Yahoo Sports AM: Is Pitino the GOAT?

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🚨 Headlines

🏀 Automatic bids: McNeese, American and Montana punched their tickets to the NCAA men’s tournament, while Montana State, USF and San Diego State secured spots in the women’s field.

⚽️ The final eight: The Champions League quarterfinals are set, with Real Madrid (by inches in a shootout), Dortmund, Arsenal and Aston Villa advancing to join Barcelona, PSG, Bayern Munich and Inter Milan.

⚾️ Historic power surge: Kansas hit an NCAA record-tying five straight home runs in the third inning en route to a 29-1 shellacking over the same Minnesota team that beat them one day earlier. Go figure.

🏀 Thunder 118, Celtics 112: Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (34-5-7) and Chet Holmgren (23-15) led OKC past Jayson Tatum (33-8-8) and Boston in a battle of the two NBA title favorites.

🏈 NFL offseason: DeMarcus Lawrence is a Seahawk, Evan Engram is a Bronco, the Rams released Cooper Kupp, the Falcons are keeping Kirk Cousins and the Steelers made an offer to Aaron Rodgers. See all the latest moves here.

🏀 Is Rick Pitino the best college hoops coach ever?

Just asking: Is Rick Pitino the best coach in the history of college basketball?

From Yahoo Sports’ Dan Wetzel:

Pitino is rarely mentioned in such a debate in part because his 758 career victories, his .712 winning percentage and even his two NCAA titles (one of which the NCAA “vacated” due to sanctions) fall far short of other contenders.

Duke’s Mike Krzyzewski won 1,202 games with a .766 winning percentage at Duke and Army, while taking home five national titles. John Wooden won 10 national championships at UCLA. Bob Knight won 902 games and three titles at Indiana despite coaching only one player who would ever become a NBA All-Star (Isiah Thomas).

Meanwhile, Adolph Rupp won 82.2% of his games at Kentucky, and in a more modern era, Roy Williams was victorious 77.4% of the time at North Carolina and Kansas. There are others.

As such, Pitino rarely finds his name among the greatest of the greats. He wasn’t a college lifer though, entrenched for decades at a single program.

Part of this was his NBA dalliances (eight seasons with the Celtics and Knicks). And part of it was due to the various scandals that seemed to crop up across the decades, leaving him to be seen with caution by some schools.

That meant either re-climbing the coaching ladder or even bouncing him out of the college game (from 2018-2020, for example, he coached in the Greek Professional League and won two titles).

Yet where consistent longevity is costing him in sheer numbers, the job-hopping and rebuilds he constantly produces offers a different résumé point. The guy can coach anyone, anywhere, at any time.

The 72-year-old is in his second season with St. John’s. He took over a storied but middling program and is about to lead them to the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2019. The Johnnie’s are 27-4 and won the Big East regular season title … by three games.

This will be the sixth different school Pitino has led to the NCAA tournament — the most of any coach — joining Boston University (1983), Providence (1987), Kentucky (1991), Louisville (2003) and Iona (2021).

It took five seasons as a young coach at BU, but other than that each program he has led made it within two years of being eligible for March Madness.

And while some of the schools have had historic success and great resources, none were in good shape when he arrived. In the season prior, the programs went a combined 76-105 (.419). Kentucky was even saddled with crippling sanctions, including a two-year postseason ban.

He’s been innovative — his embrace of the 3-point shot with Providence, where guard Billy Donovan would drive and kick out, was decades ahead of its time. He’s been relentless — his teams always play full-throttle defense, often with a full-court press.

He’s been resilient — he coached in an era where the NCAA once charged him as an assistant at Hawaii with giving players coupons for free food at McDonalds to today’s open market transfer portal where players could buy their own restaurant. None of it mattered. Has whistle; will win. Always.

Now he heads to the Big East Tournament again, looking to win the league again, in the same Madison Square Garden where after a high school game in 1970 he signed on the scorer’s table his scholarship papers with the University of Massachusetts.

Bottom line: Pitino’s numbers and accomplishments may never register up there with the other greats of the college game. But if you needed someone to take over a listless program, who else are you calling?

🇺🇸 Photos across America

Portland — Mikal Bridges’ buzzer-beating three in overtime lifted the Knicks to a 114-113 victory over the Trail Blazers — and earned the 10th “Double Bang” ever from Mike Breen.

Seattle — Brandon Mountour scored the fastest goal in NHL overtime history, finding the back of the net just four seconds into the extra period to complete the Kraken’s 5-4 comeback win over the Canadiens.

Indian Wells, California — Wild card Belinda Bencic, who returned from maternity leave just five months ago after the birth of her first child, stunned No. 3 Coco Gauff to reach the quarterfinals at the “Fifth Grand Slam.”

Houston — Mason Plumlee and Steven Adams were both ejected from the Rockets’ 111-104 win over the Suns after the two giants wrestled each other to the ground during a scuffle.

📸 Behind the lens

Caption: Tim Bringer of France competes in the Slopestyle final during the first stop on the 2025 Crankworx World Tour — the Super Bowl of mountain biking.

Behind the lens: Here’s photographer Hannah Peters on how she lined up this shot…

I checked the weather report the night before and the sunrise was right around the time of this event. I knew I needed to get there early if I were to make the most of it.

There were only a few athletes that were getting high enough on the jump to line up perfectly with the sun. I was perched on the side of a hill, adjusting myself in between each rider to try to get the perfect angle.

I was constantly looking at the position of the light, changing my exposure to create the silhouette and adapting my aperture to emphasize the rays from the sun.

Then it came down to a bit of luck and timing — I needed the right athlete doing the right trick at the right time, all while flying through the shape of the sun.

Camera/technique: Nikon Z9 camera body. Nikon Z 70-200mm f2.8 VR S lens. Exposure 1/3200 sec; f22; ISO 640.

⚽️ NWSL season preview

The 13th NWSL season kicks off on Friday, and it should begin much like the last one ended: with 12 teams chasing Orlando and Washington.

The favorites: The Pride and Spirit both set the league record with 18 wins last season before meeting in the championship game, where Orlando won its maiden title. There’s no good reason why they can’t run it back again.

• Orlando lost just twice last year, a stunning turnaround after five straight sub-.500 seasons, and the Pride’s core — led by Brazilian legend Marta and Zambian star Barbra Banda — remains intact.

• Washington, which beat Orlando in last week’s Challenge Cup, has the makings of a juggernaut. The Spirit boast seven USWNT members, including MVP finalist Trinity Rodman and reigning ROY Croix Bethune.

Others to watch: Last year’s third, fourth and fifth-place finishers headline our next three most interesting teams to watch.

• The Kansas City Current were every bit as dangerous as the frontrunners last year, led by newcomer Temwa Chaŵinga, who scored a league-record 21 goals en route to winning MVP. Now in Year 5, the 2022 runners-up seek their first title.

• Gotham FC are hard to pin down. The 2023 champs finished just four points behind Orlando last year, but then saw half a dozen key contributors leave in the offseason. Still, they’ve retooled with a number of shrewd signings and might surprise some people.

• Speaking of hard to pin down, the North Carolina Courage haven’t made it out of the first round since winning two straight titles in 2018-19. But they took a clear step forward last year and traded for rising USWNT star Jaedyn Shaw this offseason to help lead their attack.

Go deeper: Stars and storylines to watch (Yahoo Sports)

📺 Watchlist: The Players tees off

Golf’s most prestigious non-major begins today at TPC Sawgrass (7:30am ET, ESPN+; 1pm, Golf), where 144 golfers will compete for the largest purse on the PGA Tour ($25 million).

The super group: World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler (two-time defending champion), No. 2 Rory McIlroy (2019 champion) and No. 3 Xander Schauffele tee off at 1:29pm. See more pairings, tee times.

More to watch:

• ⚾️ Spring Breakout: Red Sox at Rays (7pm, MLB); Cubs at Dodgers (9pm, MLB.TV) … Year 2 of MLB’s showcase gets underway.*

• 🏀 NBA: Lakers at Bucks (7:30pm, TNT); Kings at Warriors (10pm, TNT) … Stephen Curry is two 3-pointers shy of 4,000. Second place has 3,127 (James Harden).

• 🏀 NCAAW: Stephen F. Austin at Southeastern Louisiana (5pm, ESPNU) … Southland title game.

• 🏒 NHL: Panthers at Maple Leafs (7pm, ESPN+); Golden Knights at Blue Jackets (7pm, ESPN+); Oilers at Devils (7:30pm, Disney+); Capitals at Kings (10:30pm, ESPN) … All of these teams would be in the playoffs if the season ended today.

• 🎾 Tennis: Indian Wells quarterfinals (2pm, Tennis) … No. 11 Ben Shelton vs. No. 13 Jack Draper (8pm) and No. 2 Iga Świątek vs. No. 8 Qinwen Zheng (2pm) headline today’s slate.

• ⚽️ Champions Cup: Cavalier (0-2) vs. Inter Miami (8pm, FS2) … Lionel Messi takes the field with a spot in the quarterfinals on the line.

• ⛳️ LIV: Singapore (9pm, Fox Sports app) … At Sentosa Golf Club.

• 🏀 Overtime Elite: YNG Dreamerz (1-1) vs. City Reapers (7pm, YouTube) … Game 3 in the best-of-five finals.

*How it works: Each organization has compiled an “All-Star team” featuring their minor league prospects, who will play 16 total games against each other over the next four days. 18 of 30 teams are sending their No. 1 prospect, and 72 of MLB’s top 100 prospects are participating.

⚽️ Champions League trivia

Real Madrid, back in the quarterfinals once again, has won five of the last nine Champions League titles.

Question: Which clubs won the other four?

Hint: Three from England, one from Germany.

Answer at the bottom.

⚾️ It’s time to draft your team

The 2025 MLB season is just around the corner, which means two things:

1. Ballpark hot dogs are back

2. And so is Fantasy Baseball!

Yahoo Fantasy: Create or join a league today. Want to draft right away? Skip the scheduling by joining an instant draft lobby.

Trivia answer: Liverpool (2019), Bayern Munich (2020), Chelsea (2021), Manchester City (2023)

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