Let's go Sycamores!
This is For The Win’s daily newsletter, The Morning Win. Did a friend recommend or forward this to you? If so, subscribe here. Have feedback? Leave your questions, comments and concerns through this brief reader survey! Now, here’s Charles Curtis.
Happy Thursday, friends! There’s college basketball on Thursday before we get the women’s and men’s Final Four and championship games in the next few days.
It’s … the men’s NIT final?
Now, normally I wouldn’t be so amped up about the NIT (I’m the casualest of casuals in college hoops who only pays attention in March!). But Indiana State is marching in to the final against Seton Hall on Thursday night, and that means we get to watch the bespectacled Robbie Avila cook. Dude is really good at basketball.
It’s also a chance for some kind of redemption. The Sycamores should have been in the men’s NCAA tournament this year but were completely snubbed by the selection committee. Instead, we got Virginia somehow making it and a First Four one-and-done appearance that had everyone wishing Indiana State made it instead.
So I’m hoping that Avila and the Sycamores win to prove that we all missed out on March Madness greatness.
Dale Zanine-USA TODAY Sports
Scoring in the NBA is nuts this year, but here’s the best story: Malachi Flynn was traded twice this year (to the Knicks, then to the Pistons) and had a previous career-high of 27 points.
On Thursday, he EXPLODED for 50. And our Bryan Kalbrosky has a fact about that:
Even crazier, though, is that Flynn entered the game with the lowest scoring average from someone with a 50-point game.
Flynn averaged just 5.2 points per game before this random scoring outburst.
While the Pistons are having a dreadful season, it was amazing that the guard was given a chance to prove that this is something that he is capable of on the court.
No matter what happens during the rest of his basketball career, Flynn will always have the 50-point game associated with his name. It just goes to show that anyone can get hot on any given night if they get the right opportunity.
Amazing.
Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports
It’s always amazing to me when NFL players send cryptic tweets and everyone goes wild about it and then nothing happens for a bit … and then SOMETHING happens.
That’s Stefon Diggs, but for what feels like a while. There were cryptic tweets, including one a few weeks ago and another just hours before he was dealt from the Buffalo Bills to the Houston Texans. WOW! Here’s a look at some of the stuff we wrote about it:
— Angel Reese declared for the WNBA draft, which is awesome. Kim Mulkey said goodbye on Instagram.
— Travis Kelce confirmed he’ll go see some of Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour shows in Europe. Here’s how their schedules line up.
— Shohei Ohtani hit his first Dodgers dinger but didn’t have to pay much to a fan for the ball.
— Here’s everything we know about the proposed college football super league.
