Washington enters Top 25 for first time since 2017

Undefeated South Carolina remained the unanimous No. 1 while Washington — also undefeated — entered the Associated Press Top 25 women's college basketball poll for the first time since 2017. The Gamecocks improved to 10-0 with a 99-29 demolition of Presbyterian on Saturday. The entire top 10 remains unchanged from the previous week — UCLA (9-0), North Carolina State (11-0), Iowa (11-1) and Texas (11-0) round out the top five, followed by Southern California (8-0), LSU (11-1), Colorado (9-1), Stanford (9-1) and Baylor (9-0). Washington (11-0) debuts at No. 23 after a 64-32 win over Saint Mary's, its first appearance in the Top 25 since the final poll in the 2016-17 season. TCU (11-0) also made its 2023-24 debut at No. 25. Miami and UNLV dropped out of the poll. The res…

How Those 3-on-3 Overtime Rules Would Cut Down NHL Shootouts

The NHL general managers are having their annual meetings this week and for the second year in a row they are discussing rule changes to decrease the number of games that are resolved by a shootout. The particular ideas they're tossing around—centered around adopting a 3-on-3 overtime—stand a very good chance of working. Since the 2005-2006 season when the NHL got rid of regular season ties by adding the shootout, roughly 2 out of every 5 overtime games ended with a sudden-death goal in overtime. The winners of the remaining 60 percent of games were decided by the shootout, which is a huge amount of games to end in such an unsatisfying fashion. A couple seasons ago, the NHL decreased the value of shootout wins by decreasing their impact as a tiebreaker in the standings. Prio…