WINNIPEG, Manitoba (AP) — Mark Scheifele scored two goals, Vladislav Namestnikov and Jonathan Toews both ended lengthy goal-scoring droughts, and the Winnipeg Jets ended their 11-game losing streak with a 5-1 win over the Los Angeles Kings on Friday night.
The Jets were winless (0-7-4) since a 5-1 victory over the Washington Capitals on Dec. 13. It was their longest skid since the team moved to Winnipeg from Atlanta in 2011.
Namestnikov ended a 29-game goal drought, while Toews halted a 26-game scoring slump. Cole Koepke also scored for the Jets and Gabriel Vilardi had two assists. Eric Comrie made 23 saves.
Quinton Byfield scored for the Kings. Darcy Kuemper stopped 11 of the 16 shots he faced before he was replaced by Anton Forsberg to start the third period. Forsberg made three saves.
CAPITALS 5, BLACKHAWKS 1
CHICAGO (AP) — Connor McMichael had a goal and an assist, and Washington snapped Chicago’s four-game win streak with a win over the depleted Blackhawks.
Alex Ovechkin, Anthony Beauvillier, Ethen Frank and Justin Sourdif also scored for Washington, which had lost three of four. John Carlson and Martin Fehervary each had two assists, and Logan Thompson made 23 saves.
Connor Bedard returned for Chicago after being sidelined by a shoulder injury, but the Blackhawks were hit hard by an illness going around the locker room. Goaltenders Spencer Knight and Arvid Soderblom were scratched, along with forward Ilya Mikheyev and defenseman Louis Crevier.
Oliver Moore scored for Chicago, which beat Washington 3-2 in a shootout last weekend. Drew Commesso made 19 saves in his second career NHL start.
MAMMOTH 4, BLUES 2
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Nick Schmaltz scored twice and assisted on another goal to lead Utah to a victory over St. Louis.
Schmaltz now has 43 points in 40 career games against St. Louis. Lawson Crouse and Sean Durzi also scored goals to help Utah win its third straight game. Karel Vejmelka made 26 saves.
Oskar Sundqvist and Pavel Buchnevich scored for the Blues while Joel Hofer made 19 stops. St. Louis dropped its fourth straight road game.
Winnipeg Jets' Mark Scheifele, left, scores against Los Angeles Kings goaltender Darcy Kuemper (35) during second-period NHL hockey game action in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Friday, Jan. 9, 2026. (John Woods/The Canadian Press via AP)
INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Tarris Reed Jr. sat at his locker Thursday, fielding questions about his run as the interior-scoring, rebound-snagging force in UConn's latest Final Four push.
Yet he wasn't the main attraction.
That's because across the room, an even bigger gaggle of reporters waited for freshman guard Braylon Mullins — the Indiana kid who hit an all-timer of a shot to send the Huskies back to the sport's biggest stage — to return for his own round of interviews.
“Guards are the ones that hit the big shots,” Reed said Thursday when asked about big men getting their due, adding with a grin: “We just do our job, we do the dirty work — and we're used to doing it our whole life so we have fun doing it.”
Maybe so, but there's no minimizing the impact of size this week in Indianapolis. Not with the Final Four boasting its biggest quartet of teams going back roughly two decades, starting with guys such as Reed, Michigan's Aday Mara, Arizona's Koa Peat and Illinois' 7-foot Ivisic twins as anchors to lineups with size radiating all the way out to the perimeter.
The average height of the Final Four teams is nearly 79.1 inches, or roughly 6 feet 6, according to KenPom’s analytics site. That edges last year’s average of nearly 78.3 inches for the biggest of any Final Four going back to the start of KenPom’s data in 2007.
Illinois (28-8) is Division I's tallest team with an average roster height of nearly 6-7 (80 inches), while Arizona (36-2) is seventh at nearly 6-6 (79 inches). Michigan (35-3) and UConn (33-5) are in the top 30 nationally with nearly identical averages slightly behind the Wildcats.
Consider it a sign of the premium each team put on building a roster to overwhelm teams inside, on the glass and with game-altering length spanning the gaps between.
That kind of size, strength and wingspan creates trouble cascading through the matchups. ACC Network analyst Luke Hancock said teams are also thriving by finding power forwards and centers capable of stepping outside to stretch defenses further and create space, eliminating the ability for a defense to simply collapse on a lone big man.
“Guards still win in March,” said Hancock, the most outstanding player of the 2013 Final Four in Louisville’s later-vacated title run. "But I think these guys have become almost like a necessary component. If you want to win championships, you need a big 4 and a monster 5.”
And it's manifesting in several ways as March Madness reaches its final act.
The Illini have had the best defensive tournament efficiency of the Final Four teams while dominating the glass to complete those stops. Their roster includes an influx of European talent, including Tomislav (7-1) and Zvonimir Ivisic (7-2), as well as 6-9 forward David Mirkovic from Montenegro.
The Illini also brings 6-9, 235-pound graduate Ben Humrichous off the bench, while the outlier in the big lineup is 6-2 senior guard Kylan Boswell as a strong backcourt defender.
The South Region champion has allowed .976 points per possession in the NCAA Tournament to lead the remaining four teams. Throw in the fact that Illinois is outrebounding opponents by 16.3 per game, and it's been a perfectly timed boost to an already elite offense with those forwards and centers capable of hitting from behind the arc, too.
"Playing in the summer, you could tell it’s a little bit harder to do some things just because you’ve got Z at the rim, who’s 7-foot-2 and a great shot blocker," 6-6 forward Jake Davis said. “You got Tommy down there. So anybody you’re going up against in practice is super tall. ... We’ve just got a bunch of length everywhere. And you could tell early on that we could cause problems for other teams.”
The Illini will be tested against Reed, a 6-foot-11, 265-pound senior whose scoring (21.8) and rebounding (13.5) averages in the tournament are the best of any player still standing.
That included opening the tournament with a video game-type stat line of 31 points and 27 rebounds against Furman, making him the first player with 30-plus points and 25-plus rebounds in an NCAA Tournament game since Houston’s Elvin Hayes did it twice in 1968.
He’s coming off a 26-point showing in the comeback from 19 down to stun Duke in the Elite Eight.
“He’s a monster,” said UConn senior Alex Karaban, who was part of the Huskies’ 2023 and 2024 title winners. “He’s been so dominant. He’s really playing like the most dominant player in college basketball right now.”
When it comes to the No. 1 seeds, the Wolverines have hummed with 90-plus points in four tournament wins. The Wildcats have been right behind in offensive efficiency despite being shooting fewer 3-pointers than just about every other Division I team all season.
Their meeting Saturday matches strengths.
Michigan has used the 7-3, 255-pound Mara to protect the paint, flanked by a pair of versatile 6-9 forwards in Associated Press first-team All-American Yaxel Lendeborg (240 pounds) and Morez Johnson Jr. (250).
“Our size definitely makes it tougher for smaller guards,” Lendeborg said. “Because we’re so versatile ... we can switch and guard point guards, make their life a little harder. And you know, we’re all strong bodies too. So we try to wear down teams.
“And then, toward the end of the game, that’s when we usually make our runs when we need it.”
Michigan will be tested against the Wildcats with 7-2 center Motiejus Krivas (10.4 points, 8.2 rebounds) and Peat, a 6-8, 235-pound freshman considered a strong NBA prospect.
“If you don't have the big to defend other bigs, you can't compete at this level in my opinion,” Hancock said.
“How do you make it so you're really tough to guard and you have an advantage? It’s the 4-men in this Final Four who are just so talented and the diversity of their skill sets — they can do so many things. That is the ultimate to me.”
AP March Madness bracket: https://apnews.com/hub/ncaa-mens-bracket and coverage: https://apnews.com/hub/march-madness
Arizona forward Koa Peat (10) dunks during the second half in the Elite Eight of the NCAA college basketball tournament against Purdue, Saturday, March 28, 2026, in San Jose, Calif. (AP Photo/Kelley L Cox)
Iowa's Tavion Banks (6) has his shot blocked by Illinois' Zvonimir Ivisic (44) during the first half of an Elite Eight game in the NCAA college basketball tournament Saturday, March 28, 2026, in Houston. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)
UConn forward Tarris Reed Jr. (5) reacts after the team's win against Duke in the Elite Eight of the NCAA college basketball tournament, Sunday, March 29, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)
