The Tide play hoops, too: Alabama rises up to No. 1
Alabama is the new No. 1, rising to the top spot in The Associated Press Top 25 men's college basketball poll for the first time in 20 years.
Purdue's loss to Northwestern last week caused a jumble at the top of the AP Top 25 and that helped the Crimson Tide.
Alabama received 38 first-place votes from a 62-person media panel Monday, moving up two spots to leapfrog No. 2 Houston. The Cougars had 22 first-place votes to remain at No. 2 and Purdue, down to No. 3, still had two first-place votes.
UCLA and Kansas rounded out the top five.
Saint Mary's fell two spots to No. 17 after losing its first West Coast Conference game of the season, to Loyola Marymount in overtime last Thursday. The Gaels are now four spots behind Gonzaga, who checks in at No. 13 despite Saint Mary's being one game ahead of the Bulldogs in the WCC standings and beating Gonzaga on Feb. 4 in Moraga.
The two will square off in Spokane on the final Saturday of the WCC regular season on Feb. 25. This week, Saint Mary's plays at San Diego on Thursday and hosts BYU on Saturday.
Alabama has made a name for itself as more than just a football school since coach Nate Oats arrived from Buffalo in in 2019. The Crimson Tide reached the NCAA Tournament's Elite Eight two years ago and Oats pulled in one of the nation's best recruiting classes last year.
Alabama is No. 1 for the first time since spending two weeks atop the poll midway through the 2002-03 season. It also is the first school to be No. 1 in the AP football and basketball polls in the same season since Ohio State in 2010-11.
NO. 15 MIAMI WINS AT NORTH CAROLINA >> Jordan Miller had 24 points and 11 rebounds as No. 15 Miami took over after halftime then had to hold off a late rally to beat North Carolina 8072 in Chapel Hill, N.C.
Nijel Pack added 23 points for the Hurricanes (21-5, 12-4 ACC), who led by just one at halftime but shot 52% after the break while locking down on UNC's drivers who had found success getting to the rim in the first 20 minutes. The combination helped Miami stretch out the lead to as many as 14 points, with Miller and Pack leading the way from either behind the arc or with Miller's nifty moves inside. The Tar Heels are 16-10, 8-7.
Women's basketball
STANFORD ALUM GETS UNLV INTO TOP 25 FOR FIRST TIME SINCE 1994 >> UNLV coach and Stanford alum Lindy La Rocque was 4 years old the last time the Lady Rebels were ranked in the AP Top 25 women's basketball poll.
Now the Las Vegas native has the team back in the Top 25 for the first time since 1994: UNLV entered the poll at No. 23 on Monday.
“Obviously it means a lot. When I took the job I had a vision of what this place could be and what it once was,” La Rocque said. “That's what I remember and I'm trying to put the pieces together to make that come to fruition. This is one of the small milestones that gives you a little bit of joy and you know that you're doing some things right.”
South Carolina earned the No. 1 ranking for the 34th consecutive week. That is tied for the third-longest run atop the poll with UConn. Only the Huskies (51 weeks) and Louisiana Tech (36) have had longer streaks at No. 1.
La Rocque's former head coach Tara VanDerveer has Stanford back up to No. 3 after two wins in Arizona last week, including a blowout of then-No. 17 Arizona on national television on Thursday. The Cardinal benefitted from both LSU and UConn losing games to leapfrog above each, with LSU now at No. 5 and UConn at No. 6. Fellow Pac-12 school Utah is in at No. 4.
NO. 2 INDIANA ROUTS NO. 13 OHIO STATE IN COLUMBUS >> Mackenzie Holmes scored a career-high 33 points and Sara Scalia made six 3 pointers as No. 2 Indiana extended its winning streak to 12 games with an 83-59 win over No. 13 Ohio State.
The Hoosiers (24-1, 14-1 Big Ten) shot 74% in the first half and never looked back, pulling away from Ohio State after the score knotted at 6.
Cotie McMahon's 22 points led the Buckeyes (21-5, 10-5), who shot 46% from the field and 20% from 3-point distance. Ohio State was without starters Jacy Sheldon and Rebeka Mikulasikova due to injuries.
HEAL GETS 10TH WCC FRESHMAN NOD >> Santa Clara guard Tess Heal was named West Coast Conference freshman of the week once again on Monday, her 10th time winning the conference honor.
Heal, who scored a season-high 29 points against Pacific on Tuesday, is second among the nation's freshman with 455 total points, and her 16.9 points per game is fourth-best among Division I freshman.
Television
SUPER BOWL GETS THIRD-MOST VIEWERS IN HISTORY >> Sunday's Super Bowl was the third most-watched television show in history, with an estimated 113 million people watching the Kansas City Chiefs rally to defeat the Philadelphia Eagles.
The 2015 game between New England and Seattle on NBC holds the record at 114,442,000 viewers followed by Super Bowl 48 in 2014 on Fox between Seattle and Denver (112,191,000).
Fox said that the preliminary numbers include the broadcasts on Fox and Fox Deportes as well as streaming on Fox and the NFL's digital sites. The figures are via Nielsen's Fast National data and Adobe Analytics.
Final Nielsen data will be available on Tuesday.
This was Fox's 10th Super Bowl since it began airing NFL games in 1994 and the second most-watched program in Fox Sports history.
It would also be a slight increase over the 112.3 million average for last year's Super Bowl. The Los Angeles Rams' victory over the Cincinnati Bengals was broadcast by NBC and Telemundo and streamed on Peacock and NFL digital sites.
According to Adobe Analytics, the digital feed averaged a Super Bowlrecord 7 million streams, an 18% increase over last year (6 million) and more than double Fox's last Super Bowl in 2020 (3.4 million).
Soccer
CZECH SOCCER PLAYER COMES OUT AS GAY >> Czech Republic midfielder Jakub Jankto posted a video on social media saying he is gay, making him one of the most high-profile male soccer players to come out.
Jankto posted a video on Twitter saying: “I'm homosexual. And I no longer want to hide myself.”
The 27-year-old Jankto is playing for Sparta Prague this season on loan from Spanish club Getafe. He has previously played for Italian clubs Sampdoria and Udinese and has made 45 appearances for the Czech national team, scoring four goals and setting up 13 more.
Sparta Prague's official Twitter account retweeted the video and said “you have our support.”