Sports
College Football Playoff semifinals preview: Rose Bowl and Sugar Bowl take center stage
It’s been a fascinating year in college football.
Deion Sanders took over the sport for a few months before his Colorado Buffaloes lost eight of their last nine games to end the season, the “Conference of Champions” became the conference of just two teams, and Florida State became the first undefeated Power 5 conference champion to be left out of the College Football Playoff.
Colorado head coach Deion Sanders is shown prior to the game against UCLA at Rose Bowl Stadium, Oct. 28, 2023, in Pasadena, California. (Sean M. Haffey/Getty Images)
All of the storylines have led to the final edition of the four-team CFP, which has the potential to be the best semifinals in the 10-year history of the CFP.
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Let’s take a look at the New Year’s Day matchups with the winners playing for the national championship in Houston on Jan. 8.
Rose Bowl – No. 1 Michigan vs No. 4 Alabama, 5 p.m. ET
It’s a matchup between two traditional powers at “The Granddaddy of Them All.”
In what has the look of a classic, Michigan and Alabama will square off in the Rose Bowl with a 13-game and an 11-game winning streak on the line.
Michigan is looking to bounce back from its performance in last year’s CFP after a tumultuous season.
Rose Bowl Stadium is shown on Dec. 27, 2023, in Pasadena, California. (David McNew/Getty Images)
Head coach Jim Harbaugh was suspended by the school for the first three games of the season before missing the final three games of the year after the Big Ten came down on him over allegations of sign-stealing.
With or without Harbaugh, the Wolverines have been perfect, and they’ve gotten it done on the defensive side of the football.
Michigan has allowed the fewest points per game (9.5) while holding opponents to just 239.7 yards per game.
After starting off the year with a very soft schedule, Michigan finished the year against two top-10 teams before shutting out No. 16 Iowa in the Big Ten title game.
They need quarterback J.J. McCarthy to have one of his better games to beat a red-hot Alabama team.
J.J. McCarthy of the Michigan Wolverines (Justin Casterline/Getty Images)
In Michigan’s first seven games of the season. McCarthy threw for 14 touchdowns with an average of 10.6 yards per pass attempt, according to The Athletic. In the final six games, McCarthy threw just five touchdowns and averaged 7.7 yards per pass attempt.
The Crimson Tide come into the CFP winners of 11 consecutive games, a winning streak that can mostly be attributed to quarterback Jalen Milroe’s play.
Since sitting out against South Florida in Week 3, Milroe has been spectacular, throwing for 2,269 yards, 18 passing touchdowns and just four interceptions.
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Milroe’s ability to make plays with his legs – 12 rushing touchdowns – makes the Alabama offense dangerous for Michigan as they prepare for a quarterback rarely seen in the Big Ten.
Alabama quarterback Jalen Milroe (Jeffrey Vest/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
“I don’t think we’ve seen a quarterback like this,” Michigan defensive coordinator Jesse Minter said, according to USA Today.
The New Year’s Day matchup at the Rose Bowl will be one college football fans won’t want to miss.
Sugar Bowl – No. 2 Washington vs No. 3 Texas, 8:45 p.m. ET
Fans of the Longhorns can finally say that “Texas is back.”
It’s been 13 years since Texas last played for a national championship, and Steve Sarkisian has his team on the doorstep of reaching the pinnacle of the sport.
Texas entered the 2023 college football season as the villains of the Big 12 as they prepare to depart the conference for the SEC in 2024. After winning the program’s first conference championship since 2009, Texas has an opportunity for the ultimate exit.
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“We have a chance to be legends,” senior linebacker David Gbenda said. “So why not go be great?”
Quarterback Quinn Ewers of the Texas Longhorns (Ron Jenkins/Getty Images)
The Longhorns enter Monday’s game against Washington with an offense ranked in the top 10 in yards per game and a defense in the top 15 in points allowed per game.
The offense is led by quarterback Quinn Ewers, who has shown major improvements in his second season under Sarkisian.
After missing two games due to injury, Ewers enters the CFP on a tear, throwing for 1,246 yards, eight touchdowns and three interceptions in the final four games of the year.
Ewers has thrown for 3,161 yards, 21 touchdowns and six interceptions in 2023, and the sophomore QB drastically improved his completion percentage, going from completing 58.1% of his passes in 2022 to 70.7% in 2023.
The Texas defense has been elite at stopping the run, allowing just 80.3 rushing yards per game, fourth-best in the country.
They’ll be facing a Washington team led by a Heisman Trophy finalist and an offense that can get up and down the field.
The Huskies finished the year 13-0 for the first time in program history as they prepare to depart the Pac-12 for the Big Ten in 2024.
Michael Penix Jr. led the top passing offense in the country (343.8 yards per game) while throwing for 4,218 yards, 33 touchdowns and nine interceptions.
Michael Penix Jr. of the Washington Huskies (Brandon Sloter/Image Of Sport/Getty Images)
While the Washington offense slowed in the second half of the season, the Huskies found a way to win close games, winning their last four games by a combined 15 points.
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Their receiving core is elite, led by two 1,000-yard wideouts in Rome Odunze and Ja’Lynn Polk.
“It’s the touchdowns. It’s the moving of the chains in the big, big moments. There’s been so many we forget about a lot of [them] and you take it for granted the gaudy stats that he has,” Washington head coach Kalen DeBoer said of Odunze. “Just over and over again, think about how many times he’s come through when you really needed it. A lot of times you think about when you lose football games or you didn’t come through in the big moment. You remember those. I can’t remember Rome not coming through.”
And while Washington is known for its passing attack, running back Dillon Johnson has come on strong in the second half, averaging 136.6 yards per game in the last five contests, including a 256-yard performance against USC.
With a secondary allowing 263.2 passing yards per game (120th in the country), college football fans could be in for a high-scoring affair in New Orleans.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Sports
WWE NXT star Jacy Jayne ready for Stand & Deliver challenge, says she loves to prove people wrong
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Jacy Jayne has been the NXT women’s champion for more than 130 days and has all the belief in the world that her reign will remain intact once Stand & Deliver is finished on Saturday night.
Jayne’s hopes of battling either Kendal Grey or Lola Vice one-on-one vanished on Wednesday as NXT GM Rob Stone announced that she will defend the title in a triple-threat match. Grey and Vice’s match to determine a No. 1 contender ended in controversy as one competitor tapped out and the other was pinned.
Lainey Reid and Jacy Jayne compete against Kendal Grey and Lola Vice during NXT at The Theater at Madison Square Garden in New York on March 31, 2026. (Rich Freeda/WWE)
To make things right, Stone put both challengers in the match against Jayne at Stand & Deliver.
Jayne told Fox News Digital before the decision was made that it doesn’t matter who she faces, she was confident she was going to come out on top.
“No, because I’ve beaten them both already,” she said when asked if it mattered who she was going to face. “So, I’m going to do the same thing that I’ve done in the past and I’m gonna win and remain your NXT women’s champion.”
Jayne is in her second run as NXT women’s champion. She defeated Tatum Paxley at NXT Gold Rush in November to jumpstart the next reign. She’s one of four women to hold the NXT Women’s Championship at least twice. Roxanne Perez, Charlotte Flair and Shayna Baszler each accomplishing the feat.
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Fallon Henley, Jacy Jayne and Lainey Reid enter the arena during Showdown at the WWE Performance Center in Orlando, Fla., on Dec. 2, 2025. (Andrea Kellaway/Getty Images)
The New Jersey native is relishing the opportunity to be the NXT women’s champion and proving the doubters wrong.
“Well, I feel like I was severely underrated and people doubted me and when I won the title, they were like, ‘What the heck is going on? Why Jacy?’ And I think over the last 10-11 months that I’ve been champion, I’ve proven everybody wrong,” she told Fox News Digital.
“I was always meant for this spot. It was only a matter of time. I was waiting for my right moment and I love to prove people wrong, and I love to make grown men cry.”
NXT women’s champion Jacy Jayne addresses the crowd during NXT’s Vengeance Day on March 7, 2026, in Orlando. (Conor Kvatek/WWE)
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NXT Stand & Deliver will take place Saturday in St. Louis, Missouri, at 7 p.m. ET. The event can be seen on YouTube.
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Sports
Rapper J Cole signs with Chinese basketball team, his third stint as a professional hoopster
Hip-hop star J. Cole is taking his basketball dreams overseas — again.
When ESPN reported Wednesday that the two-time Grammy winner has signed to play for the Nanjing Monkey Kings in the Chinese Basketball Assn., it might have sounded like an April Fool’s Day prank.
But it’s no joke. Cole’s longtime manager and business partner Ibrahim Hamad reposted the ESPN report on X and wrote that basketball “is still Life for my boy, even at 41.”
Videos and photos posted on social media, some of which were reposted by Hamad, show Cole at a Monkey Kings game wearing team gear and warming up with the other players. The “Work Out” rapper reportedly did not play in the game. One video shows Cole autographing an album for an excited fan.
Cole posted a video to the Chinese social media site Douyin saying he was in China and “excited” to be there.
Born Jermaine Lamarr Cole, the multiplatinum artist played basketball at Terry Sanford High in North Carolina and tried out for the hoops team at St. John’s as a walk-on while attending the university on an academic scholarship. Throughout his music career, Cole has incorporated basketball images and references into his lyrics, performances and cover art.
This will be Cole’s third stint as a professional basketball player. In 2021, the 6-foot-3 guard played three games for Rwanda’s Patriots Basketball Club of the Basketball Africa League, averaging 1.7 points and 1.7 rebounds in about 15 minutes a game.
The following year, he played five games for the Scarborough Shooting Stars of the Canadian Elite Basketball League, averaging 2.4 points and less than one rebound and assist in about 10 minutes a game.
On a recent episode of “Talk with Flee,” Cole spoke with fellow rapper Cam’ron about his lifelong “love and passion for basketball” even though he’s never been the best player on the court at any given time. He said playing professionally overseas has been “like me trying to scratch a last itch.”
“Like, yo, let me see if I could do this,” Cole said. “Could I train and be able to go play professional? Because these teams and these leagues are looking at it like, you know what, he not a—. He could come be on the court, and he could give our league some publicity.”
Cole mentioned the upcoming opportunity to play for Nanjing.
“I’m looking at the clock like, boy, I’m getting older. Like, this might be my last shot,” Cole, whose “The Fall-Off” album dropped Feb. 6 and tour starts July 10, said. “So I’m going to keep my word to them and show up and play in a couple games, although I know I’m not in the best of shape because of the album. But I’m going to go out there and have fun with it.”
Sports
Former Cowboys player Trysten Hill appears to grin after arrest tied to alleged assault of pregnant woman
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Former NFL defensive tackle Trysten Hill was booked into a Texas jail last week on multiple charges relating to an alleged assault of a pregnant woman.
Ellis County Sheriff’s Office jail records list “assault of a pregnant person” and “interfering with an emergency request for assistance.”
FOX 4 in Dallas obtained the records, which also showed Hill was arrested March 26.
Hill was booked and held on a $3,500 bond connected to two bond-forfeiture warrants from a 2025 criminal investigation, the sheriff’s office said.
Trysten Hill of the Dallas Cowboys at AT&T Stadium Oct. 20, 2019, in Arlington, Texas. (Richard Rodriguez/Getty Images)
Hill appeared to grin in his booking photo.
The identity of the alleged victim and any relationship to Hill were not disclosed. Fox News Digital contacted the Ellis County Sheriff’s Office, but a request for comment was not immediately returned.
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After his three-year career at Central Florida, the Cowboys selected Hill in the second round of the 2019 NFL Draft. He appeared in 25 regular-season games with the Cowboys, recording 39 combined tackles over four seasons.
Trysten Hill of the Dallas Cowboys at SoFi Stadium Oct. 9, 2022, in Inglewood, Calif. (Ronald Martinez/Getty Images)
Hill joined the Arizona Cardinals midway through the 2022 season, recording five solo tackles and one sack in six games. He signed with the Cleveland Browns in 2023 but was released before the regular season kicked off.
New England Patriots defensive tackle Trysten Hill reacts against the Carolina Panthers during the first half at Gillette Stadium Aug. 8, 2024, in Foxborough, Mass. (Eric Canha/USA Today Sports)
The New England Patriots signed Hill to their practice squad later in 2023.
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