April 1, 2024 4:41 am
MIAMI (AP) — Oneil Cruz raced home on Jason Delay’s bunt in the 10th inning, and the Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Miami Marlins 9-7 for a four-game sweep of their season-opening series. Cruz opened the 10th on second as a pinch runner for Rowdy Tellez. He advanced to third when reliever Tanner Scott committed an error on Alika Williams’ sacrifice attempt. Delay then sent another bunt toward first and Cruz beat first baseman Jake Burger’s throw to the plate. Ke’Bryan Hayes reached on a two-out infield single and Michael A. Taylor gave Pittsburgh a 9-7 lead with a bases-loaded walk.
April 1, 2024 4:45 am
DALLAS (AP) — Bruising big man DJ Burns Jr. scored a season-high 29 points, DJ Horne had 20 and 11th-seeded North Carolina State reached its first Final Four in four decades, beating Atlantic Coast Conference rival Duke 76-64 in the South Region final. N.C. State is back in the national semifinals for the first time since the late Jim Valvano was sprinting around the court looking for someone to hug after winning the 1983 national title. The Wolfpack will play Zach Edey and Purdue in the national semifinals. Jared McCain scored 32 points for Duke, which fell short of its second Final Four in three seasons. Meanwhile, in Detroit Purdue big man Zach Edey went for a career-high 40 points along with 16 rebounds and one big block to muscle the Boilermakers into the program’s first Final Four since 1980 with a 72-66 victory over Tennessee. The 7-foot-4 center and the Boilermakers eked out a back-and-forth thriller between the country’s top two players, edging out Tennessee’s All-American, Dalton Knecht, who finished with 37 points. Top-seeded Purdue set aside last year’s grand disappointment — a first-round loss as a No. 1 seed — to book the trip to Glendale, Arizona. N.C State and Purdue Meet Saturday in a national semifinal. Alabama and UConn will meet in the other semifinal.
April 1, 2024 4:46 am
ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — Tessa Johnson scored 15 points, Kamilla Cardoso added 12 and undefeated South Carolina advanced to the Final Four of the women’s NCAA Tournament with a 70-58 win over Oregon State. South Carolina made it to the national semifinals unbeaten for the second straight season. The Gamecocks lost to Caitlin Clark and Iowa in the Final Four last year. This time, with an entirely new starting lineup, coach Dawn Staley has her group on the verge of the school’s third national championship. The Gamecocks are 36-0 and will play N.C. State on Friday night in Cleveland. Raegan Beers scored 16 points to lead the Beavers.
April 1, 2024 4:40 am
TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — Cameron Sutton has turned himself in, ending a weekslong search for a former NFL defensive back who was wanted for a domestic violence warrant. The Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office announced the 29-year-old Sutton arrived at a jail in Florida on Sunday night, nearly a week after it said his attorney informed authorities that the former Detroit Lions and Pittsburgh Steelers standout would turn himself in. Sutton was wanted for domestic battery by strangulation. The sheriff’s department responded to a call about domestic violence in progress involving Sutton and a female around 5 a.m. on March 7.
March 31, 2024 7:38 am
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Alexandre Texier and Damon Severson scored in the shootout and the Columbus Blue Jackets broke a six-game losing streak with a 4-3 victory over the Pittsburgh Penguins. Kirill Marchenko and Zach Werenski scored third-period goals as Columbus rallied from a two-goal deficit. Mathieu Olivier also scored and Elvis Merzlikins made 30 saves. Drew O’Connor, Bryan Rust and Rickard Rackell scored goals while Alex Nedeljkovic stopped 35 shots for the Penguins, who split a back-to-back series with Columbus and lost to the Blue Jackets for the first time this season.
March 29, 2024 1:24 am
BOSTON (AP) — No. 1 overall seed UConn has looked unbeatable so far during its bid to become the first school since 2007 to win back-to-back NCAA Tournament titles. Its next hurdle in the Sweet 16 is a rematch with fifth-seeded San Diego State, which the Huskies beat in last year’s title game. The other regional semifinal features a matchup between a second-seeded Iowa State team that has the best defensive rating against No. 3 seed Illinois, which boasts the top offensive rating of remaining teams.
WJPA-AM (1450) is your home for all the exciting moments of March Madness with live coverage of the Sweet 16, Elite 8, the Final Four and the National Championship games. And, once again this year, we’ll bring you extensive coverage of the Women’s Tournament starting with the Sweet 16 on Friday.
Friday — Women’s Sweet 16
#3 Oregon St. 70, #2 Notre Dame 65
#1 South Carolina 79, #4 Indiana 75
#3 North Carolina St. 77, #2 Stanford 67
#1 Texas 69, #4 Gonzaga 47
Men’s Sweet 16
#11 North Carolina St. 67, #2 Marquette 58
#1 Purdue 80, #5 Gonzaga 68
#4 Duke 54, #1 Houston 51
#2 Tennessee 82, #3 Creighton 75
Saturday — Women’s Sweet 16
1:00 pm #2 UCLA vs. #3 LSU
3:30 pm #1 Iowa vs. #5 Colorado
5:30 pm #1 USC vs. #5 Baylor
8:00 pm #3 UConn vs. #7 Duke
Men’s Elite 8
6:00 pm #1 UConn vs. #3 Illinois
8:45 pm #4 Alabama vs. #6 Clemson
Thursday — Men’s Sweet 16
#6 Clemson 77, #2 Arizona 72
#1 UConn 82, #5 San Diego St. 52
#4 Alabama 89, #1 North Carolina 87
#3 Illinois 72, #2 Iowa St. 69
March 30, 2024 4:39 am
MIAMI (AP) — Ke’Bryan Hayes had a single and an RBI double, and the Pittsburgh Pirates used another solid pitching outing to beat the Marlins 7-2 on Friday night. Michael A. Taylor and Connor Joe also doubled for the Pirates, who beat the Marlins in front of 13,636 people at loanDepot park, a sharp decline in attendance from the crowd of 32,564 on opening day. Starter Martín Pérez (pictured) held the Marlins to one run through four innings, allowing six hits with two strikeouts and three walks. Marlins starter A.J. Puk struggled in his first career MLB start, giving up three hits, four runs and walking six in two innings.
March 30, 2024 4:40 am
MIAMI (AP) — The New York Yankees acquired right-hander JT Brubaker and international bonus pool allotment from the Pittsburgh Pirates for a player to be named. Brubaker, Pittsburgh’s opening-day starter in 2022, missed last season after Tommy John surgery. He agreed in January to a one-year deal for $2,275,000. Brubaker, 30, went 3-12 with a 4.69 ERA in 28 appearances with the Pirates in 2022. He posted career highs in with 28 starts, 144 innings and 147 strikeouts that season.
March 29, 2024 4:37 am
MIAMI (AP) — Jared Triolo hit an RBI single in the top of the 12th inning to finish the Pittsburgh Pirates’ rally and beat the Miami Marlins 6-5 on opening day. Triolo’s line drive single against Marlins reliever Declan Cronin scored automatic runner Ke’Bryan Hayes. Pirates reliever Jose Hernandez got the save, retiring 2023 NL batting champion Luis Arraez, Josh Bell and Bryan De La Cruz in his only inning of relief. Luis Ortiz recorded the win for the Pirates on Thursday. After Pirates starter Mitch Keller gave up seven hits over 5 2/3 innings, Pittsburgh’s bullpen held the Marlins to just one hit.
March 29, 2024 4:39 am
PITTSBURGH (AP) — Evgeni Malkin scored twice to reach the 20-goal plateau for the 15th time and the Pittsburgh Penguins continued their mastery over the Columbus Blue Jackets with a 3-2 win. The Russian became the 31st player in league history to reach 20 goals in 15 seasons. Malkin did it with a pair of power-play blasts — one from the right circle, one from the left circle — that erased one-goal deficits. Sidney Crosby had two assists for Pittsburgh to increase his career total to 995. That’s 11th on the NHL’s all-time list. Mathieu Olivier and Cole Sillinger scored for Columbus.
