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On First Take, Stephen A.

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The Vikings are a part of history.
Another playoff season has come and gone for the Minnesota Vikings without success. The NFL’s best regular season team continues to struggle when the games matter the most, and that manifested on Monday night with a blowout loss to the Los Angeles Rams that made it look like the Vikings never belonged in the playoffs.
It was also a loss that cemented the Vikings in history once more.

Indiana has been one of the NBA’s hottest teams, winning six straight, capped by an impressive win over the NBA-best Cavaliers on Sunday.

Indiana has turned into one of the NBA’s hottest teams.

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Photo by Kevin Sabitus/Getty Images
The best teams left in the playoffs and how we piece them together.
Six playoff games are in books.
Seven games, and eight teams, remain standing on the road to Super Bowl LIX.
How did the Wild Card round influence our thinking when it comes to which of the eight teams left standing have the best odds of winning the Lombardi Trophy? As we did last week, our staff writers here at. SB Nation each ranked the teams left standing, and based on the voting results, we have our latest set of rankings.

Let’s take a different approach and look at three trades — including one involving Jimmy Butler — that make check the boxes of the modern NBA landscape.

Charles Huff had to deal with an outrageous locker room issue this past season at Marshall.
Huff is the new coach at Southern Miss after departing the Thundering Herd following a very successful 10-3 season.
He will now try to improve a program that won just one game this season, and for the sake of his sanity, he better hope he leaves one problem behind.
What was Huff’s biggest issue while coaching the Thundering Herd? Injuries? NIL? Locker room fights? Academics?
Nope.
Players complaining about their ratings on “College Football 25.

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Jon Rahm during a practice round ahead of the 2025 Hero Dubai Desert Classic. | Photo by David Cannon/Getty Images
Even though he joined LIV Golf, Jon Rahm remains steadfast in representing the Europeans at Bethpage Black.
Because of his affiliation with LIV Golf, Jon Rahm faces a bevy of sanctions and fines from the DP World Tour, which facilitates the Ryder Cup from the European side.
He does not know when arbitrators will settle those issues, but he is sure of one thing: he plans to play on the 2025 Ryder Cup team.

Dan Patrick unpacks the Cowboys’ decision

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Safe to say he loved the look 👏 (via @itsjaz

Spurs stars Chris Paul and Victor Wembanyama gave game-worn jerseys to JJ Redick’s sons, who lost their entire memorabilia collection in the wildfires that burned down their family home.

Stephen Curry said that while he wants the slumping Warriors to improve, he doesn’t want the team to make a “desperate” move that would “deplete the future.

Texas wide receiver Isaiah Bond is leaving school early to enter the NFL draft, he told ESPN’s Pete Thamel.

As Vikings QB Sam Darnold’s dream season sputtered to a close Monday night in a playoff loss to the Rams, he now heads toward free agency with his future as unsettled as ever.

Cowboys owner and general manager Jerry Jones has spoken with Colorado coach Deion Sanders about Dallas’ open head coach position, a source confirmed to ESPN.

New details about now-banned NBA player Jontay Porter and his alleged betting habits have been revealed, and they are something, to put it incredibly mildly.
In early 2024, an investigation unveiled Porter’s scheme of purchasing player props to underperform to cash on his ‘under’ bets. It was also discovered that he bet against his own team, the Toronto Raptors, during his tenure with the club from 2023 to 2024.
Porter’s betting strategy included exiting games early due to a ‘medical reason’ to hit on his own player prop bets.

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We have entered the final week of the college football season, with Ohio State and Notre Dame set to play for a title next Monday in Atlanta. 
After what has been a wild ride that started in Dublin, Ireland, it will all come down to one final game inside Mercedes-Benz Stadium. For the Fighting Irish, I don’t know how many folks thought they’d be in this spot following that loss to Northern Illinois in September, but here they are, on the final leg of their redemption tour.

Jeff Saturday, Dan Graziano, Louis Riddick and

Nottingham Forest defender Ola Aina talks with

Photo by Mitchell Leff/Getty Images
The Wild Card Round was unkind to a couple of superstar quarterbacks.
Somehow, at some point very recently, the NFL decided that the opening round of the playoffs was to be called the Wild Card Weekend. This was a startling change.
You see, in recent years the NFL has tried to force the round in question as the Super Wild Card Weekend and has done so in a (clearly) failing effort.
Sunday night’s game provided the first bit of true entertainment as the first four games of this whole thing were sleepy outings at best.

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The professional divorce between Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones and coach Mike McCarthy has been submitted for its autopsy, and that work is being done by reporters throughout the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex now.
But the exercise, whichever direction it leads, has to start with the fact that Jones has hurt himself. And his football team.
It must be acknowledged that barring some trick up his sleeve, where he’s been stashing a secret weapon coach hire like Deion Sanders or Mike Tomlin (in trade), Jones put himself and his team at a significant disadvantage this NFL hiring cycle.

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The Australian Open does not own all of its broadcasting rights. Therefore, it can’t broadcast every tournament match, at least not in the traditional sense. The tournament has thought way outside the box to combat this and still give fans a way to watch the match.
Several matches during the first couple of days of the Grand Slam have been streamed on YouTube. The players appear not as themselves but as Wii characters, technically called Mii characters, with movements matching those of the players on the court.

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Photo by Ryan Kang/Getty Images
There are some stout defensive tackles available in free agency.
With a few defensive tackles projected to be taken in the first round of the 2025 NFL Draft and several plug-and-go starters available in free agency, the DT positions are sure to see some overhaul this offseason.
We polled a group of writers from around SB Nation to gather consensus rankings about the players.
We will remove players from the list as they re-sign with their current teams all the way up to the opening of free agency in March.

On Sunday, police arrested a man accused of stalking WNBA superstar Caitlin Clark. The details of the alleged stalking are disturbing. 
As OutKick reported Monday, “the Marion County Prosecutor’s office alleged the man sent the Indiana Fever star numerous threats and sexually explicit messages via his social media accounts’” before eventually trying to physically contact Clark by traveling to Indianapolis.

The idiom that best suits Sam Darnold now? The bubble has burst.
Or the dream has become a nightmare.
It’s your choice, but this much is certain:
Darnold’s season that looked so promising and gave off such a feel-good vibe about the value of resiliency has collapsed. And the Minnesota Vikings quarterback found himself buried under the rubble Monday night.
“At the end of the day, all that matters, when you have a good season,” Darnold said, “is what you do in the playoffs. And we didn’t get it done today and that’s all that matters.

Which players should the Patriots consider in the first round of the 2025 NFL Draft? Here’s a roundup of predictions from recent expert mock drafts.

Jay Croucher (@croucherJD) and Drew Dinsick (@w

Tiger Woods looks on during TGL’s opening match. | Photo by Brennan Asplen/Getty Images
Tiger Woods will make his highly-anticipated TGL debut against Collin Morikawa and the Los Angeles Golf Club.
After a successful launch on Jan. 7, which received tremendous acclaim from golf fans, TGL returns on Tuesday with the biggest name in the game.
Tiger Woods, one of the co-founders, will lead his Jupiter Golf Links into battle against the Los Angeles Golf Club, the team headlined by two-time major winner Collin Morikawa.

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Sam Darnold joins the media following the Vikin

Bryant McFadden joins CBS Sports HQ to break do

Kevin O’Connor is joined by Deuce Mason and Morgan Ragan as they chat the current state of the Sacramento Kings & answer mailbag questions from fans.

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Scott Van Pelt is joined by Joe Buck, Troy Aikm

A 14-win season has gone to waste.
The top question heading into Monday’s showdown between the Minnesota Vikings and Los Angeles Rams was simple: does Sam Darnold have the “juice” to lead his team to victory?
As it turns out, the project-QB-turned-Viking did not have the juice.
Darnold gave a miserable performance for Minnesota in a Wild Card matchup against LA — the Vikings suffered a gutting 27-9 loss to Sean McVay’s Rams.
Darnold held the ball too long all night, giving the booming Rams defense nine sacks (tying an NFL postseason record).

Kevin O’Connell joins the media following

Bryant McFadden and Emory Hunt join CBS Sports

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The Rams dominated the Vikings, sacking Sam Darnold an NFL playoff record-tying nine times, to win Monday night in an NFC wild-card game that was moved out of Southern California because of devastating wildfires.

Sean McVay joins the media following the Rams w

Bryant McFadden and Emory Hunt join CBS Sports