Good Morning, Stumpers!

Happy Feb 12, everybody! Talk about a whole lot of action yesterday! We had a whole lot of basketball and some Champions League drama! UConn Freshman Liam McNeeley made a country-wide statement with 38 points! If you watch anything today, check out the 1 minute clip of ‘Slick Rick’ from the Buffalo Bills Mailroom! Josh gave him a shoutout in his MVP speech! Let’s have a day today!

Today’s Rundown

Everything you’ll get from today’s edition, and more:

• 🏀 Liam McNeeley with 38 for the Huskies!

• ⚽️ Champions League Knockout Round Day 1

• 🏒 The ‘4 Nations’ gets underway in the world of Hockey

• 🏨 A Hotel GLUE GUY for you! Guess this one before you look!

On This Day

On This Day…

🏀 Bill Grabs Boards

Nowadays, a guy grabs 20 rebounds in an NBA game, and the world goes crazy, but on this day in 1958, Bill Russell brought down 41 rebounds while playing for the Boston Celtics!

What’s even crazier is that this is only T-7 for the most rebounds secured by an individual in a single NBA game! If you look up the list of the most rebounds in a game, it will blow your mind. It’s literally just a list of Bill Russell and Wilt Chamberlain putting up heinous stats in the late 1950s into the 60s. These guys were nuts!

Trivia Time

🧠 Test your sports knowledge…

Yesterday’s Trivia Answer: (D) Real Madrid! A team that seems to always show up for the big ones! In last year’s finals, Real Madrid defeated Borussia Dortmund, 2-0, in front of 86,000 in Wembley Stadium. This was their 5th Champions League victory in just the last 10 years! Domination!

Before We Dive In…

👀 Here’s Yesterday’s MUST-See’s

• 🏀 Is that KAT or a Globetrotter?

• 🏀 A picture worth hanging for the freshman!

• 🏈 Slick Rick! Must Watch!

• 🏀 KD Reaches 30,000 points! 8th player ever!

The Hot Stove

College Basketball

🚨 LIAM. MCNEELEY. Bad Move to Count Out the Huskies!

What to know: You don’t count out the back-to-back National Champs! You just don’t do it. Their freshman superstar came up big yesterday…BIG!

UConn was on the road last night in a place they had never won before. In the few years they’ve been in the Big East together, UConn-Creighton has been one of the better rivalries in the conference. Despite winning back-to-back titles, UConn still had not beaten Creighton in Omaha.

The Huskies were coming off a tough loss at home to St. Johns, and Creighton was heading into the game with a 9-game winning streak. The Huskies were just going to mail it in, right?

What a ridiculous thought that would be!

HAVE A NIGHT, LIAM MCNEELEY! It was a historic night for the freshman! He had a UConn freshman record 38 points! He shattered the record of Rip Hamilton, who had scored 31 twice. When UConn fell behind by 14 points in the first half, with a laboring Hassan Diarra and Solo Ball, it looked like it could get ugly quick.

You don’t often see anybody in college basketball single-handedly put the team on their back, let alone a freshman, but what went on in the final 30 minutes of the game was unlike anything Huskies fans have seen from a freshman! McNeeley went 12/22 from the field and 5/10 from behind the arc. He tacked on 10 rebounds as well! Just an all-around dominant performance from McNeeley. The highlights are worth watching HERE.

This was UConn’s first game outside the AP Top 25 in 2 years, and leave it to the guy who still hasn’t won any hardware with the team to erupt!

What a game, what a performance.

It doesn’t matter what seed this team is, they will be DANGEROUS in March! When the going gets tough, the tough get going!

UConn 70, Creighton 66! Great win for the Huskies!

NHL

🏒 4 Nations Face off Gets Started

What to know: The 2025 4 Nations Face-Off will temporarily replace the NHL All-Star Game for the season. In the tournament, teams representing Canada, Finland, Sweden, and the United States will face of in a round-robin format, followed by a one-game final between the top-placed teams.

It’s important to note that only NHL players will be active for these teams.

The games will take place at the Bell Centre in Montreal and TD Garden in Boston. Each team will play 3 games, the top two teams who accumulate the most points will play each other for the final.

Currently, Canada is the top ranked team in the world, followed by Finland at 2, the United State in fourth, and Sweden in the 6th spot. Four of the top six in the world! Pretty dang sweet.

I don’t know about you, but this fires me up. When a player is representing his country, it just means more! This is going to be one hell of a show. The action gets rolling tonight as Finland takes on Sweden at 8:00 PM ET on TNT.

Soccer

⚽️ Champions League Knockouts: Day 1

What to know: The road to the UEFA Champions League finals has finally reached the knockout rounds. Day one featured some of the biggest names in European soccer as teams are fighting for their spot in the round of 16. Let’s look at the teams who went to battle on the pitch today.

Brest vs Paris Saint-Germain: PSG went wire to wire in this one with the lead, scoring a 21st-minute goal in penalty kicks. Forward Ousmane Dembele was the man of the match with two second-half goals. Dembele has now scored 18 goals in his last 11 matches, while PSG is unbeaten in their last 31 encounters against Brest. PSG 3, Brest 0.

Juventus vs PSV: Fans of American Soccer will be familiar with the name Weston McKennie! It was the American who got the scoring started in the 34th minute for Juventus. It went into halftime 1-0. It was Ivan Perisic who knotted it up at one a piece in the 56th minute. It was a relatively even game in terms of possession, it looked like it could be anyone’s game. It was the SUBSTITUTE Samuel Mbangula who got the go-ahead goal for Juventus in the 82nd minute! Juventus 2, PSV 1!

Manchester City vs Real Madrid: If you want to talk about two powerhouses, this is the matchup right here. Powerhouses within a field of powerhouses. As you saw in our trivia, historically, Real Madrid plays unbelievably in the Champions League. The stars just always seem to align. Was yesterday any different? After 2 goals from Erling Haaland and one from Kylian Mbappe, Man City was up 2-1 in the 85th minute. Real Madrid surely would drop one! No. CHAOS ENSUED! It was a see it to believe it game in Manchester, but Real Madrid rattled off two goals! One from Diaz in the 86th minute, and the finisher from Jude Bellingham in the 93rd! MADNESS! Check out the highlights here! Real Madrid 3, Man City, 2!

Sporting CP vs Borussia Dortmund: We’ll start this section the same way we started. With a good old-fashioned drubbing! It went into half 0-0, but it was all Dortmund after the break! Rattling off not one, not two, but THREE second-half goals to get the defiant win. Borussia Dortmund 3, Sporting CP 0!

Quick Hitters

• 🏀 Gafford is out for Mavs with knee strain; re-evaluated in 2 weeks

• 🏈 Saints officially hire Eagles OC Kellen Moore to be next Head Coach

• 🏀 Lakers sign big-man Alex Len to be their missing piece in the frontcourt!

• ⚾️ Dodgers remain hungry for another title in 2025!

What We’re Watching

🏀 ESPN decided to treat all of us to a little double header today!

• Spurs @ Celtics (7:00 PM), Warriors @ Mavericks (9:30 PM)

• More: Hawks @ Knicks, Cavs @ Raptors, Bucks @ Timberwolves, Suns @ Rockets, Trail Blazers @ Nuggets, Grizzlies @ Clippers

🏒 4 Nations Day One!

• Canada vs Sweden (8:00 PM on TNT)

🏀 College Basketball ranked action:

• Men’s: (9) St. Johns @ Villanova (6:00 PM on FS1), Cal @ Duke (9:00 PM on ACCN), Arizona State @ (12) Texas Tech (9:00 PM on CBSSN), Oklahoma @ (21) Missouri (9:00 PM on SECN)

• Women’s: (14) Kansas State @ Cincy (6:30 PM), Wisconsin @ (22) Michigan State (6:30 PM), St. Johns @ (7) UConn (7:30 PM), Arizona @ (20) Oklahoma State (7:30 PM)

⚽️ Fútbol!

• Champions League 1st Leg: Brugge vs Atalanta (12:45 PM), Monaco vs Benfica (3:00 PM), Celtic vs Bayern Munich (3:00 PM), Rotterdam vs AC Milan (3:00 PM)

The Moment You’ve Been Waiting For

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