Unrivaled is taking its semifinals on the road, playing at Barclays Center in New York on Monday night.Top seed Phantom BC will face sixth-seeded Vinyl and No. 2 Mist will play No. 5 Breeze. The top two teams earned byes to this round. The title game will be Wednesday at Unrivaleds home arena in Miami, with a prize pool of $600,000 to be split among players from the championship club.Phantom will be missing star forward Aliyah Boston for the rest of the playoffs as she's out with a right lower extremity injury. Playing at Barclays Center will be a homecoming for Unrivaled co-founder Breanna Stewart, who led the New York Liberty to its first championship in 2024. The league expects a huge crowd Monday night.The young 3-on-3 league drew a professional womens basketball regular-season record crowd of 21, 490 that included Good Morning America host Robin Roberts, Sixers guard Kyle Lowry, and comedians Leslie Jones and Wanda Sykes when it played in Philadelphia in late January.The Philadelphia tour stop represented a proving ground on whether taking the product on the road can lead to new revenue and expand the leagues fan base, while recalibrating a business model that was originally rooted in centralization.MVPChelsea Gray won the league's MVP playing for Rose BC on Monday. The guard, who won Unrivaled's 1-on-1 tournament last month, averaged 24.2 points, 5.6 rebounds and 6.1 assists. Gray broke her own league single-season assists record with 85 in 14 games for Rose BC. She had nine games with 20 or more points and 10 contests with five or more assists. She also tied the league single-game 3-pointers record with 10 on Feb. 22.___AP WNBA: https://apnews.com/hub/wnba-basketball

Iran's participation in this summer's World Cup has been thrown into serious doubt following the escalating Middle East crisis triggered by attacks that resulted in the death of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.The Iranian Football Federation's president, Mehdi Taj, cast uncertainty over his nation's involvement in the tournament, which begins on 11 June across the United States, Canada and Mexico."After this attack, we cannot be expected to look forward to the World Cup with hope," Taj stated.The attacks, attributed to American and Israeli forces, have prompted retaliatory strikes from Tehran against US allies, dramatically intensifying regional tensions just months before kick-off.FIFA's tournament regulations remain notably imprecise regarding the replacement of qualified nations, stating merely that the governing body retains "sole discretion" to "take whatever action is deemed necessary."The world football authority may opt to substitute any withdrawing member association with another nation.Should Iran pull out, reports state that the replacement would most probably emerge from the Asian Football Confederation.Iraq and the United Arab Emirates have been identified as the frontrunners to fill any vacancy.FIFA's general secretary, Mattias Grafstrom, remarked on Saturday that "our focus is to have a safe World Cup with everybody participating."The governing body has declined further comment since those remarks.Iran's withdrawal from the tournament would mark an unprecedented development in modern football history.No nation has pulled out of the World Cup following the draw since 1950, when both France and India declined to participate, citing the expense of travel.Team Melli earned their berth at the finals by topping Group A during the third round of Asian qualifying.The potential void raises complex questions about succession, with FIFA sources suggesting Iraq would be first in line should they fail to secure qualification through their own route.Iraq face an intercontinental playoff on 31 March against either Bolivia or Suriname in Monterrey.Should Iraq successfully navigate their playoff, any Iranian vacancy would likely default to the UAE, Asia's next highest-ranked nation without a finals berth.Iran are scheduled to contest their group-stage matches entirely on American soil, facing New Zealand and Belgium in Los Angeles before meeting Egypt in Seattle.The diplomatic backdrop remains fraught, with Washington having imposed restrictions barring Iranian citizens from entering the country.Limited exceptions have been granted for national team players and essential support staff.Several Iranian Football Federation officials, including Taj himself, were refused visas to attend the World Cup draw held in Washington DC last December.Our Standards: The GB News Editorial Charter

Hundreds of fans line the streets of Birmingham to catch a glimpse of the show's stars.

Iran secured qualification for its fourth consecutive World Cup appearance and was drawn into Group G alongside Belgium, Egypt, and New Zealand.

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Aprs la premire complique Brest (2-0), Habib Beye effectuait son baptme du feu au Vlodrome lors d'un Olympico trs tendu face Lyon. En termes d'motions et de montagnes russes, difficile de faire plus renversant que ce choc remport finalement 3-2 par l'OM. Une rencontre o Leonardo Balerdi ne portait pas le brassard de capitaine confi Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg. Un choix justifi par le coach olympien en confrence de presse.

Billy Slater is left stunned after Bulldogs captain Stephen Crichton escapes punishment for a high tackle against the Dragons.

You know all about the Power 5 conferences in college basketball. You hear about those more than any other, and those groups often dominate the March Madness conversation. There are 26 other conferences out there, however, and our goal is to get you up to speed on the teams, players and fights in the standings to know before the conference tournaments, Selection Sunday and the official start of March Madness. Its time for you to get to know a mid-major: this time, its the Summit League. "The Summit" is a midwestern-centered conference with nine teams, formed in 1982 right around when the NCAA became the sponsor of womens college basketball. None of the original conference members remain, however, so the present-day Summit, 32 schools later, is vastly different than it was at its inception. And will be different again a year from now, when Denver heads to the West Coast Conference for the 2026-2027 season, leaving the Summit with eight members. In the present, though, all nine teams make it to the conference basketball tournaments, with the 8- and 9-seeds facing off in a first-round matchup to get the field down to an even eight. The winner of that game takes on the top seed, while No. 2 faces No. 7, and then the other half of the quarterfinals pits four vs. five and three vs. six. The automatic bid for the conference champion is likely the only way into March Madness for mens basketball, as thats how it has been the last three years, and none of the teams are playing well enough to change that in 2026. Womens basketball, though well, its an open question, at least. Summit League Mens College Basketball Leaders: The Summit League mens tournament field is already set, and will begin play on March 4. Oral Roberts (8-seed) will face Kansas City (9) in the opening round, with the winner taking on top-seeded North Dakota State on March 5. North Dakota State (7) will face St. Thomas (2) on the same day, with South Dakota (4) vs. Omaha (5) the next day, as well as North Dakota (3) against Denver (6). North Dakota State was well ahead of the pack this season, going 14-2, two games ahead of second-place St. Thomas, four games up on North Dakota and six ahead of South Dakota, Denver and Omaha, which all tied for fourth. The Bison arent invulnerable, however: Denver beat them, 78-71, a month ago, and St. Thomas did so with authority on Feb. 26, 84-62. The first meeting between the two was much closer, with the Tommies losing, 68-65: a 1-point loss to North Dakota, a 98-94 defeat against Omaha and an 82-80 loss to Denver were the Tommies other Ls. In short, the standings present some clear favorites, but the reality is that even the best teams in the conference are capable of losing to the ones in the middle of the standings. While most of the conference is in the bottom-150 teams in the league per the NCAA Evaluation Tools accounting, its not as if North Dakota State and St. Thomas are so far ahead that its clear it will be those two facing off in the tournament finals, either. St. Thomas is 106th in NET and 104th in Wins Above Bubble, while North Dakota State is 117th and 98th neither figure suggests that there will be an at-large bid coming. St. Thomas is powered by a top-100 (unadjusted) offense, according toKenPoms Offensive Rating, as it scores 114.7 points per 100 possessions. The issue is that it allows 108.5, putting it 148th in Defensive Rating and resulting in an unadjusted 6.22 Net Rating. That is better than North Dakota State, however, which has roughly the same defense (108.3 points per 100 possessions, 145th) but with an offense that lags behind the Tommies, at 112.9 and 117th. Admittedly, those differences are slight, but since neither is particularly dominant it also opens them up to defeat. Denver, for instance, has one of the worst defenses in the league. Not the Summit League, either, but Division I basketball. However, it also ranks 67th in Offensive Rating, meaning if it does play serviceable defense and the offense is cooking, either of the Bisons or Tommies could go down. Summit League -Womens College Basketball Leaders: The womens Summit League standings and tournament seeding are also set: Omaha (8) faces North Dakota (9) on day one, March 4, then the tournament resumes March 5 with South Dakota (2) facing Kansas City (7) and North Dakota State (1) against the winner of Omaha-North Dakota. Oral Roberts (4) takes on St. Thomas (5) on the second day of the quarterfinals, then South Dakota (3) faces Denver (6). Unlike with the mens Summit League, there are two genuinely tournament-worthy teams in the Summit. However, because of the fact that one of the two will lose a game in the Summit League tournament, that might not result in an at-large bid. South Dakota State (24-6) is 43rd in NET and 46th in WAB, while North Dakota State (24-3) ranks 45th and 50th. Thats two top-50 teams in both NET and WAB, but again, there might be just one when Summit League play is truly over. Its not difficult to see why its these two teams standing so far ahead of the rest the next-best team in the Summit by NET is South Dakota, at 114, and the only other top-200 one is Oral Roberts at 184. The difference is that each has a player driving them to a possible March Madness berth to a degree that outshines what anyone else in the Summit League is doing, as well as most of the rest of Division I. South Dakota State senior forward Brooklyn Meyer is the Summits leading scorer at 22.1 points per game, but she also has a Player Efficiency Rating of 46.0, which puts her second in Division I behind UConns Sarah Strong. Right behind her, in both the Summit PER rankings as well as D-Is, is North Dakota State junior forward Avery Koenen, at 45.6. Just two other players Iowa States Audi Crooks and Notre Dames Hannah Hidalgo have a PER over 40. Meyer has the top Plus/Minus in the Summit; Koenen is second. Koenen has the best Offensive Rating (136.4) and Defensive Rating (77.2) in the conference; Meyer is second and fifth. Koenen is second in the Summit in rebounds per game; Meyer is third. As said, Meyer leads the conference in scoring Koenen is in third, at 19.2 points. Meyer leads in shooting percentage (65.3%), and is averaging 7.9 rebounds, 2.9 assists and 1.8 blocks per game. Koenen is behind in points, but has 11 rebounds per, with 2.3 assists and over a steal and block each per game. Both players can change the direction of a Summit League game on their own, and chances are good the two are going to clash in the conference finals. Its possible not likely, but possible that both teams end up making it to March Madness if that happensand the championship game is a close, impressive affair for both teams, but if there is any one-sidedness to it at all, then its unlikely the human element of the Selection Committee is going to overlook what WAB cannot. North Dakota States lone loss in conference play? That came against South Dakota State on Feb. 25, 59-54. The Jackrabbits lost to North Dakota State back on Jan. 17 in the first matchup between the two, 76-68, and then to South Dakota to close out January. Since then? Seven-straight wins, including evening up the season series with the Bison.