85 min: Krstović one-twos with Zalewski down the middle … and he’s clear! But Kobel reads the danger and comes racing out of his box to blooter clear. The keeper takes a whack for his trouble, but Krstović was within his rights to compete for the ball with so much on the line. Great play all round.
82 min: Atalanta counter, and Samardžić dances his way in from the right, before lashing a low diagonal drive inches wide of the left-hand post. Kobel wasn’t getting to that.
The Ohio State Buckeyes’ defensive presence is among the hot topics of the NFL scouting combine, with several prospects drawing serious attention from scouts and coaches. What makes this year unique is not just the usual slate of first-round hopefuls — it’s the quantity and versatility of OSU defenders that has everyone buzzing.
In an episode of the “Football 301” podcast, Yahoo Sports’ Nate Tice and Matt Harmon, who are in Indianapolis this week at the combine, took a look at those star Buckeyes.
According to Tice, this year’s draft is “basically one quarterback, one running back, and a lot of defenders and some tackles.” And there’s no school more central to this defensive bonanza than Ohio State.
What makes this Buckeye class special is its fit for today’s NFL. As Tice points out, “the league needs [off-ball linebackers] and they’re so important now.” With defenses constantly in flux, players who can shift from linebacker to edge and even out to the slot are at a premium, and Ohio State’s blue-chip prospects all check those boxes.
As Harmon summed up, “when you go back and watch [Ohio State’s defense], it’s just not like, ‘Oh, yeah, they’re pretty good players.’ It’s like, no, they’re the best players of this draft.”
Sonny Styles: modern linebacker prototype
Harmon called Styles “one of those guys” who blends elite athleticism (a legit 6-foot-5, 240+ pounds), rare movement skills and the ability to do everything required in the modern NFL: “He can play off-ball linebacker but can also line up on the edge and play and drop from there, play the run, take on tight ends.”
Tice’s assessment: “What's cool about Styles is he can do all the modern asks because that's what he was asked to do at Ohio State under Matt Patricia. Line up on, on the ball on the edge, much like how Zack Baun is used sometimes for the Eagles.”
Both Tice and Harmon expect Styles to be a top-15 pick, and potentially even higher given the way defenses are evolving.
Ohio State's Arvell Reese (right) could be one of the top defenders drafted this year due to his versatility and skills. (Photo by Luke Hales/Getty Images)
Luke Hales via Getty Images
Arvell Reese: the next hybrid force
Reese is being pegged as possibly “the first non-quarterback selected after Fernando Mendoza.” Like Styles, Reese brings versatility. He can play off-ball, line up on the edge, and has a “developing game sense as far as coverage,” according to Tice. His blend of pass rush and coverage skills fits perfectly with what today’s defensive coordinators are seeking.
Kayden McDonald: Anchor on the interior
Not to be outdone, McDonald has cemented his stock as a premier run-stuffing defensive tackle. He may not have the flashiest pass rush yet, but his ability “to line up across the interior, eat blocks and keep his balance” is drawing attention for teams looking for a dependable presence in the trenches.
Caleb Downs: Swiss Army Knife in the secondary
On the back end, Downs, a safety, is a prospect everyone is watching. Tice described him as more of a Budda Baker or Antoine Winfield Jr. type — "a guy that just gives a boost effect on everybody else because he’s so, so smart.” Downs’ workout numbers will be scrutinized, but his tape already gives him a very high floor.
The unsung hero: Caden Curry
He’s a likely Day 2 pick with real flash and the kind of tools that get coaches excited. He’s the type of prospect who rises over the course of combine week.
Projected overall draft Impact
With Styles and Reese project as sure-fire first-rounders — and with McDonald and Downs also likely to see their names called early — it’s not an exaggeration to say that four or five Ohio State defenders could go in the first 15 picks. Other teams will likely soon mirror their approach, blending size, movement, and versatility as the new defensive standard.
Serie A side win 4-3 on aggregate after 4-1 victory
Atalanta face Arsenal or Bayern Munich in last 16
Lazar Samardzic slotted home a stoppage-time penalty to complete a dramatic 4-1 victory for Atalanta against Borussia Dortmund on Wednesday, sending the Italian side into the Champions League’s last 16 with a comeback 4-3 aggregate triumph.
Dortmund’s Ramy Bensebaini was sent off after his studs caught the head of Atalanta’s Nikola Krstovic in the penalty area and Samardzic converted the spot kick in the 98th minute to send the Italians through. Atalanta will now face either Arsenal or Bayern Munich in the round of 16, with the draw on Friday.
Blow as scrum-half Alex Mitchell is ruled out of campaign
Johnson, Dallaglio, Leonard and co to dine with players
Steve Borthwick has turned to England’s 2003 World Cup winners to arrest his side’s drastic decline after enduring another setback with the scrum‑half Alex Mitchell ruled out for the rest of the Six Nations.
Borthwick’s squad were due on Wednesday night to have dinner with members of the 2003 team, including the captain Martin Johnson, the Test centurion Jason Leonard and Lewis Moody, who revealed in October that he had been diagnosed with motor neurone disease.
The world of soccer throws up no shortage of questions. Today, Graham Ruthven endeavors to answer three of them
The soccer news agenda hasn’t exactly been a picnic recently. Concerns over the hosting of World Cup matches in Mexico. Gianni Infantino cozying up to Donald Trump whenever he can. The fleecing of supporters planning to visit the US this summer. Is all this really worth it? But then there’s Bodø/Glimt.
ST. LOUIS (AP) — St. Louis Blues forward Robert Thomas, who is second on the team with 33 points, will take a temporary leave of absence because of a personal matter.
Blues president of hockey operations and general manager Doug Armstrong announced the leave of absence on Wednesday.
Thomas is expected to return to the team on Friday.
In 42 games, Thomas has 11 goals and 22 assists. He was placed on injured reserve on Jan. 16 with a lower body injury and has not returned. He made his last appearance in a game on Jan. 10 against the Vegas Golden Knights.
Feb 18, 2026; Port St. Lucie, FL, USA; New York Mets pitcher Jonah Tong (21) throws a pitch during spring training workouts at Clover Park. Mandatory Credit: Reinhold Matay-Imagn Images | Reinhold Matay-Imagn Images
Mets lineup
Carson Benge – RF
Juan Soto – LF
Francisco Alvarez – DH
Mark Vientos – 1B
Hayden Senger – C
Christian Arroyo – 3B
Vidal Brujan – SS
Cristian Pache – CF
Grae Kessinger – 2B
Jonah Tong – RHP
Cardinals lineup
JJ Wetherholt – SS
Jose Fermin – 2B
Nolan Gorman – 3B
Nelson Velazquez – RF
Leonardo Bernal – C
Nathan Church – CF
Joshua Baez – DH
Blaze Jordan – 1B
Chase Davis – LF
Richard Fitts – RHP
Broadcast info
First pitch: 1:10 PM EST TV: PIX11 Radio: Audacy Mets Radio WHSQ 880AM, Audacy App, 92.3 HD2
Feb 19, 2026; PortCharlotte, FL, USA; Tampa Bay Rays pitcher Brody Hopkins (88) poses for a photo during media day at Mandatory Credit: Kim Klement Neitzel-Imagn Images | Kim Klement Neitzel-Imagn Images
The Tampa Bay Rays top overall prospect will make his spring debut this afternoon, getting the start against the Baltimore Orioles.
There isn’t any radio coverage today, but the Orioles are broadcasting the game so it can be seen on MLB.tv.
The Pittsburgh Pirates are on the road against the Atlanta Braves, where they will try and pick up another win.
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That's all sharpshooting Hornets rookie Kon Knueppel needed to get to 200 3-pointers made — he set a new NBA record for fastest to 200 3s, besting former record holder Duncan Robinson by 11 games.
200 THREES FOR KON KNUEPPEL
He got there in just 58 games... the fastest player to reach that mark in NBA history! pic.twitter.com/TV7CZYNXlo
Knueppel has made an NBA-leading 201 3-pointers this season and needs just six more to pass Sacramento's Keegan Murray for the most threes made by a rookie.
Knueppel is averaging 19.3 points and 3.5 made 3-pointers a game while shooting 43.6% from beyond the arc. What really has him neck-and-neck with Dallas Cooper Flagg for Rookie of the Year is that Knueppel has shown off more playmaking and offensive diversity than was expected, as is the fact that he's doing this for a hot Hornets team that appears headed to the play-in in the East.
Feb 20, 2026; Surprise, Arizona, USA; Former Kansas City Royals Mike Moustakas and Texas Rangers manager Skip Schumaker (55) exchange line up cards prior to the game at Surprise Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jayne Kamin-Oncea-Imagn Images | Jayne Kamin-Oncea-Imagn Images
After months of waiting, the Kansas City Royals are back on the field. Granted, it’s for Spring Training games, but still–you can watch professional baseball players in actual games against other teams. The Royals last played a game on September 28, 2025, so it’s been almost five months since diehard Kansas City baseball fans were able to watch their team.
We all know that baseball is a marathon, which is part of its charm. The National Football League plays 17 regular season games a year. The National Basketball Association plays 82 regular season games a year, with the National Hockey League moving to 84 games a year soon. Major League Baseball? MLB blows them out of the water with 162 regular season games a year.
Nick Kappel, the Royals’ director of media relations, posted this, which really puts into perspective what is about to play out over the coming months:
Good morning, Kansas City!
Starting today, the @Royals will play 194 games over the next 220 days.
The Royals played their first game a few days ago on February 20. Their last scheduled game is on September 27. That means that, outside the four-day All-Star break, Kansas City will have played a baseball game in nine out of every 10 days for over seven consecutive months.
Don’t get me wrong–I’m glad the Royals are back to playing baseball. I prefer when it’s baseball season to when it’s not baseball season. But at the same time, I wonder if MLB’s total number of regular season games has surpassed the point of diminishing returns, and that a return to the 154-game regular season is the way to go.
From 1904 through 1960, MLB had a 154-game season except for a few outlier seasons like immediately following World War I. The league only shifted to 162 games coinciding with the American League’s 1961 expansion. So many legendary MLB players played all of or most of their careers before the 162-game season, from Babe Ruth to Jackie Robinson, Ted Williams, and Stan Musial.
The argument for a 154-game season is that it maintains baseball’s unique cadence while eliminating the “filler” that happens in a 162-game season, and we can think of this on two core axes.
The first axis here is simply player quality. You want your best players to play all your games, but a 162-game season is grueling and very few players play in the whole thing. Last year, only 6 hitters played in 162 games, and only 22 starting pitchers made 32 or more starts. Every time one of the clear best players in the league doesn’t play, they are replaced by a less talented and less exciting player. Meanwhile, there were 51 hitters who played in 154 games, and 54 starting pitchers who made 30 or more starts–all of whom would have played every possible game in a shorter season.
The other axis here is game quality. There are some games that are just not attractive for fans or teams alike, and those games are early-season weekday games. That’s when the weather is the most questionable, when school is in full swing, and when teams haven’t built up excitement in the product. I took a look at the five least-attended home games for each of the AL Central teams last year, and the results are just about what you’d expect for those 25 games:
19 were April games
5 of the non-April games happened when teams were 9+ games behind first place
24 were Monday-Thursday games
0 were Saturday/Sunday games
You can’t just cut eight Monday-Thursday games in April and call it a day. But you can do some of that, and also cut weekday games throughout the year to provide more off days.
While it seems unlikely that the union or the owners would want to cut 120 games off the books, it can be balanced in two ways. First, increase the divisional series to seven games to get multiple high-revenue playoff games on the books. Second, timing it alongside an expansion from 30 to 32 teams would increase the total games played from 2,430 to 2,464.
Baseball will never get to a truly short season, and it shouldn’t. However, cutting just a few games from the calendar could have a knockdown effect that gives everyone a breather and just might result in a better product.
CLEARWATER, FL - FEBRUARY 22: The Philly Phanatic performs prior to the spring training baseball game between the Pittsburgh Pirates and Philadelphia Phillies at BayCare Ballpark on February 22, 2026 in Clearwater, Florida. (Photo by Mike Carlson/Getty Images) | Getty Images
In the responses to our last question, it seemed that people were generally expecting there to be a lockout at the end of this season, when the current Collective Bargaining Agreement expires. The duration and impact of that lockout is considerably less certain. But to follow up on that, today I wanted to get your opinions on what the impact of that lockout might be – in particular, with regard to the Diamondbacks.
What would a lockout do to this team? Which players or plans get derailed the most?
There are a whole number of levels at which you can look at this. Obviously, there will be a loss of revenue, and while the players may be on strike, that does not mean that all expenditure goes down to zero for the D-backs. On the roster level, it’ll potentially be a year lost for players under contract. But also a year gained for player development (albeit without formal competition, young prospects will still get older and stronger, and can gain experience outside of minor-league settings). Let’s presume the entire 2027 season is lost. Where will the team sit at the end of that year?
The NHL returns to action tonight, and we’ve got a marquee matchup between the Toronto Maple Leafs and Tampa Bay Lightning to kick things off.
Matthew Knies has been a thorn in the Lightning's side, which is why he's the subject of our Maple Leafs vs. Lightning predictions and NHL picks for Wednesday, February 25.
Maple Leafs vs Lightning prediction
Maple Leafs vs Lightning best bet: Matthew Knies anytime goal (+300)
Knies has scored 10 goals in 10 career games against the Lightning, including at least one goal in six of his last nine, which includes a hat-trick performance on April 9 of last season.
He’s also scored four goals in the five meetings against Andrei Vasilevskiy, who has struggled against the Leafs recently.
The perennial Vezina candidate has a 3.62 GAA and an .874 SV% over his last 10 meetings against the Toronto Maple Leafs.
Maple Leafs vs Lightning same-game parlay
This matchup typically yields high-scoring games, which is why I’ll add Over 5.5 to my SGP. The total has gone Over the number in five of the last six meetings. Plus, with three weeks off, it could get sloppy, which often leads to higher-scoring games.
Auston Matthews returns to the Leafs a winner. I believe he’ll parlay his Olympic success into a shooting bonanza tonight and go Over his 3.5 shot total. He averages 5.4 shots per game in his last 10 meetings against Tampa.
Maple Leafs vs Lightning SGP
Knies to score
Matthews Over 3.5 shots
Over 5.5
Maple Leafs vs Lightning odds
Moneyline: Maple Leafs +185 | Lightning -225
Puck Line: Maple Leafs +1.5 (-135) | Lightning -1.5 (+115)
Over/Under: Over 6 | Under 6
Maple Leafs vs Lightning trend
The Maple Leafs are 8-2 on the moneyline in the last ten meetings between these two clubs. Find more NHL betting trends for Maple Leafs vs. Lightning.
How to watch Maple Leafs vs Lightning
Location
Benchmark International Arena, Tampa, FL
Date
Wednesday, February 25, 2026
Puck drop
7:30 p.m. ET
TV
TNT, HBO Max
Maple Leafs vs Lightning latest injuries
Odds are correct at the time of publishing and are subject to change. Not intended for use in MA. Affiliate Disclosure: Our team of experts has thoroughly researched and handpicked each product that appears on our website. We may receive compensation if you sign up through our links.
Boston and Denver hook up in the marquee matchup of the night, and our NBA player prop projections have circled some of the best edges in this showdown.
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Celtics computer picks
Payton Pritchard Over 3.5 rebounds (+100)
Projection: 4.5 rebounds
Payton Pritchard plays bigger than his size when it comes to rebounding. He tracks long misses well and stays active around the perimeter. The projection has Pritchard clearing four boards with room to spare, and at plus money, that edge matters.
He's gone Over this number in three of his last four games.
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Neemias Queta Over 8.5 points (-112)
Projection: 10.0 points
Neemias Queta doesn’t need isolation touches to score. Rim runs, dump-offs, and put-backs are enough to push him toward double digits. The model projects Queta right around 10, giving this Over a clean cushion.
He's gone Over this number in three straight games with just 21 total field goal attempts.
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Sam Hauser Over 9.5 points (-115)
Projection: 10.9 points
Sam Hauser’s role is simple: space the floor and shoot. If he gets his usual volume from deep, this number is well within reach. The projection puts Hauser close to 11, which makes 10 points a reasonable expectation.
He's gone Over this total in three of his last four games.
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Nuggets computer picks
Nikola Jokic Under 28.5 points (-120)
Projection: 25.8 points
Nikola Jokic can explode at any time, but the model sees more distribution than domination. If the defense sends help and forces the ball out early, Jokic’s scoring settles into the mid-20s. That gives this Under a solid path.
He's stayed Under this number in four of his last six games.
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Cameron Johnson Over 11.5 points (-112)
Projection: 12.8 points
Cameron Johnson doesn’t need high usage to clear this number. A few clean looks from three and one trip to the line puts him on pace. The projection has Johnson nearly a full bucket above the line.
He's gone Over this number in two of his last three games.
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Jamal Murray Under 23.5 points (-120)
Projection: 22.3 points
Jamal Murray’s ceiling is obvious, but the projection leans slightly Under here. If shot volume dips or he shifts into more of a facilitator role, Murray lands closer to 22 than 25. It’s a thin edge — but still an edge.
He's gone Under this number in two of his last three games.
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How to watch Celtics vs Nuggets tonight
Location
Ball Arena, Denver, CO
Date
Wednesday, February 25, 2026
Tip-off
10:00 p.m. ET
TV
ESPN
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Celtics
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