No. 1 Michigan: The Wolverines, who recorded 24 double-digit victories, are a top seed for the fourth time in program history. They will play the winner of the First Four matchup between Baltimore, Maryland County and Howard. Michigan finished the regular season by winning its final 15 Big Ten games, setting victory records for both the program and conference.

No. 2 Iowa State: The Cyclones started hot and at one point were ranked second in the country. They cooled at midseason, however, before hitting their stride again as they headed into the tournament. Iowa State opens against Tennessee State in St. Louis, which is a five-hour drive from Ames, Iowa, but is still a quasi-home game.

No. 3 Virginia: Virginia lost by four to Duke in the ACC tournament championship, but it was an improvement over a 26-point loss to the Blue Devils two weeks earlier. Playing for first-year coach Ryan Odom, the Cavaliers improved by 14 wins from last season, a school record. The matchup is a tall order for Wright State, which won a First Four game in 2022 by beating Bryant.

No. 4 Alabama: The Crimson Tide is the highest-scoring team in the country at 91.7 points per game. Alabama won 23 games and lost to Mississippi in the SEC quarterfinals. Hofstra, which has won seven in a row, could be a tough first-round matchup. Outstanding junior guard Labaron Philon Jr. leads Alabama and averages 21.7 points.

CINDERELLA SEARCH

Texas Tech is hobbling into the tournament without star forward J.T. Toppin, who suffered a season-ending knee injury. Opportunity awaits for the No. 12 Akron Zips, who won 20 of their final 21 games and have four players averaging double-figures in scoring.

PLAYERS TO WATCH

Yaxel Lendeborg, forward, Michigan: A 6-foot-9 standout, Lendeborg withdrew from the NBA draft last May and chose to play his final season in Michigan after playing at Arizona Western and Alabama Birmingham earlier in his career. He was Big Ten Player of the Year.

Christian Anderson, guard, Texas Tech: After the Red Raiders lost Toppin, Anderson helped pick up the scoring slack. The point guard was named the Big 12’s most improved player and is coming back from a groin injury he suffered last Thursday against Iowa State.

Ugonna Onyenso, center, Virginia: The 7-foot player from Nigeria is a shot-blocking machine, with a record nine blocks in the ACC championship game against Duke and 21 over three tournament games. The previous record of 14 for the tournament was set 31 years earlier by Tim Duncan of Wake Forest.

RIM SHOTS

• Nolan Smith, a former Duke guard, took the Tennessee State coaching job in July and led the school to its first NCAA tournament appearance since 1994.
• It has been 30 years since Santa Clara got an invite to the tournament: That was back when the Broncos had a dazzling Canadian point guard named Steve Nash.
• Miami (Ohio) is the first Mid-American Conference school to receive an at-large bid since 1999.

— Sam Farmer

Team USA is headed back to the World Baseball Classic (WBC) final, as they toppled the Dominican Republic, 2-1, in a thriller in Miami on Sunday night. 

The U.S., who fell to Japan in the WBC final in 2023, will look for redemption against either Venezuela or Italy, who play their semifinal matchup on Monday night.

The hype and hysteria coming into this contest between two world baseball powerhouses lived up to it all despite what the box score said. Both teams came in clutch during key moments, while matching the raucous energy of the crowd. 

Of course, the Dominican Republic dugout and faithful went ballistic when Junior Caminero, the 22-year-old Tampa Bay Rays rising star, belted a hanging breaking ball from Skenes in the bottom of the second inning with two strikes. The ball was pelted to left field at over 400 feet, and their patented celebration ensued. 

The D.R. got the first strike off Skenes, who had been looking forward to this start against a lineup littered with some of the best baseball players in MLB. But two innings later, it was Team USA’s own young stars who turned the game around in their favor. 

Gunnar Henderson, who manager Mark DeRosa chose to play at third base, his secondary position as a shortstop for the Baltimore Orioles, over Alex Bregman, one of the best defensive players at the hot corner in MLB, due to how well he hit Luis Severino. The veteran right-hander was amped for his start for the D.R., and his emotion showed it. 

JAPAN SUFFERS SHOCKING COLLAPSE TO VENEZUELA IN WORLD BASEBALL CLASSIC

However, DeRosa’s decision came down to how much success Henderson had against Severino. The decision paid off, as Henderson hit a moon shot over the right-center field fence to tie the game at one apiece. 

Severino was pulled after one more batter for Gregory Soto, who was facing Boston Red Sox phenom Roman Anthony, the 21-year-old who has had a great first appearance in the WBC. After running the count full, Anthony took advantage of a fastball right down the middle, launching it over the center field wall to take a 2-1 lead. 

The entire American dugout was on the field, as Anthony motioned across his chest, showing off his pride as he celebrated with teammates. 

It was just what Team USA needed in the top of the fourth inning, especially after having runners at second and third with one out in the previous frame and not being able to get runs across. Aaron Judge and Kyle Schwarber both struck out to end the inning, which fired up Severino who screamed toward Team USA’s dugout. 

But Judge clearly let that go from his head, as he had a crucial defensive play in the bottom of the third inning when he gunned down Fernando Tatis Jr. trying to go from first base to third. Tatis, who is a fast runner, was out by a mile, with Judge proving his elbow, which caused issues in 2025, is more than fine heading into the 2026 season. 

The Dominicans ultimately chased Skenes from the game after 4.1 innings, as his final line read six hits, one earned run on the Caminero homer and two strikeouts. Severino lasted 3.1 innings, giving up five hits while striking out six Team USA hitters in an impressive outing that saw triple-digit fastballs on the radar gun. 

The U.S. knew a 2-1 lead was not enough, but as the Dominican bullpen continued to stifle their bats, and Julio Rodriguez appeared to rob a home run from Judge, they needed their own relievers to come through. After Tyler Rogers and Griffin Jax did their jobs, David Bednar found himself in some trouble with runners on second and third with one out – the same situation Judge and Schwarber found themselves in – in the bottom of the seventh. 

But Bednar, who escaped a similar situation against Canada in the quarterfinals, struck out Tatis and Ketel Marte to get out of the jam and keep the score the same. 

Garrett Whitlock was solid in the eighth inning to keep the one-run lead alive, which led for the easiest decision for DeRosa on the night: Mason Miller to pitch the ninth. 

The San Diego Padres All-Star closer got a strikeout to start the inning, but things got interesting when he walked Rodriguez and Will Smith couldn’t handle a pitch from Miller that allowed a free pass to second base. 

Oneil Cruz moved Rodriguez to third on a groundnut to Bobby Witt Jr., leaving Geraldo Perdomo as the D.R.’s last hope. He had a clutch at-bat earlier in the game, one that could’ve tied it up if Wells read the line drive to center field better from second base. 

But Miller got Perdomo looking on a 3-2 slider at the bottom of the zone to secure Team USA’s spot in the WBC final.

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Neither Alexander Straus nor Mark Parsons were around when Angel City played its first NWSL game in 2022. But they didn’t miss much; in four years the team had one winning season and made just one playoff appearance.

So Straus, in his first full season as coach, and Parsons, 15 months into his job as sporting director, decided to raze the club and its sad history and start over. And that break from the past couldn’t have been much clearer than it was in the opening game of the team’s fifth season Sunday, a 4-0 rout of the Chicago Stars.

“There is a little bit of a new beginning,” Straus said.

The performance was the most dominant in club history and the margin of victory matched Angel City’s largest ever. It was also the team’s first season-opening win since 2022.

“We’re a completely different organization than we were at the end of last year,” Parsons said.

For one thing the players are already having a good time, something that rarely happened the first four seasons. So if there was a black cloud hovering over the team when Straus and Parsons arrived, it has lifted — at least for one afternoon.

“It’s a lot different than last year,” said teenager Kennedy Fuller, who opened the scoring in the 33rd minute. “We’re just having fun. We’re expressing ourselves and we’re playing how we want to play and we’re doing what we’re able to do and what we’re good at.

“We’re OK to make mistakes. And so that really drives us to want to do better.”

Fuller said that new attitude is the product of having Straus for a full preseason camp. The coach arrived midway through last season and never had a chance to fully implement the aggressive, attacking style he wants to play. Those lessons took hold this winter.

The second big change was to the roster. Six of Sunday’s starters weren’t with Angel City at the start of last season and three of them — Evelyn Shores, Ary Borges and Maiara Niehues — scored. Borges also picked up her first Angel City assist.

“He kind of got his time to really structure us how he wanted. And he was able to bring in players that he thought were going to fit his style,” Fuller said of Straus. “With that, we were able to kind of mold into the team that he wants.

“Our meetings were very long and our trainings were very long, and so we were really able to focus on exactly what he wanted.”

Fuller’s goal was the only score in a first half Angel City dominated but the second half was just eight minutes old when Shores doubled the lead, heading in a Fuller corner for her second NWSL goal. Borges, a Brazilian international, made it 3-0 in the 66th minute, jumping in front of Chicago’s Maitane López to intercept a short goal kick by Alyssa Naeher, then beating the Stars‘ keeper cleanly with a left-footed shot from the center of the box.

Niehues, another Brazilian international, closed the scoring in the 70th minute on a right-footed shot from the center of the box. Iceland’s Sveindis Jonsdottir, got the assist on that goal. Of the four goal-scorers for Angel City, only Borges, who also had an assist in her Angel City debut, is older 21.

For Straus, part of the challenge now is convincing his young team that it can get better while also preparing it for the struggles that undoubtedly await.

“So we take this, we learn from the experience of what we were successful with today, and we keep that,” he said. “And when we try things that fail, we try again.

“From a coaching perspective, you have games like today and it’s great and it’s fantastic and it’s amazing. But I do exactly the same job when we when we lose. And [the] players do the same job. The outcome is something that sometimes is out of [our] control.”

Also likely to temper Straus’ excitement is that Sunday’s performance came against a team that finished last in the 14-team NWSL in 2025 and hasn’t had a winning record since 2022. Angel City’s long-suffering fans certainly still need to be convinced things have changed because the announced crowd of 16,813 on a beautiful sun-splashed afternoon at BMO Stadium was the smallest ever for an Angel City opener.

That was the only sour note of the day, though. In fact, the franchise got a second, arguably more important, victory in the 63rd minute when defender Savy King came off the bench to play for the first time since collapsing on the same field 10 months ago. King was rushed to a hospital and later underwent surgery to address a heart abnormality, which temporarily left her career in doubt.

Those doubts ended Sunday.

“The game is so much bigger than playing 90 minutes on the field,” Fuller said. “She came back and she was like, ‘I’m gonna play. And I’m gonna be better than I was.’

“To see her step on the field and have so much confidence, to be able to have that back in our environment, is so crucial. To be able to get that moment in front of her family, in front of her hometown, is so, so special.”