General Sports 24-Hour Briefing
×NCAA Basketball
One of the so-called fixers in a sprawling betting scheme to cash in on big bets on rigged NCAA basketball games pleaded guilty Monday according to federal prosecutors. The final AP poll before Selection Sunday has a new top five though Duke, Arizona and Michigan stay top three. No. 2 UCLA picked up three first-place votes from top-ranked UConn in this week's Associated Press women's basketball Top 25 poll while Texas jumped South Carolina to move into the No. 3 spot.
College Sports
West Virginia avenged two regular-season losses to No. 10 TCU by beating the reigning Big 12 tournament champion 62-53 in the conference title game Sunday. No. 15 West Virginia's victory came after underwhelming performances from top teams shook up this week's rankings. Queens University earned an NCAA berth in its first year of eligibility with a 98-93 win over Central Arkansas in the Atlantic Sun tournament. Michigan State point guard Jeremy Fears Jr. received another technical foul for a kick toward a player's groin area.
Tennis
Britain's Emma Raducanu won only 11 points in the first set as Amanda Anisimova won 6-1 6-1 to reach the fourth round at Indian Wells. Raducanu's coach called it "a long way to go" after the devastating loss that lasted just 52 minutes.
Golf
Akshay Bhatia beat fellow American Daniel Berger on the first sudden death play-off hole to win the Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill in Orlando. We run through the top contenders among the 123-man field to win the PGA Tour's flagship event at TPC Sawgrass in our ranking of the top 25 players in the 2026 Players Championship field.
Football
England head coach Steve Borthwick may make major changes for the trip to France after three straight defeats and a backline overhaul for the loss to Italy. Wales hope Tottenham defender Ashley Phillips could boost their World Cup qualifying hopes if they can persuade the 20-year-old to switch allegiance from England. The 2027 Six Nations opener will see Ireland host England in Dublin to face Ireland in the opening match.
Rugby Union
Scotland will be without first-choice second-row pair Gregor Brown and Scott Cummings, winger Duhan van der Merwe and three others in Dublin. Ireland head coach Andy Farrell says his side will benefit from the pressure of having to secure a win in Saturday's game against Scotland to secure the Triple Crown. A sensational fourth weekend of the Six Nations saw Scotland give themselves a chance of the title while Italy beat England for the first time.
Motorsport
Ryan Blaney completed a Team Penske sweep at Phoenix Raceway by winning the Cup Series race Sunday. After a wild, often polarising Australian Grand Prix weekend, ESPN looks at some of the sweeping generalisations being made about Formula 1 and judges whether they're overblown or not in their analysis of Australian GP overreactions.
Combat Sports
Ex-UFC, PFL heavyweight champ Francis Ngannou will return to action on May 16 as part of Jake Paul's Most Valuable Promotions' inaugural MMA fight card headlined by Ronda Rousey vs. Gina Carano. Jai Opetaia could be stripped of his IBF cruiserweight belt after he defeats Brandon Glanton to win the inaugural Zuffa World cruiserweight title in a bout that puts his IBF title in doubt.
Winter Sports
Ukraine's Maksym Murashkovskyi says he has Chat GPT to thank for helping him win Para-biathlon silver at the Winter Paralympics. Russia won their first gold medal of the Paralympics as Para-alpine skier Varvara Voronchikhina won the first Paralympic gold medal for Russia since 2014 with victory in the standing super G. Great Britain's joyless start to the Winter Paralympics continues as wheelchair curlers Jo Butterfield and Jason Kean miss out on the mixed doubles semi-finals in a devastated performance.
Horse Racing
Trainer Jeremy Scott believes Golden Ace can successfully defend her Champion Hurdle title at the Cheltenham Festival. Sean Bowen has achieved most of what there is to achieve as a jockey but there is one glaring omission on his impressive CV - a Cheltenham Festival win. Gillian Fortescue-Thomas remembers the 1976 Cheltenham Festival where she became the first female rider to complete a race in what was everything groundbreaking.
Other Sports
Britain's Sky Brown became a skateboarding world champion for the second time after winning gold in a rain-disrupted park event in Brazil. Sri Lanka named former South Africa batter Gary Kirsten as their new head coach. The BMF title headliner between Charles Oliveira and Max Holloway earned the lowest grade at UFC 326 in a fight that showed the F in BMF stands for fail.