This felt like so many of Oklahoma City’s games during the regular season. In particular, the 68 wins. The Thunder’s elite pressure defense forced 19 turnovers and turned that into 31 points. Oklahoma City’s defense also took away the paint, giving up just 20 points on 43.5% shooting in the key. The Timberwolves tried to shoot over the top of that defense and it got them an early lead when they shot 8-of-19 to start the game. Eventually, the math caught up with them, and Minnesota shot 7-of-32 (21.9%) the rest of the way. Then came the run. Sparked by that defense, the Thunder took the lead with a 10-0 run using their small-ball lineup in the third quarter. That was stretched out to 17-2 with Kenrich Williams hitting some big shots off the bench. By the start of the fourth, Oklahoma City was up by 10, 76-66, and from there they started to pull away. Oklahoma City won the second half 70-40. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, after a rough 2-of-13 first half, found his groove, shot 8-of-14 in the second half, drew fouls, and finished with a game-high 31 points. “I didn’t particularly change my mindset, honestly. I just tried to continue to be aggressive, trust my work,” Gilgeous-Alexander said postgame. The result was a comfortable 114-88 win at home, which has Oklahoma City up 1-0 in the Western Conference Finals. Game 2 is Thursday night in the same building. Defense is why Oklahoma City is the title favorite, and it held Anthony Edwards to zero points in the fourth quarter, and the Timberwolves team to a 92.6 offensive rating for the game. It’s not just that the Thunder have elite defenders like Lu Dort and Alex Caruso, it’s their teamwork — they can have two or three players swarming the ball trying to force a turnover, yet still seem not to leave anyone else open. By the end, the swarming defense had the Timberwolves hesitant and second-guessing before making a pass. OKC’s defense led to offense. Also in the second half, the Thunder started to get inside the Timberwolves’ stout defense (something they didn’t do well in the first 24 minutes), which led to dunks and open 3-pointers. It was a rough night for Minnesota’s leader Edwards, who picked up a foolish early technical for tossing the ball at Gilgeous-Alexander. Later in the first quarter, Edwards went back to the locker room after turning his ankle on a landing. Fortunately, he returned to the floor midway through the second quarter and looked like nothing had happened. Julius Randle was Minnesota’s offense in the first half, scoring 20 points and shooting 5-of-6 from 3. Minnesota was an impressive 7-of-17 on above-the-break 3-pointers in the first half, but that dried up after the break. The Thunder’s defense focused more on Randle, who scored eight points in the second half, and nobody else stepped up. Edwards finished with 18 for Minnesota as only he and Randle scored in double figures. “I definitely got to shoot more. I took 13 f***** shots,” Edwards said. “But I’ll say probably just get off the ball a little more. Play without the ball. I think that would be the answer, because playing on the ball, they’re just going to double and sit in the gaps all day. So I’ve got to go watch some film and take it apart and figure it out.” Jalen Williams and Chet Holmgren came on in the second half for the Thunder, finishing with 19 and 15 points, respectively. “It’s Game 1,” Timberwolves coach Chris Finch said. “They won at home. Congrats to them. They played really well. There’s another game in two days.”

Seahawks third-round pick Jalen Milroe signed his rookie contract on Tuesday, the team announced. He is the ninth of Seattle’s 11 draft picks to sign. Last week, the Seahawks signed first-round pick Grey Zabel, fifth-rounders Rylie Mills, Tory Horton and Robbie Ouzts, sixth-rounder Bryce Cabeldue, and seventh-rounders Damien Martinez, Mason Richman and Ricky White III. The only unsigned members of the 2025 draft class are second-round picks Nick Emmanwori and Elijah Arroyo. “It’s definitely a great feeling,” Milroe said after signing, via John Boyle of the team website. “To be able to have an organization that’s behind you — they selected me out of all the individuals that were placed in the draft — I was one of their selections in this year’s draft. So I’m tremendously happy that I have the support of the organization, but now it’s all about putting our best foot forward moving forward for the organization and for the guys in the locker room.” Milroe is participating in the team’s voluntary offseason workouts. “For me it’s all about relationships, building relationships with everyone in the locker room, offense and defense,” Milroe said. “What’s big when it comes to that offseason period before you get into the season is the relationship phase. Secondly, mastering us on offense. Who’s our guys offensively, in the receiving corps, tight ends, fullback, running back, quarterback room, just understanding everyone as a whole, because this is a new phase in my life on a new team, so that’s big. Xs and Ox are Xs and Os, but it’s all about the relationship factor right now.” Milroe, the 92nd overall pick, was a two-year starter at Alabama. He threw for 5,678 yards and 39 touchdowns with 17 interceptions the past two seasons, while also rushing for 1,257 yards and 32 touchdowns. He joins the quarterbacks room that includes Sam Darnold and Drew Lock.

Joe Burrow declined to appear on Season 1 of the Netflix series Quarterback. He is featured in Season 2, which debuts in July. So what changed? “They caught me on a good day,” Burrow joked Tuesday, via Jay Morrison of SI.com. It actually was Peyton Manning, the show’s executive producer, who changed Burrow’s mind about being a part of it along with Jared Goff and Kirk Cousins. “A big part was Peyton being involved in it,” Burrow said. “I have a lot of respect for him, obviously. What he did, does, as a person, when that guy reaches out to you and asks you to do something . . . most of the time I’m going to say ‘yes.’” Burrow said, because he trusts Manning, he sees the opportunity as a high-reward, no-risk scenario. “Only positive things could come out of it,” Burrow said. “He’s going to protect me, protect our team, protect our organization. I have trust in him for saying that and trust that he’s going to do that. I probably wouldn’t have done it if he wasn’t involved, but I have a lot of trust and faith in him to not do anything that would hurt me or the team.” Hard Knocks cameras already were filming the Bengals in 2024 anyway, so it made it easier for Burrow to accept Manning’s invitation. But Quarterback will address the burglary of Burrow’s home in December, something not mentioned in Hard Knocks after the Bengals nixed it. “That was definitely a curveball I didn’t quite expect throughout the whole process, but the people involved in it, working on it day to day, were great and weren’t too intrusive,” Burrow said. “I worked with some good people with that.” Burrow had his final interview with the show last week and has watched screenings of the first few episodes. But he said he will leave it to viewers whether it’s any good or not.

As of late March, the league office had some work to do to get the owners to get behind the idea of loaning active players to Olympic flag football. The NFL got it done, and then some. PFT has confirmed that the vote on the resolution allowing active players to participate in the tournament passed with a vote of 32-0. Per a source with knowledge of the voting, the unanimous outcome happened on the first ballot, and not through the not-uncommon device of holding a second vote for P.R. purposes aimed at creating the impression that everyone was on the same page. Regardless, it seems that not everyone was on the same page. But with a maximum investment of one player per team (plus the team’s international player), the league was able not only to get to 24 votes but also to create a unified front. Hell, even Bengals owner Mike Brown — who often votes no when everyone else votes yes — was with the “ayes.” There’s still a lot of work to be done. And plenty of questions to be answered. But the league has decided that exporting active players to the Olympics advances the greater greed. I mean the greater good. (No, I don’t.)

Eagles receiver A.J. Brown is very good at tackle football. And that’s good enough for him. Meeting with reporters on Tuesday, Brown made it clear that he has no interest in pressing pause on his primary gig to play flag football in the Olympics. “I heard the Olympics is during camp,” Brown said, via Zach Berman of allphly.com. “So, yeah, that would be tough. . . . That would be fun just to compete. Me personally, no, because of camp. [The media] would be complaining, ‘A.J. Brown is not in camp.’ So would the fans. So I’m going to keep the main thing the main thing.” That’s going to be the biggest question for plenty of players. Are they willing to miss camp time (and possibly offseason workouts) to practice and play a very different type of football? Ultimately, only 12 NFL players will be participating in the 2028 Olympics, with up to six alternates. The league, and USA Football, will have no problem finding enough players to volunteer to do it. Even if plenty of them, like Brown, won’t be interested in distracting themselves from the more important task at hand.

During a recent interview with The Pivot Podcast, North Carolina coach Bill Belichick took a sudden turn to share some alternative facts regarding the disconnect between UNC and the Hard Knocks franchise. As Belichick told it, it wasn’t a fit because “Hard Knocks is training camp and we’re not training camp.” And we’re not buying that. Multiple reports indicated a deal was done on Friday, February 28. By Monday, March 3, NFL Films had cut and run. TheAthletic.com previously reported that Jordon Hudson, Belichick’s 24-year-old girlfriend/handler/publicist/idea mill/creative muse, “played an instrumental role in stopping the production, related to her request to be heavily involved in the project.” Earlier today, Katherine Rosman of the New York Times reported that Hudson “demanded she be granted content approval and partial ownership of the show.” Per the report, Hard Knocks producers later learned that Hudson separately was negotiating with EverWonder to make a similar series. It’s ultimately more evidence to prove that, whatever Hudson’s current role may be, she was very involved with North Carolina football — and she apparently had some sort of responsibility for blocking a reality series that would have increased the profile of the UNC program, boosting its recruiting efforts and enhancing its overall interests.

Dak Prescott’s right hamstring tore off the bone in a Week 9 game against the Falcons. He underwent surgery Nov. 13 and started his rehab soon after. Six months later, the Cowboys quarterback is close to being all the way back. The team’s medical staff has yet to fully clear Prescott, but he is participating in voluntary offseason workouts. “Pretty much can do it all. Feel good,” Prescott said Tuesday, via Schuyler Dixon of the Associated Press. “Yeah, I think I’m just not cleared for contact, which we’ve got a while for that anyways. Yeah, I’m out there in the team activities. Feel good. Just trying to stay that way. Yeah, feeling great.” Prescott downplayed concerns about the fact that he isn’t fully healed yet. “People say a lot of things about me, man,” Prescott said. “I just show up and control what I can control [to get] healthy. Trying to stay healthy. Feels good. Yeah, just trying to push the energy and make sure I continue to get better.” He also said he is ahead, not behind, in his offseason work. “Am I behind? No,” Prescott said. “Left the [2024] season early. I mean f—k, I was hurt. Excuse me. My offseason started way earlier. Sorry for the language, but my offseason started way earlier, so that’s really essentially why I’m ahead, on top of working with director of rehabilitation Britt [Brown], working with this training staff.” Prescott, 32, has missed a total of 26 games the past five seasons with ankle, calf, thumb and hamstring injuries. He also had a shoulder injury that caused him to miss practice time in training camp in 2021.

Brock Purdy officially signed his five-year contract extension through the 2030 season, the team announced Tuesday. “Brock is a tremendous leader and a fantastic representative for the 49ers organization, and we are ecstatic to get this deal done,” General Manager John Lynch said in a statement. “When we took him with the last pick in the draft, we knew he had potential to succeed in this league, but we had no idea how special of a player he would become. He has played at an exceptionally high level since taking over the starting job, and we look forward to seeing him continue to lead this team for years to come.” Purdy, 25, was the final pick of the 2022 draft but won the starting job late in his rookie season after injuries to Trey Lance and Jimmy Garoppolo. He has not let go of the position, going 23-13 as the starter in three seasons with a 4-2 postseason record. Purdy ha completed 67.5 percent of his passes for 9,518 yards with 64 touchdowns, 27 interceptions and a passer rating of 104.9.

Badar Khan Suri, a postdoctoral fellow at Georgetown University, was released after 58 days. Rumeyza Ozturk, a Tufts doctoral student, was released after 45 days. Mohsen Mahdawi, a Columbia undergraduate, was released after 16 days. But 72 days after his arrest on March 9, Mahmoud Khalil — the country’s most prominent pro-Palestinian-protester-turned-prisoner — is still detained in Jena, La., waiting for a New Jersey federal judge to decide whether he can go free while his immigration case proceeds. The Trump administration has invoked a rarely cited law to argue that Mr. Khalil’s presence in the country threatens its foreign-policy goal of halting antisemitism. Mr. Khalil’s lawyers have argued that the government is retaliating against their client, a legal permanent resident, for participating in protests that shook Columbia University’s campus and that he should have his liberty while his immigration case is assessed. The New Jersey judge, Michael E. Farbiarz, has been thoroughly engaged. But he has yet to weigh in fully on the issues of free speech and due process that have attracted enormous attention to Mr. Khalil’s case.His meticulous approach has made the case an exemplar of Trump-era justice, in which the White House frequently moves with a speed that courts are not used to matching. Mr. Khalil’s lawyers have repeatedly asked the judge to decide whether to release their client on bail, like the other students, before ruling on the issues at the heart of the case. The judge has responded that he must deal with the procedural basics first. Judge Farbiarz has issued numerous orders and written two lengthy rulings: a 67-page determination that he had the right to preside over the case and a 108-page opinion asserting that his control over the case had not been stripped. In the second ruling, he acknowledged that the law’s response to cases like Mr. Khalil’s “has been the same across the board: no unnecessary delay.” That opinion was issued on April 29. “Mahmoud is understandably frustrated that he was the first to be detained and nine weeks later is still in detention,” said Baher Azmy, one of Mr. Khalil’s lawyers and the legal director at the Center for Constitutional Rights. “But we remain optimistic that the court will see through the patent unconstitutionality of the government’s actions here and order him released soon.”Legal experts acknowledged that Judge Farbiarz, 51, has proceeded more slowly than other judges. But they emphasized that each judge was different and said they believed it made sense, particularly for an early-career jurist like Judge Farbiarz, to be as thorough as possible. “In a case that has gotten this much notoriety, I think there’s every reason if you’re the judge to make sure you have all of your ducks in a row,” said Stephen I. Vladeck, a law professor at Georgetown University. “Judge Farbiarz knows that there is a national spotlight, not just on him but on the ability of the federal courts to handle cases like these.” Judge Farbiarz has a reputation for thorough, methodical preparation that borders on the obsessive. Before he ascended to the bench in 2023, he was a federal prosecutor in Manhattan, where he headed the office’s terrorism and international narcotics unit. As a prosecutor, he led a case against one of Osama Bin Laden’s sons-in-law, and another against the first Guantánamo Bay detainee to be tried in civilian court. He also prosecuted a Swedish citizen, Oussama Kassir, who was accused of plotting to set up a training camp for terrorists at an Oregon ranch. Mark S. DeMarco, a defense lawyer based in the Bronx, represented Mr. Kassir. He was struck by the future Judge Farbiarz’s sense of fair play, and his thoroughness. “All his bases were covered. There was no stone left unturned,” Mr. DeMarco remembered, adding, “He was probably one of the most prepared prosecutors I’ve gone up against as an adversary.” After leaving the Manhattan office, the ex-prosecutor became a senior fellow at New York University’s law school, and worked on academic papers that focused on jurisdiction and due process issues involving defendants outside the United States — issues similar to those he has pondered at length in Mr. Khalil’s case. “What’s really marked about those articles is they do not read as somebody straight out of the prosecutorial trenches,” said Daniel Richman, a law professor at Columbia University who is friendly with the judge. “They read as written by somebody who stepped back from his own practice and really tried to get it right in terms of the legal doctrine.” People caught up in the legal system often find that judges do not rule quickly enough to account for rapidly unfolding events. The disjuncture has been particularly notable during the second Trump administration, during which courts have struggled to keep up. “A lot of us on the outside expect federal courts to move with the same dispatch that the executive branch can move. That’s not practicable and it’s not wise,” Mr. Vladeck said. “What separates judicial power from political power is principled legal rationale. Sometimes it takes a little time to make sure that you’ve got the right principles to inform your position.” In Mr. Khalil’s case, the administration moved with characteristic speed, both in initially detaining him and in rationalizing his arrest. A spokeswoman for the Homeland Security Department quickly claimed he had led activities “aligned to Hamas.” And Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, accused him of “siding with terrorists,” and of participating in protests in which “pro-Hamas” fliers were handed out. But in the weeks since, those allegations have not been substantiated. Evidence submitted in Mr. Khalil’s immigration case revealed no secretive support for Hamas. And his lawyers have pointed to comments he made on CNN saying that “antisemitism and any form of racism has no place on campus and in this movement.” His case continues to play out in two separate courts. Judge Farbiarz has the power to free him and to determine the constitutionality of the administration’s attempts to deport him. An immigration court judge, Jamee Comans, is overseeing his immigration proceedings, which determine more narrowly whether the United States has met the legal burden for deporting him. Mr. Khalil’s next immigration court hearing is scheduled for Thursday. Over the weekend, friends and supporters of Mr. Khalil held a “people’s graduation” event in Manhattan, acknowledging that if he were free, he would have walked in a Columbia University commencement this week. Mr. Khalil’s wife, Dr. Noor Abdalla, was there with the couple’s infant son, Deen, who was born on April 21. Speaking through tears, Dr. Abdalla said she had looked forward to her husband getting to experience his commencement ceremony. “Like witnessing the birth of our son, Deen, and the first precious month of his life, this moment was stolen from him,” she said.

McPherson College, in the middle of Kansas wheat country, is a small school that accepts the vast majority of its applicants, many from surrounding towns. It is best known for its degree in classic car restoration. The college might still end up a potential target in a Republican plan aimed primarily at the Ivy League, which would impose billions in taxes on the investment returns of several dozen private colleges and universities. The goal of the proposal, laid out in a report last week from Republicans on the House Ways and Means Committee, is to hold accountable “woke, elite universities that operate more like major corporations.” McPherson could be on the list because it has an endowment of $1.6 billion, thanks to an anonymous donation a few years ago. An analysis by The New York Times shows that at least 58 schools would potentially be subject to the tax, based on the size of their endowments and enrollments. The list includes highly selective and wealthy institutions like Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, but also smaller schools like Berry College in Georgia and DePauw University in Indiana. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT The tax idea has been discussed by Republicans since at least President Trump’s first term, when a 1.4 percent tax was imposed on some endowments. Momentum to broaden it grew in 2023, when JD Vance, then a senator from Ohio, proposed a 35 percent tax on endowments of $10 billion and larger. Now, as President Trump has made challenging the nation’s wealthiest colleges a centerpiece of his second-term agenda, the endowment tax could become a potent weapon. During Mr. Trump’s second presidential run, his campaign promised to collect billions “by taxing the large endowments of private universities plagued by antisemitism.” The tax, part of the House proposal that President Trump has called the “big, beautiful bill,” would be tiered depending on the size of the school’s endowment and enrollment, with a top rate of 21 percent for those with endowments of at least $2 million per student. That rate would hit nine schools, including Harvard, Yale and Princeton. The proposal threatens to cost Harvard about $850 million a year, Yale $690 million a year, and Princeton $586 million a year, according to estimates by Phillip Levine, an economics professor at Wellesley College, which would also be subject to the tax. The stated aim of the tax, according to the proposal, is to ensure elite schools in the country “can no longer abuse generous benefits provided through the tax code.”But the plan would envelop other institutions as well, including some in rural parts of Republican states. The earnings from McPherson’s endowment would be taxed at 7 percent, potentially costing the school nearly $8 million a year, for example.The criteria for the tax excludes some schools with large endowments, such as the University of Southern California, because of their large enrollment numbers. Columbia University, which has been targeted by Republicans over accusations that it mishandled claims of antisemitism, might not have qualified either, because of the size of its student population in relation to its endowment. But lawmakers tweaked the “per student” formula used in the bill to exclude the school's large number of international students. As a result, Columbia would pay $79 million a year. While The Times’s analysis is based on endowment size, under the proposal’s current language the list is likely to grow larger because the tax would also apply to other forms of university investment income, including royalties. The existing 1.4 percent tax hit 56 schools in 2023, according to data from the Internal Revenue Service. Republicans and others argue that the universities should use more of their endowments, some which have accumulated tax-free over centuries. Mr. Trump said on the campaign trail that the proceeds from the tax would “endow the American Academy,” a free virtual university that he said he would create. But a plan for that school has not materialized, and any money collected through the new taxes would go into the government’s general fund. Schools have pushed back against the tax, noting that they use their endowments to fund the education of poor and middle-class students. Of the $30 billion that schools spent in endowment funds in 2024, nearly half went to financial aid, according to an analysis by the National Association of College and University Business Officers. (Vice President Vance was a beneficiary of this need-based aid. He attended Yale Law School as a Marine Corps veteran with a financial aid package that he later wrote “exceeded my wildest dreams.”)Christopher L. Eisgruber, Princeton’s president, wrote in a recent message that 71 percent of students in this year’s freshman class received no-loan financial aid funded by the school’s endowment, with the average grant totaling $73,000. “This tax is a scholarship tax,” said Steven M. Bloom, an assistant vice president at the American Council on Education, a large industry trade group that is opposing the proposal. Williams College, a liberal arts school in Massachusetts, would be subject to at least a 14 percent tax. In an interview, its president, Maud S. Mandel, said the school devoted $92 million from its endowment this year to help over half the school’s student body. “Any tax on the endowment would have a direct impact on that,” she said. And in California, Pomona College’s vice president, Jonathan B. Williams, said the tax would cost the school $40 million a year, the equivalent of 460 full scholarships. Its enrollment is about 1,700. “This will shift the cost of tuition squarely on to families,” he said. Universities have dispatched lobbyists to Capitol Hill to try to water down the plan’s impact.Williams College has partnered with other colleges to hire a lobbying firm. DePauw University said it was also working with a group of small colleges to tell lawmakers how they would be affected. Four medical schools could also be on the list, including Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, which is not affiliated with Baylor University. Lori Williams, vice president of communications for the medical school, wonders whether independent medical schools were included accidentally. “We have been engaging with legislators to seek to remedy this,” Ms. Williams said. Lawmakers crafted an exception for religious institutions that could exempt some of the 58 schools included in The Times’s analysis. But schools formed before July 4, 1776, would be excluded from that exemption. That means Ivy League schools opened by religious groups before the nation’s founding would not be eligible. David A. Super, a professor at Georgetown University Law Center, said that could raise legal issues. “Particularly problematic is reliance on a date: Some faiths have established more colleges in some eras, some faiths have established more in other times,” Mr. Super said. “That starts to look like discrimination among religions.”Matthew Lindsey, president of the Kansas Independent College Association, hopes the religious exemption will ultimately protect McPherson, which was founded by the Church of the Brethren, a pacifist Protestant denomination. “Clearly McPherson is not the target of this legislation,” Mr. Lindsey said, noting that the bill “very much talked about woke colleges. They’re not talking about McPherson in that language.” McPherson, in McPherson, Kan., became rich practically overnight in 2022, when an anonymous donation grew its endowment to $1.6 billion from $50 million. The school’s classic car restoration program has also attracted support from the comedian Jay Leno, a classic car collector. McPherson officials did not respond to a request for comment, but Mr. Lindsey said the school used its endowment to help students graduate debt free. He said his association had been working to notify the Kansas congressional delegation of the predicament. Representative Tracey Mann, a Republican and a supporter of President Trump who represents the congressional district that includes McPherson, did not respond to requests for comment.