensation who was the first with consecutive 40-point games in an NCAA Tournament, made the face-waving gesture to no one in particular during an Elite Eight victory over Louisville.
The Associated Press Player of the Year wasn&rsquo;t shy about showing her emotions when the Hawkeyes knocked off undefeated defending national champion South Carolina in the semifinals.
If she saw Reese&rsquo;s gestures, Clark didn&rsquo;t seem concerned about them.
&ldquo;I was just trying to get to the handshake line and shake hands and be grateful that my team was in that position,&rdquo; said Clark, who scored 30 points. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s all you can do is hold your head high, be proud of what you did. All the credit in the world to LSU. They were tremendous.&rdquo;
In a 79-72 semifinal victory over Virginia Tech, Reese made what appeared to be a &ldquo;you&rsquo;re too small&rdquo; gesture several times after scoring around the basket.
The fashionable 6-foot-3 post with modeling aspirations is becoming a social media magnet. Reese wooed Lil Wayne after chastising the rapper from New Orleans for reaching out to Elite Eight opponent Miami before doing the same with the Tigers.
&ldquo;I&rsquo;m going to be me, but I can&rsquo;t do it without the girls here, and I can&rsquo;t do it without the rest of my teammates and coaches,&rdquo; said Reese, who had 15 points and 10 rebounds while three teammates scored at least 20 points.
She was named the Most Outstanding Player at the Final Four after setting an NCAA single-season record with her 34th double-double against the Hawkeyes.
&ldquo;Twitter can say what Twitter can say,&rdquo; Reese said. &ldquo;I love reading those comments. I have all the screenshots of what everybody has said about me all season. What are you going to say now?&rdquo;

"This was for the girls that look like me, that’s going to speak up on what they believe in. It’s unapologetically you,” Reese said.

LSU’s Angel Reese unapologetic over gestures to Iowa star Clark

DALLAS (AP) &mdash; This year&rsquo;s record-breaking women&rsquo;s NCAA Tournament featured breakout stars, upsets and capped off with the flamboyant Kim Mulkey leading LSU to its first basketball championship.
Mulkey&rsquo;s unforgettable outfits were just one of several memorable moments. There was Caitlin Clark&rsquo;s 40-point triple-double in the Elite Eight game, the drama of South Carolina&rsquo;s quest to complete the latest undefeated season and two No. 1 seeds being knock off before the Sweet 16.
It led to the highest attendance ever in the tournament&rsquo;s history to go along with stellar TV ratings in every round. The timing couldn&rsquo;t be better for the sport. It all could lead to women&rsquo;s basketball getting a separate TV deal when the contract expires next summer.
Here&rsquo;s a look at some of the top moments from the tournament:
FIERY FASHIONISTA
Mulkey is never hard to miss on the sideline with her feisty approach and reactions to referees and her players. The coach&rsquo;s flamboyant attire takes her presence to a different level, and her Final Four outfits certainly stood out.
For the national semifinal game, Mulkey arrived in a carnation pink top with a flower-like puffs along the entire sleeves, a designer-made top similar to what her 2-year-old granddaughter wore. Even the LSU mascot was spotted in pink attire.
The coach wore a sparkly, golden, tiger-striped outfit during the championship game. Her team were the golden girls, winning the first basketball championship in school history.
DAZZLING CLARK
Clark set an NCAA Tournament record by scoring 191 points over Iowa&rsquo;s six games, surpassing Sheryl Swoopes&rsquo; 177 points for Texas Tech in 1993 &mdash; and Glen Rice&rsquo;s 184 for Michigan in the 1989 men&rsquo;s tournament.
Before 30 points in the championship game, the 6-foot Iowa-born Clark was the first player in the women&rsquo;s tournament with back-to-back 40-point games. That included her 11th career triple-double in the regional final against Louisville, before another 41 points against previously undefeated South Carolina in the national semifinal game.
HISTORY DENIED
South Carolina was trying to become the 10th women&rsquo;s team to run through a season undefeated and the first school to win consecutive titles since UConn won four straight from 2013-16. The Gamecocks were denied that chance, losing to Iowa in the Final Four behind a stellar effort from Clark.
END OF AN ERA
UConn&rsquo;s run of 14 consecutive Final Four appearance came to an end in the Elite Eight when Ohio State forced the Huskies into 18 first-half turnovers with full-court pressure defense. The Huskies hadn&rsquo;t missed playing in the national semifinals since 2007.
NEW FORMAT
The NCAA changed its regional format this year going to two sites instead of the traditional four. It got strong reviews from players and coaches and fans alike. There ended up being a record attendance for that round with more fans showing up in Seattle &mdash; which had no team within 1,300 miles of the venue &mdash; than Greenville, South Carolina.
&rsquo;CANES WERE COOKING
Miami did more than just be part of history by knocking out No. 1 seed Indiana before the Sweet 16. The Hurricanes under coach Katie Meier ousted Villanova and ended national scoring leader Maddy Siegrist&rsquo;s career to reach the Elite Eight for the first time. The champs from LSU ended Miami&rsquo;s run with a muddy 54-42 win in the regional finals.
THIRST FOR FIRSTS
Virginia Tech was a first-time participant in the Final Four, which had a pair of first-time finalists after LSU beat the top-seeded Hokies and Clark&rsquo;s Hawkeyes ousted undefeated defending national champion South Carolina. It was already guaranteed before the final that the champion would be something other than a No. 1 seed for the first time since 2011.
UPSETTING PERFORMANCES
Stanford and Indiana both fell in the second round becoming the second pair of No. 1 seeds to not make the Sweet 16 since the tournament expanded to 64 teams in 1994. It also happened in 1998. The Cardinal were stymied on their home court by Mississippi&rsquo;s defense. They never led the second-round game and had their streak of 14 consecutive Sweet 16 appearances ended. The Hoosiers lost at Assembly Hall the next night, when Miami&rsquo;s Destiny Harden made the game-winning shot with 3.5 seconds left.
___
AP Sports Writer Stephen Hawkins and AP Basketball Writer Doug Feinberg contributed to this story.

A look at some of the top moments from the 2023 NCAA Women's Tournament.

Women’s NCAA Tournament features plethora of March Madness

DALLAS (AP) &mdash; Kim Mulkey returned home to Louisiana wanting to bring LSU its first basketball championship. The Hall of Fame coach did just that in only her second year at the school.
Her Tigers used a record offensive performance to beat Caitlin Clark and Iowa 102-85 on Sunday and win the first basketball title, men&rsquo;s or women&rsquo;s, in school history.
&ldquo;I turn around and look at the Final Four banners (in the home arena), nowhere did it say national champion,&rdquo; Mulkey said. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s what I came home to do.&rdquo;
The victory made Mulkey the first women&rsquo;s coach to win national titles at two different schools. She won three at Baylor before leaving for LSU two years ago.
&ldquo;Coaches coach a lifetime and this is the fourth time I&rsquo;ve been blessed,&rdquo; Mulkey said. &ldquo;Never in the history of LSU basketball, men or women, has (anybody) ever played for a championship.&rdquo;
The feisty and flamboyantly dressed Mulkey, who wore a sparkly, golden, tiger-striped outfit, now has the third-most national titles behind Geno Auriemma&rsquo;s 11 and Pat Summitt&rsquo;s eight. Mulkey has never lost in a championship game.
&ldquo;My tears are tears of joy,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m so happy for everybody back home in Louisiana.&rdquo;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-theme="dark">
LSU dropped 102 POINTS to win its first national title EVER 🐯🔥 <a href="https://t.co/H2ZPuGMj4p">pic.twitter.com/H2ZPuGMj4p</a>
&mdash; BasketballNews.com (@basketbllnews) <a href="https://twitter.com/basketbllnews/status/1642649936503209985?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 2, 2023</a></blockquote>

<script src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>

Clark,&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/march-madness-caitlin-clark-player-of-year-ed943aa5f1e86a1bb04505497bd4c9b3" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Associated Press national player of the year</a>, couldn&rsquo;t lead the Hawkeyes to their first national title despite one of the greatest individual performances in NCAA Tournament history. The junior finished with 30 points. She scored 40 in the semifinals to&nbsp;knock out unbeaten South Carolina&nbsp;one game after she had the&nbsp;first 40-point triple-double&nbsp;in NCAA history in the Elite Eight.
The dazzling guard set the NCAA record for points in a tournament, passing the 177 that Sheryl Swoopes scored in 1993 en route to leading Texas Tech to the title. Clark ended her tournament with 191.
The 102 points broke the previous high for a championship game, surpassing the 97 that Texas scored against Southern California in 1986.
&ldquo;So much for preaching defense and rebounding,&rdquo; Mulkey said, laughing.
Taking in the game was first lady Jill Biden, who sat in a suite above the court with tennis great Billie Jean King. Mulkey said she hadn&rsquo;t met the first lady yet but told the AP that if the team was invited to the White House, she&rsquo;d go.
Jasmine Carson scored 22 points, Alexis Morris added 21 and Angel Reese had 15 points and 10 rebounds for LSU (34-2).
&ldquo;It&rsquo;s no one-man show around here. When I go down, the next man is up,&rdquo; said Reese, who was honored as the Most Outstanding Player of the Final Four. &ldquo;Every single time, every time I go out or Alexis goes out, everybody always comes to step up.&rdquo;
Trailing by 21 points early in the third quarter, Iowa started hitting from the outside to go on a 15-2 run, hitting four 3-pointers and converting a 3-point play to get within 65-57.
The Hawkeyes (31-7) trailed 73-64 with 1:03 left in the third quarter when Clark was called for a technical foul. She swatted the ball away on the floor after a foul call against a teammate. That counted as a personal foul for her, her fourth of the game.
&ldquo;I thought they called it very, very tight,&rdquo; Clark said. &ldquo;Hit with a technical foul for throwing the ball under the basket &mdash; sometimes that&rsquo;s how things go.&rdquo;
Clark played the entire fourth quarter with four fouls but couldn&rsquo;t get the Hawkeyes much closer.
&ldquo;They really played well, they were ready to go. They did a great job. I&rsquo;m just so proud of my team,&rdquo; Iowa coach Lisa Bluder said. &ldquo;This is brutal, it&rsquo;s really tough to walk out of that locker room today and not be able to coach Monika (Czinano) and McKenna (Warnock) again. I&rsquo;m very thankful for the season we had and don&rsquo;t want to take anything away from that.&rdquo;
After Katari Poole hit a 3-pointer in front of the LSU bench, Mulkey started weeping.
&ldquo;With about 1:30 to go, I couldn&rsquo;t hold it. I got very emotional,&rdquo; Mulkey said. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s not like me, but I knew we would hold on and win this game. I don&rsquo;t what it was, but I lost it. Very emotional and tears of joy. Don&rsquo;t know if it&rsquo;s the mere fact that we&rsquo;re doing it in my second year back home or that I am back home.&rdquo;
A few seconds later after another LSU basket, Reese taunted Clark by putting her hand in front of her face with a &ldquo;you can&rsquo;t see me&rdquo; gesture and then pointed to her ring finger.
As the final seconds ticked off, Mulkey and Reese hugged, setting off a wild celebration by the Tigers.
The game was tight for the first 15 minutes before Carson got hot from the outside. She made all six of her shots in the second quarter, including four 3-pointers. After one of them, she threw her hands in the air, which Mulkey mimicked on the sidelines.
For good measure, the graduate student banked in a shot just before the halftime buzzer to give the Tigers a 59-42 lead at the break. It was the&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/ncaa-march-madness-lsu-champion-game-iowa-scoring-record-3553732a3f7c830a61337c2f22789496" target="_blank" rel="noopener">most points ever in the first half</a>&nbsp;of a championship game, breaking the record held by Tennessee since 1998.
Before Sunday, Carson had gone scoreless in five of her seven postseason games in her career. She had 11 points in this NCAA Tournament before the finale.
&ldquo;I would definitely say this is the game of my life because I won a national championship on the biggest stage possible in college,&rdquo; Carson said. &ldquo;When I woke up, I just wanted to win &mdash; do anything my team needed in this game, whether it was defense, rebounding, supporting them. I scored tonight and that&rsquo;s what pushed us and got us momentum.&rdquo;

Kim Mulkey’s LSU Tigers used a record offensive performance to beat Caitlin Clark and Iowa 102-85 in the title game on Sunday.

LSU beats Iowa 102-85 to win first national championship

DALLAS (AP) &mdash; Caitlin Clark overwhelmed the reigning champions with another sensational game, scoring 41 points to help Iowa spoil South Carolina&rsquo;s perfect season with a 77-73 victory on Friday night in the Final Four.
The spectacular junior guard set a record for the highest-scoring semifinal game and became the first women&rsquo;s player to post back-to-back 40-point games in the NCAA Tournament. She now has the Hawkeyes in a spot they&rsquo;ve never been in before &mdash; one victory away from a national championship.
They&rsquo;ll have to beat another SEC team to do that as Iowa (31-6) will face LSU in the title game on Sunday afternoon. The Tigers&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/womens-final-four-lsu-virginia-tech-march-madness-292680727b52d2e99d887b40667dbc59">beat Virginia Tech</a>&nbsp;in the other national semifinal.
It&rsquo;s the Tigers&rsquo; first appearance in the title game as well, as Kim Mulkey became the second coach to take two different teams to the championship game.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-theme="dark">
Caitlin Clark's NCAA Tournament so far: Rd. of 64: 26 PTS | 12 AST | 7 REB Rd. of 32: 22 PTS | 12 AST | 3 STL Sweet 16: 31 PTS | 8 AST | 3 REB Elite Eight: 41 PTS | 12 AST | 10 REB Final Four: 41 PTS | 8 AST | 6 REB ARE YOU SERIOUS 🤯 <a href="https://t.co/drWn36Z9nt">pic.twitter.com/drWn36Z9nt</a>
&mdash; BasketballNews.com (@basketbllnews) <a href="https://twitter.com/basketbllnews/status/1642014148169981957?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 1, 2023</a></blockquote>

<script src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>

Thanks to the spectacular play of Clark and the historic year by South Carolina, this was one of the most talked about and highly anticipated matchups in women&rsquo;s Final Four history.
The game lived up to the hype surrounding it &mdash; the best player vs. the best team &mdash; much to the delight of the sellout crowd of over 19,000 fans.
Coach Dawn Staley and South Carolina (36-1) had won 42 in a row, including last year&rsquo;s championship game.
This was Iowa&rsquo;s first appearance in the Final Four in 30 years. The last time the Hawkeyes advanced this far was 1993 and C. Vivian Stringer was the coach of that team that lost to Ohio State in overtime.
Clark wowed the crowd that included Harper Stribe, a young fan of the team who has been battling cancer. She was featured in a surprise video that informed the Hawkeyes&rsquo; star that she was the AP Player of the Year.
Trailing 59-55 entering the fourth quarter, South Carolina scored the first five points to take the lead. Clark answered right back with two deep 3-pointers and an assist to Monika Czinano to give the Hawkeyes a 67-62 lead.
South Carolina got within 69-68 on Raven Johnson&rsquo;s 3-pointer before Clark got a steal for a layup with 3:32 left. Neither team scored again until star Aliyah Boston was fouled with 1:37 left. She made the second of two free throws.
Clark then scored another layup on the other end out of a timeout to make it a four-point game. After a layup by Zia Cooke made it a two-point game with 58 seconds left, the Hawkeyes ran the clock down with McKenna Warnock grabbing a huge offensive rebound off a Clark miss with 18 seconds remaining.
Clark hit two free throws after South Carolina fouled her with 13.5 seconds left. They were her 38th and 39th point, moving her past Nneka Ogwumike for the most points scored in a Final Four semifinal game.
After a putback by Johnson with 9.9 seconds left got the Gamecocks within 75-73, Clark sealed the game with two more free throws.
As the final seconds went off the clock, Clark threw the ball high in the air and galloped around the court.
The loss ended a spectacular season for the defending champion Gamecocks, who were trying to become the 10th team to go through a season unbeaten.
Cooke led the Gamecocks with 24 points. Slowed by foul trouble, Boston had just eight points and 10 rebounds as the Hawkeyes packed the paint, daring South Carolina to shoot from the outside.
The Gamecocks finished 4-for-20 from behind the 3-point line and couldn&rsquo;t take advantage of their 49-25 advantage on the boards that included 26 offensive rebounds.

Caitlin Clark had another sensational game with 41 points to lift Iowa over South Carolina 77-73 and into the national championship game.

Caitlin Clark, Iowa end South Carolina's perfect season in Final Four

DALLAS (AP) &mdash; Kim Mulkey is back in another national championship game, this time taking the flagship university from her home state there for the first time.
It took LSU only two seasons to get there with the feisty and flamboyantly dressed coach, and a big comeback in the national semifinal game that was quite an undercard Friday night.
Alexis Morris scored 27 points&nbsp;and had two of her misses in the fourth quarter turned into putback baskets by Angel Reese in a big run as LSU rallied to beat top-seeded Virginia Tech 79-72 in the first semifinal game.
&ldquo;I&rsquo;m never satisfied. I&rsquo;m super-excited that we won, but I&rsquo;m hungry,&rdquo; said Morris, who jumped on a courtside table and fired up LSU fans after the game. &ldquo;Like, I&rsquo;m greedy. I want to win it all so I can complete the story.&rdquo;
Reese finished with 24 points and 12 rebounds for LSU (33-2), which will play in the national title game Sunday against the winner of the highly anticipated matchup between Southeastern Conference foe South Carolina or Iowa in the other semifinal.
&ldquo;It&rsquo;s like a dream. It still hasn&rsquo;t hit me that I&rsquo;m at the Final Four,&rdquo; said Reese, the transfer from Maryland who carries the nickname 'Bayou Barbie.' &ldquo;I&rsquo;m just not even believing this right now. It&rsquo;s crazy how much my life has changed in one year.&rdquo;
Mulkey &mdash; in a carnation pink top this time &mdash; won three national titles in four Final Four appearances over her 21 seasons at Baylor. She is only the second coach to take two different teams to the national championship game. The other is C. Vivian Stringer, who did it with Cheyney in the inaugural 1982 women&rsquo;s tournament and Rutgers in 2007.
&ldquo;I came home for lots of reasons,&rdquo; Mulkey said. &ldquo;One, to some day hang a championship banner in the PMAC (Pete Maravich Assembly Center). Never, ever do you think you&rsquo;re going to do something like this in two years.&rdquo;
LSU made five national semifinal games in a row from 2004-08 &mdash; the only times the Tigers had made it this far. They lost each of those years.
The Tigers had to dig deep for this one, with neither team backing down.
Trailing 59-50 after three quarters, LSU went ahead with a 15-0 run over a five-minute span. The Tigers led for the first time since late in the first half when&nbsp;Falu&rsquo;jae Johnson had a steal and drove for a layup to make it 64-62.
Reese had six points in that game-turning spurt, including a basket after Morris&rsquo; attempted 3-pointer clanked off the front rim. Reese had a second-effort follow of her own miss after rebounding another shot by Morris.
Elizabeth Kitley, the 6-foot-6 senior, had 18 points and 12 rebounds for Virginia Tech (31-5), the Atlantic Coast Conference champion that was in the Final Four for the first time. Georgia Amoore and Kayana Traylor each had 17 points, while Cayla King had 14.
Amoore set a record for the most 3-pointers in a single NCAA Tournament&nbsp;with 24, though she had a tough night shooting &mdash; 4 of 17 overall, including 4 of 15 from beyond the arc. She passed Kia Nurse&rsquo;s record 22 set in the 2017 tourney for UConn, which lost in the national semifinals on the same court. Arizona&rsquo;s Aari McDonald had 22 in six NCAA tourney games two years ago.
The big run for LSU came right after Amoore made her last 3-pointer with 7:52 left for a 62-57 lead. The Hokies didn&rsquo;t make another basket until King&rsquo;s 3 with 1:19 left.
&ldquo;I think we had a few crucial turnovers as well as missed box-outs where they scored on second-chance opportunities,&rdquo; Traylor said. &ldquo;I think that&rsquo;s just what it came down to really.&rdquo;
Morris had opened the fourth quarter with a 3-pointer for LSU, then had a driving layup before Reese had a layup after a steal by Johnson. That quick 7-0 run prompted a timeout by Hokies coach Kenny Brooks.
&ldquo;They hit a couple of shots, gave them a little bit of momentum. They hit a 3 right off the bat &hellip; kind of changed the momentum,&rdquo; Brooks said. &ldquo;They were aggressive in the passing lanes. But they also were a little bit more aggressive down low.&rdquo;
Virginia Tech had ended the first half with its own 11-0 run to lead for the first time, at 34-32 on Traylor&rsquo;s driving layup with 53 seconds left.
But it was the Tigers who led for 17:55 of the first half with the Hokies getting off to a slow start shooting &mdash; they missed eight of their first nine shots &mdash; that an&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://twitter.com/espn/status/1641942728568369153?s=20" target="_blank" rel="noopener">LSU cheerleader had an assist even before they officially had a shot</a>.
King was charged with a turnover on a ball that hit the rim and bounced over the top of the backboard and got stuck there. With encouragement from officials and others at that end, a male cheerleader lifted up a female cheerleader, who knocked the ball down.

Kim Mulkey is back in another national championship game, taking the flagship university from her home state there for the first time.