I don’t like to be hyperbolic, but I watched Victor Wembanyama play a basketball game last night.

That’s the greatest basketball player ever, right? Like, it’s impossible for anybody to be better at basketball than that guy is at basketball, right? Like, he’s already one of the most impactful defensive players of all time and he can hit five threes in a game. WHAT IS EVEN THE POINT OF ANYBODY ELSE PLAYING BASKETBALL?

(Except, of course, the Knicks, who famously beat Wembanyama and the Spurs to win the extremely important NBA Cup championship.)

– Rodger Sherman

⚔️⚔️ Sabres, Rattling ⚔️⚔️

The best story in hockey keeps getting better. Buffalo’s long-awaited return to the NHL postseason started badly, with the Bruins taking a 2-0 lead into the third period in Game 1 of the first-round playoff series …

… but then the Sabres scored three goals in four minutes, turning that 2-0 deficit into a 3-2 win.

The scene in the arena was quintessential Playoff Hockey. So was the scene outside the arena, as shirtless Buffalonians went nuts in 40-degree weather. (I like that they knocked over the barricade. I guess that’s the hockey version of jumping through a table.)

So how did Buffalo go from the worst team in the league to the best overnight? I’d love to explain it, but there is no explanation:

Buffalo is a hockey town, but the Sabres had fallen on really, really, really hard times of late. They hadn’t made the playoffs since 2011, the longest playoff drought in NHL history.
And that streak didn’t look like it was going to end this season. The Sabres won just five of their first 16 games, and were in last place in the Eastern Conference through December 13th.
Then their fortunes flipped. The Sabres closed December on a 10-game win streak, and won 45 of their final 65 games. They literally went from last place in the conference to first.
What happened? It’s tough to say. My friends at Phantom Island were literally in the midst of producing an episode examining the Sabres’ downfall at the exact same time the Sabres began their turnaround. They had to recut the episode. (It’s a fun listen, and I’ve been imploring them to begin a similar examination of the New York Jets.)
The Sabres’ turnaround does almost exactly coincide with the December 15th firing of general manager Kevyn Adams … but, like, it’s unclear why a general manager change would so drastically affect a team’s on-ice performance. (The Athletic recently wrote that Adams’ reputation has been resuscitated as a result of the team’s resurgence.)
When asked how a team can improve its on-ice chemistry so quickly, captain Rasmus Dahlin gave a simple answer: “Drink beers.”
Fans took that to heart. Another potential explanation for Buffalo’s turnaround is the team’s novelty “Beer Sabre,” which allows fans to drink Labatt Blue out of a plastic sword. As you’d expect, fans are drinking out of the Novelty Plastic Beer Containers faster than the Novelty Plastic Beer Container factory can pump them out. Beer sabres are not available at most games, and they’re reselling for hundreds of dollars on eBay.
There’s a little bit of smoke-and-mirrors going on here. Buffalo’s opponents had more shots and more scoring chances than the Sabres did over the course of the season. The Sabres are third in the NHL in goal differential above expected, per hockey analytics site MoneyPuck.
(They should call Buffalo’s hockey analytics “sabre-metrics.”)
But mainly, a bunch of young-and-kinda-young Sabres lifers are coming together at once. Most of the team’s core players have been in Buffalo for their entire careers. Of the six players who recorded points last night, five have been with Buffalo for at least five seasons. Dahlin and defenseman Owen Power are former #1 overall picks, and the roster features a lot of other highly-drafted players who are coming into their own.
The Sabres don’t have the best odds to win the Stanley Cup — that’d be the Colorado Avalanche — but that hasn’t stopped Buffalo yet.

🤸‍♀️🤸‍♀️🤸‍♀️ You Gotta Have Faith 🤸‍♀️🤸‍♀️🤸‍♀️

How much does the regular season matter in sports? Apparently, not that much in women’s gymnastics: Oklahoma senior Faith Torrez won the NCAA individual all-around championship and played a critical role in the Sooners’ team championship despite not doing a floor routine all season long until she had to help Oklahoma win the championship.

Here are Torrez’s four rotations on Thursday to win the individual title:

And here’s her floor routine, which sealed the team national championship for Oklahoma after it trailed entering the final rotation:

Torrez dealt with an ankle injury for most of the college gymnastics season, limiting her to bars and beam. (Honestly, already impressive; you definitely need YOUR ANKLE for THE BALANCE BEAM.)
Torrez was one of the best floor performers in the country last year, recording three perfect tens and winning the silver medal at NCAA championships. But she hadn’t been competing in the event all season long.
Not only had she not been competing on the floor, she hadn’t been training. Head coach K.J. Kindler explained that Torrez approached her with weeks left in the season with “‘a golden buzzer-beater question,’ whatever that is,” asking to start training on floor. Kindler said that Torrez hadn’t even performed a full floor routine in practice until the week of the championships.
The headline is Torrez, but really, the story is Oklahoma’s incredible depth. In the national championship on Saturday, Lily Pederson actually posted a better all-around score than Torrez. And the team’s best all-arounder during the regular season, Addison Fatta, suffered a hand injury in training and was only able to compete on the beam in the championship. Teammate Keira Wells won the individual national championship on the vault. And the Sooners did all this without last year’s all-around champion, Jordan Bowers, who graduated.
That’s dynasty depth. The Sooners have won four of the last five national championships. The one year they didn’t win the national championship, in 2024, they were one of the best gymnastics teams of all time, recording four of the seven highest scores in NCAA history before a stunning semifinal crash-out. They’ve won eight national championships under Kindler after making the NCAA Tournament just six times before she took over in 2006.
So I’m gonna go ahead and predict another Oklahoma national championship next year. Doesn’t matter that Torrez is graduating. Doesn’t matter who’s on the team. Doesn’t even matter who competes in the regular season.

🤸‍♂️🌲 Another Ring for The Tree 🌲🤸‍♂️

In men’s gymnastics, Stanford won its sixth championship in seven seasons, clinching the title on the final routine of Asher Hong’s career. Stanford has now won at least one NCAA championship for 50 straight years. Michigan’s Fred Richard finished his career by winning his third individual all-around title.

🚔🚨 BACKUP REQUESTED, WE’VE GOT A SMIRKER 🚨🚔

The NFL Draft is Thursday, and the police department in Athens, Georgia, made its mark by arresting wide receiver prospect Zachariah Branch for … standing on the sidewalk? A police report claimed that Branch “smirked” while seemingly complying with an officer’s request asking him to back up, after which the cop arrested Branch for “obstructing public sidewalks.” Honestly, I’m moving him up my draft board; if the 5-foot-8, 177-pound Branch is so good at obstructing sidewalks that the police have to get involved, he must be a better blocker than anybody expected.

⚾️ 21ST INNING WALK-OFF BALK! ⚾️

Northern Colorado and St. Thomas played the eighth-longest Division I baseball game of all time this weekend, a 21-inning marathon that started on Friday and continued through most of Saturday. The teams went from the 10th to 18th innings without scoring a run, only for both teams to score two runs in the 19th. Northern Colorado walked it off when a St. Thomas pitcher flinched with the bases loaded:

If you look closely, the pitcher did rock up and down a little bit after coming set, which is probably a balk, I think (nobody has ever been 100 percent sure what a balk is, including most baseball players.) The teams had to play a double-header on Sunday to make up for the game they didn’t play on Saturday, and believe it or not, Northern Colorado won another extra innings game. Only 10 innings that time though — half as long.

🏐🤘 We found LOVB in an Austin place 🤘🏐

LOVB Austin has now won both championships in the league’s two-year history. They were one set away from losing the title to Salt Lake, but rallied back, won Game 2, forced a do-or-die golden set, and won that too:

BTW I just realized that I had been crossing up LOVB Austin’s Madisen Skinner, a former Texas volleyball star, with current Texas basketball star Madison Booker. Also I just wanted to point out that the WNBA’s Seattle Storm now has players named Jalyn Brown and Jaelyn Brown, and that Jaelyn Brown went to Cal one year after Jaylen Brown.

🇵🇷🏈 Bacardí Bowl back? 🏈🇵🇷

Out of nowhere, Brett McMurphy announced that Puerto Rico will host its first-ever bowl game this season. I’m gonna be honest, I’m a little bit skeptical; it’s unclear where, exactly, the game will be played, as Puerto Rico has more baseball-shaped stadiums than football-shaped ones, and an HBCU game scheduled to be played in Puerto Rico last year was canceled due to poor field conditions.

🏛️🏛️ DODGEBALL SCHOOL 🏛️🏛️

Congratulations to Michigan State for winning both the men’s and women’s college dodgeball championships. Gotta keep your head on a swivel walking around East Lansing, the dodgeball capital of the USA.

🏌️‍♂️🥴 Barely LIVing 🥴🏌️‍♂️

LIV Golf did, in fact, hold its event in Mexico City, even after widespread reports that the tour was losing its funding. It’s going great! Bryson DeChambeau was caught on mic whining about the quality of the course and eventually withdrew from the tournament.

💵💸📈 The EDSBS Charity Bowl 📈💸💵

April 20-24th (The Internet)

The actual most important sporting event of the year. It’s the 20th year of the EDSBS Charity Bowl, in which college football fans compete online to see who can raise the most money for charity in the name of their favorite teams — because the whole point of college sports is to prove you’re morally superior to your rivals!

The charity in question: New American Pathways, an organization that helps refugees settle in the United States. Last year the Charity Bowl raised $1.1 million. We have to crush that number this year, because the United States government has essentially decided it doesn’t want to help refugees settle in the United States anymore, cutting off a lot of New American Pathways’ funding.

I’m getting started with a $22.21 donation in honor of Northwestern’s win over Penn State.

Michigan has run off a bunch of Charity Bowl championships in a row, but the fight for every spot on the leaderboard is intense. You can check on the constantly updating leaderboard all week at moneycannon.org.

🏃🏃‍♀️🏃‍♂️ Boston Marathon 🏃🏃‍♂️🏃‍♀️

Monday, April 20, 9 a.m. ET (ESPN2)

Reigning men’s champion John Korir and women’s champion Sharon Lokedi look to continue Kenyan dominance in the event. Challengers include the 2025 world champion, Tanzanian Alphonce Felix Simbu, on the men’s side, and Helen Obiri, another Kenyan, for the women.

Aaaaaaaaaand I just realized this is probably gonna be over by the time you read it. Oh well!

Happy 18th anniversary to the time Greg Jennings put the team on his back in one of the greatest plays in NFL history. I examined that play’s context in the larger scheme of the 2010 NFL season: