Canes’ Pack might miss rest of season

The University of Miami men’s basketball team, mired in a four-game losing streak, might have to play its remaining five games without starting guard Nijel Pack.

Hurricanes coach Jim Larrañaga said Monday that Pack has been battling injuries all season and his status for the home game against No. 9 Duke on Wednesday and the remainder of the season is in question.

Pack, a fourth-year junior who played on

UM’s Final Four team last spring, missed Miami’s loss to Boston College on Saturday with a “lower extremity” injury and had missed two prior games, as well. The coach said during the Atlantic Coast Conference media call that he, team doctors,

Pack and the player’s family were discussing the guard’s future.

“While I’m on this conference call, our doctors are going to be on a conference call with Nijel and his parents to really look into the future and see what’s best for the young man,” Larrañaga said. He’s dealt with these injuries all season long. This is not something that just happened in the last week. He was dealing with this back in December. He missed a couple of games, then he came back and played and now he’s missing a couple more games.

Pack has played in 23 of UM’s 26 games this year, and is averaging 13.7 points, 2.6 rebounds and 3.6 assists per game. Miami (15-11, 6-9 ACC) is an NCAA Tournament long shot this season after a magical March in 2023.

NBA

Nets dismiss coach: Brooklyn fired coach Jacque Vaughn after less than two seasons.

Nets assistant coach Kevin Ollie is being promoted to interim head coach, ESPN reported.

The Nets are 21-33, the 11th seed in the Eastern Conference amid the All-Star break. They lost five of their last six heading into All-Star weekend.

Brooklyn signed Vaughn to a multi-year contract extension in February 2023.

Vaughn, 49, went 71-68 in parts of three seasons total as Nets head coach; he went 7-3 as interim head coach during the 2019-20 season. He did not coach a full season in Brooklyn, having taken over for Steve Nash seven games into the 202223 campaign.

NHL

Bruins 4, Stars 3: The Bruins tied the game with 1:45 left in regulation on a 6-on-5 David Pastrnak goal, then Charlie McAvoy got the winning goal in the ninth round of the shootout in Boston. McAvoy went to the backhand to beat Stars goalie Jake Oettinger for the deciding shootout goal. He also had two assists in regulation.

Wild 10, Canucks 7: Joel Eriksson Ek and

Kirill Kaprizov each finished with three goals and three assists, and host Minnesota set a franchise record for goals in a single game.

The Wild scored one goal in the first period, two goals in the second and a whopping seven goals in the third.