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Morning Edition

March 28, 2025

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The NBA is partnering with FIBA to explore a new European league, and existing franchises could join. What could it look like? Here’s what we know.

— Colin Salao [[link removed]] and Eric Fisher [[link removed]]

Silver: NBA Will ‘Explore’ European League With FIBA [[link removed]]

Stephanie Lecocq/Reuters via Imagn Images

Commissioner Adam Silver has officially declared the NBA’s pursuit of a new league in Europe.

“I’m particularly pleased today, along with my colleague Andreas, to announce that we’re ready to go to the next stage and that is to explore a potential league in Europe with FIBA as our partners,” Silver said Thursday alongside FIBA secretary general Andreas Zagklis.

His announcement directly followed a meeting with the NBA’s Board of Governors. Silver said he received “enthusiastic support” from the team owners.

He added that “nothing has been agreed upon” with regard to the new league’s structure, but some of the current discussions involve honoring the traditions of European basketball. This includes playing a 40-minute game rather than 48 minutes and the potential for an “open” league, which would include a promotion-relegation structure most famously done in European soccer. U.S. pro leagues operate under a “closed” system in which teams maintain their spot in the league regardless of performance.

“I think given the opportunity to design a league from scratch, one of the things we’re looking at is what are the best elements we can take of both systems,” Silver said. The initial idea, according to Silver, is to have 16 teams—12 permanent and four spots for qualifiers.

In terms of which teams will join, he said the NBA is gauging the interest of existing European clubs. While Silver did not name any teams, The Athletic reported Thursday that four EuroLeague clubs [[link removed]] that could move to the NBA’s new league are Real Madrid, Barca Barcelona, ASVEL Basket of Villeurbanne, and Fenerbahçe Istanbul. A new team could reportedly be founded in Paris by Qatar Sports Investments, owners of the soccer club Paris Saint-Germain.

Silver said part of the reason for announcing the decision to explore a league—and not to confirm that the league will be established—is for transparency with potential teams.

“We want to have very open and direct conversations with existing stakeholders and not have backroom conversations. It was our feeling if we announced our intentions, then we could openly discuss with existing stakeholders, existing clubs, what their level of interest is and the community would know that,” Silver said.

Silver added that one of the opportunities of a new league would be to “build more state-of-the-art basketball-style arenas in Europe.” Earlier this week, Todd Boehly, part-owner of Chelsea FC who wants to build a new stadium for his club, cited the NBA’s potential European expansion [[link removed]] as a reason to build new sports infrastructure in the region.

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March Madness Shift: Will Other Stars Maintain Momentum Without JuJu? [[link removed]]

Robert Hanashiro-Imagn Images

Life after Caitlin Clark has gone about as expected for the women’s March Madness tournament. Viewership is down significantly, but the retention rate is high enough that the first two rounds still broke records [[link removed]] when excluding last year’s numbers.

But the continued success of the tournament was in no small part due to USC star JuJu Watkins. The Trojans had the second-most-watched women’s game of the first round and the third-most-watched game of the second round—even if the latter tipped off at 10 p.m. ET on Monday.

However, the second game saw Watkins go down with a season-ending ACL tear [[link removed]]—one that will probably keep her out for most, if not all, of next season as well—which could be a slight setback in the momentum of women’s basketball [[link removed]] especially after Paige Bueckers’s likely departure from UConn [[link removed]] at the end of this season.

Luckily for March Madness and its rights holder, ESPN, Bueckers and UConn are still alive in this year’s tournament. The Huskies games were the most watched of each round, despite both being blowouts. UConn is a 15.5-point favorite to beat Oklahoma in the Sweet 16, though their Elite Eight battle was set up to be a duel against Watkins and the Trojans, which would have been the tournament’s best challenge at mirroring the Caitlin Clark Effect this year. The two sides drew 2.2 million viewers when they met in December, still the most-watched women’s basketball game of the season.

Remember the Names

Like last year, the remainder of the tournament will be a chance for new stars to emerge, whether for the next NCAA season or as they turn pro.

Notre Dame and TCU square off Saturday with several top prospects, with the Fighting Irish’s Hannah Hidalgo, Olivia Miles, and Sonia Citron facing the Horned Frogs’ Hailey Van Lith and Sedona Prince. Citron, Van Lith, and Prince are all expected to be in the 2025 WNBA draft, while Miles is projected to go as high as No. 2—unless she decides to return to college.

If she chooses to stay in school, a high-profile win over TCU and a deeper tournament run alongside Hidalgo—who is second to Watkins in odds to win the Wooden Award [[link removed]], and, like Watkins, will be WNBA draft eligible in 2027—could put the spotlight on South Bend next year.

Most of the powerhouse programs are still on the board because no team below the No. 5 seed advanced to the Sweet 16. Dawn Staley and South Carolina are right behind the Huskies as the tournament favorites [[link removed]], SEC rivals Texas and LSU have looked impressive, and UCLA’s Lauren Betts is third in Wooden Award odds. USC is not out of the picture with Kiki Iriafen, a projected top-five WNBA draft pick, taking over in the absence of Watkins.

Sportsbooks Reflect MLB’s Divide: Dodgers Heavy Favorites, White Sox No Shot [[link removed]]

Brad Penner-Imagn Images

As Major League Baseball experiences a growing economic divide [[link removed]], and perhaps an enlarging competitive one as well, sportsbooks and analytics experts are taking close notice.

The league begins its 2025 regular season in full with two historic situations among sports bettors: The defending champion Dodgers are the league’s heaviest Opening Day betting favorite since the 2002 Yankees, according to ESPN [[link removed]], while the White Sox’ projected win total of 53.5 for over-under bets is the lowest such MLB prediction in nearly four decades.

Some of this sentiment directly follows last year’s actual outcomes in which the Dodgers won their first full-season championship since 1988 [[link removed]], while the White Sox lost 121 games, setting a modern-era MLB record and tying an American League record with 21 straight losses [[link removed]] at one point. The betting lines, however, reflect a belief that those trends will grow, with the league’s mightiest teams becoming stronger and the weakest ones falling further behind the leaders.

Los Angeles is mounting its title defense after a highly active offseason that included acquisitions of starting pitchers Blake Snell and Roki Sasaki, relievers Tanner Scott and Kirby Yates, and the retention of outfielder Teoscar Hernández, among other moves. The club’s luxury-tax payroll of $398.2 million for 2025 is a new league record. The White Sox, conversely, traded away arguably their most talented player, pitcher Garrett Crochet, to the Red Sox.

The Dodgers have an implied probability of more than 25% to win the World Series on both FanDuel and DraftKings, by far the two market leaders in U.S. sports betting.

The baseball analytics community concurs strongly with the gambling industry sentiment. Baseball Prospectus projections [[link removed]] have the Dodgers at 104.2 wins for the season, more than 10 wins greater than any other MLB club, and holding a 99.8% chance of reaching the playoffs. The White Sox have a projection of 62.5 wins for 2024, actually beating out the Marlins’ 60 and the Rockies’ 55.8, but all three teams are deemed to have literally no shot of playing in the postseason.

FanGraphs [[link removed]], similarly, predicts the Dodgers will win 97.4 games and have a 97.9% chance of the postseason, with the White Sox pegged for 62.9 wins. The site also projects that Chicago, along with Colorado, has a 0% shot of the postseason.

Despite the enlarging gaps, MLB has not had a repeat World Series winner since 2000, a streak of competitive balance unrivaled among any major men’s pro sports league in North America. The heavy favoritism for the Dodgers, however, suggests the quarter-century streak could be coming to an end.

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Yankees RSN, Comcast Reach Last-Minute Extension in Ongoing Dispute [[link removed]]

The Record

There’s been another temporary reprieve in the YES Network–Comcast carriage dispute, as the sides have struck a short-term extension and agreed to keep negotiating, according to industry sources.

The regional sports network home of MLB’s Yankees and the NBA’s Nets will stay on the air for New York–area Comcast subscribers until at least 11:59 p.m. on March 31. The four-day extension arrived just hours before a distribution contract on the No. 2 U.S. cable carrier was due to expire [[link removed]].

The extension, at least the 10th in this ongoing negotiation, ensures the YES Network will be on the air for Comcast subscribers when it begins its live game coverage of the Yankees’ 2025 regular season Saturday. ESPN carried the team’s season opener Thursday.

A large-scale philosophical divide remains, however, between YES Network and Comcast, particularly as the distributor continues its efforts to place RSNs on more expensive premium tiers. Nearly two dozen such channels have already been tiered on Comcast systems.

The YES Network insists it has a unique status as one of the most-watched RSNs in the country, operating as the only such channel in the No. 1 U.S. media market with top-tier live sports all year and with the revered brand of the Yankees.

In addition to the specific issues related to this negotiation, and RSNs more generally, Comcast also has other MLB interests potentially at play, as its NBC Sports has openly expressed interest in regaining national rights [[link removed]] with the league.

FRONT OFFICE SPORTS NETWORK

Wake Forest Football Head Coach Jake Dickert

Wake Forest football is entering a new era under head coach Jake Dickert. In this episode of Next Up with Adam Breneman. Dickert opens up about the challenges and opportunities that come with leading a Power 4 program. From his first team meeting to the culture he’s building, Dickert shares what it takes to win in today’s college football landscape.

He talks about the unconventional path that led him to this role, the lessons he’s learned from adversity, and why he believes Wake Forest has what it takes to compete at the highest level. He also dives into the importance of leadership, accountability, and surrounding yourself with the right people—both on and off the field.

Watch the full Next Up episode here [[link removed]].

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Question of the Day

Who was your favorite player to watch in the first two rounds of women’s March Madness?

Paige Bueckers [[link removed]] JuJu Watkins [[link removed]] Someone else [[link removed]]

Thursday’s result: An overwhelming 97% of respondents think the transfer portal should stay closed until the end of the NCAA tournament.

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