SEATTLE — Quinton Byfield scored twice, Anton Forsberg made 28 saves and the Kings secured a playoff spot with Monday night’s 5-3 win over the Seattle Kraken.
Trevor Moore, Adrian Kempe and Alex Laferriere also scored for the Kings, who won their fifth straight and are playoff-bound for the fifth consecutive season.
With two games left, the Kings are in position for the second Western Conference wild card and fourth in the Pacific Division, just two points behind second-place Edmonton. The Kings’ victory, combined with Nashville’s loss to San José earlier Monday night, wrapped up their playoff spot and eliminated both the Predators and the Sharks.
The Ducks also clinched a playoff berth, their first since 2018, by virtue of Nashville’s loss.
Adam Larsson, Frederick Gaudreau and Bobby McMann scored for Seattle, all in the third period. Nikke Kokko stopped 25 shots in his second career start. Matty Beniers had two assists.
Samuel Helenius and Seattle’s Jacob Melanson dropped the gloves with 7:57 to go in the first, and both earned five-minute majors. Their fight occurred just after the forwards finished serving matching roughing minors for an attempted altercation earlier in the period.
Byfield opened the scoring when a failed pinch by Ryan Lindgren allowed him to take off on a two-on-one rush. He added his 22nd goal later in the first period when a pass jumped Lindgren’s stick at the Kings’ blue line, leading to a breakaway that Byfield converted.
Moore scored on a rebound 7:13 into the second. The Kraken twice got within one goal in the third, but Laferriere’s empty-netter in the closing seconds ended their hopes.
Already eliminated from the playoffs, Seattle lost to the Kings for the first time this season and has not won three straight games since January.
Nneka Ogwumike is coming home in a strong endorsement of the Sparks’ vow to succeed during the upcoming season.
Ogwumike, a 10-time WNBA All-Star, spent the first 12 seasons of her career with the Sparks after she was drafted No. 1 overall by the franchise in 2012.
But Ogwumike left two seasons ago as the Sparks were struggling to win and signed with a Seattle Storm team with talent capable of pushing for a championship, a female coach and state-of-the-art facilities.
Ogwumike posted a 45-second video on social media Friday morning that indicated her intention to return to the Sparks. Free agents are free to sign with new teams Saturday, when the Sparks are expected to officially announce her return.
“It was always ‘see you later,’ now I’ll see you soon,” Ogwumike wrote in the post.
She did not post any contract terms, and they have yet to be reported.
Chiney Ogwumike, an ESPN analyst, longtime Spark and Nneka’s sister, broke the news on X, posting: “10x WNBA All-Star and 2016 MVP Nneka Ogwumike intends to re-sign with the Los Angeles Sparks.
“She previously played 12 seasons in LA and ‘is looking forward to returning home.’”
The Sparks last made the playoffs in 2020, and while they showed some potential last year, going 21-23 but fizzling out in the second half of the season, adding the 35-year-old veteran bolsters their push to take a big step forward into the playoff mix.
Adding the appeal of some of the talent already on their roster and a new $150-million practice facility scheduled to open next year, the Sparks are positioning themselves for a return to their winning ways.
The Sparks are expected to trade 2024 first-round pick Rickea Jackson to Chicago this weekend for guard Ariel Atkins, according to reports. Atkins, who turns 30 in July, is a two-time All-Star and five-time all-defensive player who had an important role in the Washington Mystics’ 2019 championship.
Sparks players cheer as WNBA President Lisa Borders hands the championship trophy to team owner Magic Johnson in 2016. Nneka Ogwumike was on the team that won the Sparks’ most recent title.
(Hannah Foslien / Getty Images)
That leaves the Sparks with just three other players — Plum, who signed a core contract, Cameron Brink and Sania Feagin — under contract. The Sparks extended qualifying offers to Rae Burrell, Julie Vanloo and Alissa Pili this week, essentially retaining their rights.
But Ogwumike is the kind of player whom the Sparks could build a competitive campaign around, especially playing alongside Brink in a potent frontcourt. With Plum and likely Atkins in the fold, the Sparks could use an upgraded ball-handler, unless they go with Plum at point guard and focus on bringing in another forward.
Forward Azura Stevens announced on social media she is not returning. The Sparks also lost starting point guard Julie Allemand to Toronto in the expansion draft last week.
Forward Dearica Hamby remains unsigned. She started 84 games in the last two seasons and was an All-Star in 2024 but likely is behind Ogwumike and Brink on the Sparks’ depth chart and might push for a bigger role with another team.
The Sparks don’t have a first-round draft pick, so they will need to pursue talent on the robust free-agent market or make another trade to bolster their backcourt. If they elect to go with Plum at point guard, they could start Burrell as a small forward after her strong offseason in the Unrivaled three-on-three league, but they still need more depth.
During the next seven days, the Sparks will have a chance to make moves to support a veteran core of Ogwumike and Plum alongside a rising star in Brink as they push to build a team that can make the playoffs.
Last season in Seattle, Ogwumike averaged 18.3 points, 7.0 rebounds, 2.3 assists and 1.1 steals. Her departure was somewhat expected after Noelle Quinn was fired as coach following the Storm’s first-round playoff exit.
The president of the players association, Ogwumike played an essential role in the historic collective bargaining agreement the league and players agreed to in March, which led to the salary cap being raised to $7 million per team.
Nneka Ogwumike, photographed in downtown Los Angeles in 2019, is returning to the Sparks after two seasons in Seattle.
(Christina House/Los Angeles Times)
On Wednesday, speculation was rampant that Ogwumike might end up in Minnesota after a balloon company shared a video of a balloon sign that read: “Welcome Nneka,” but the forward clarified on Instagram that it was just a greeting welcoming her to a meeting with the Lynx, not an indication she was signing there.
With the majority of the league’s players free agents, teams have an opportunity to reinvent themselves this offseason. It seems likely that Seattle, with Skylar Diggins-Smith and Gabby Williams as free agents, could take a step back.
The forecast for expansion clubs Portland and Toronto, meanwhile, won’t take shape until they finish building their rosters.
The Sparks gave up the most points per game last season, 88.2, a flaw they hope to address with Ogwumike, the expected addition of Atkins and a full season of Brink, who has been limited by injuries to 34 games in her first two seasons after being drafted No. 2 in 2024.
The Sparks promised fans they would complete their rebuild and become title contenders again. Ogwumike’s return suggests she believes in the plan.
“We were standing in the jet stream, on the edge of space,” Whittaker wrote in his 1999 memoir, “A Life on the Edge.”
He returned home a hero, with his picture on the cover of Life magazine, a White House fete and unexpected celebrity. And though life off the mountain didn’t always go smoothly, he disdained regret.
“If you stick your neck out, whether it’s by climbing mountains or speaking up for something you believe in, your odds of winning are at least fifty-fifty,” he wrote. “On the other hand, if you never stick your neck out, your odds of losing are pretty close to 100%.”
An adventurer until the end, Whittaker died Tuesday at his home in Port Townsend, Wash., his son Leif confirmed to the New York Times. Whittaker was 97. .
On March 24, 1965, Robert F. Kennedy, left, stands atop Mt. Kennedy in Canada after placing a black flag in memorial to his late brother, President John F. Kennedy. With him were Jim Whittaker; William Allard, a National Geographic Society photographer; and George Senner, a ranger.
(Doug Wilson / Associated Press)
He was 34 when he scaled Everest, a feat that shaped much of the rest of his life. His Washington state license plate read 29028, the generally accepted height of Everest when he climbed it. (GPS surveys later put it at about 29,035 feet.)
He was chosen for the expedition by its leader, Swiss mountaineer Norman Dyhrenfurth, because of his experience in climbing under icy conditions, including numerous summits of Mt. Rainier near his Seattle-area home.
But Everest, first scaled in 1953 by New Zealander Edmund Hillary and Nepalese Sherpa Tenzing Norgay, was a far more formidable and dangerous beast. And even if the Dyhrenfurth expedition was successful, only a chosen few of its 19 team members would reach the top. Still, Whittaker thought his chances were good.
“I’d trained hard, put 60 pounds of bricks in my backpack,” he told National Geographic Adventure magazine in 2003. “I swam in Lake Sammamish in winter to build up to the cold we would encounter.
“I didn’t know anyone who was in better shape.”
On only the second day of the group’s climb from base camp, tragedy struck when a giant section of an icefall — a glacier formation resembling a frozen waterfall — shifted, crushing team member Jake Breitenbach.
“I had told everyone back home that Everest was not a difficult climb technically; the only problem was the lack of oxygen and the weather,” Whittaker wrote in “Life on the Edge.” “Now it had killed one of us, and we’d only just begun.”
Because the only way to get back to base camp was via that icefall, Whittaker chose to stay above it on the mountain for five steady weeks as more camps were established up Everest. He lost 25 pounds and a considerable amount of strength due to the thin air.
Still, he was in better condition than many of the other climbers, and Dyhrenfurth chose him for the final assault. He and Gombu left the last camp in the middle of a windstorm, with a scant supply of oxygen.
How hard was it to breathe? “Put a pillow on your face, run around the block, and try and suck oxygen through that pillow,” he said. It was so cold, one of his eyeballs froze, making it unusable.
Reaching the summit after several hours, they stayed only long enough to take pictures and plant flags as 50-mph winds whipped around them.
“When you are up there, you are not ecstatic, you are not afraid,” he told the Los Angeles Times in 2013. “You’re really not anything. But in the back of your mind, you know one thing: You gotta get off. Half of the climb is getting up, the other half is getting down.”
James Whittaker was born on Feb. 10, 1929, in Seattle, about 10 minutes before the birth of Louie, his twin brother. As the boys grew up, they took to rough-housing around the house, much to the chagrin of their mother.
“I believe that command to ‘Go outside and play’ is what started Louie and me on the path we have taken every since,” Whittaker wrote.
He was active in Boy Scouts and as a teenager joined a mountaineering club that sponsored climbs on the nearby Olympic and Cascade ranges. He tested himself on increasingly higher peaks, relishing moments such as breaking through cloud layers.
“I think nature is a great teacher,” he told the Seattle Times in 2013. “Being in nature that way is a good way to find out who the hell you are.”
After finishing West Seattle High School, Whittaker went on to Seattle University, graduating in 1952. He was promptly drafted into the Army, but his mountaineering experience led him to be assigned to the Mountain and Cold Weather Training Command in Colorado instead of combat duty in Korea.
In 1955, he became the first full-time employee of the Recreational Equipment Cooperative (later called REI) when it was housed in a 20-by-30-foot space above a Seattle restaurant. In his first year, he expanded the co-op’s offerings into ski equipment and introduced new concepts — such as opening on Saturday mornings so customers could pick up equipment for weekend trips — that boosted sales.
Whittaker, pictured on April 12, 1975, in Seattle, shows some of the gear he would be taking for an expedition to climb K2 on the China-Pakistan border.
(Associated Press)
Because of his connection to the co-op, he was appointed equipment coordinator of the Everest climb, and REI agreed to keep him on the payroll during the expedition.
In July 1963, he and other members of the Everest team, including Gombu, were presented the Hubbard Medal of the National Geographic Society — which partially sponsored the expedition — by President Kennedy, four months before the president was assassinated.
Two years later, Whittaker led a climb up Mt. Kennedy, a nearly 14,000-foot Canadian peak named for JFK, with Sen. Robert F. Kennedy in the climbing party. The two men forged a close friendship that extended to the wider Kennedy clan. In subsequent years, Whittaker went on ski vacations with the Kennedys, was a guest at the family compound in Hyannis Port, Mass., and hosted gatherings in Seattle that included mountain climbing.
Whittaker organized Robert Kennedy’s 1968 presidential campaign efforts in the Pacific Northwest and spoke to him by phone only minutes before the candidate was fatally shot in Los Angeles. Whittaker caught a flight to L.A. and was at the senator’s hospital bedside when he died and then served as a pallbearer at the funeral.
In mountaineering, Whittaker was closely involved in more high-profile ventures. He led a 1975 expedition up the world’s second-highest mountain, K2, that failed to reach the top. His return expedition in 1978 was successful, though he chose not to go to the summit himself.
That same year, he decided to quit REI, partly because of friction with the co-op’s board. He had been president and chief executive since 1971, and when he left, the co-op was a $46-million business with more than 700 employees.
Whittaker throws out the ceremonial first pitch before a baseball game between the Mariners and the Angels in 2013.
(Elaine Thompson / Associated Press)
Income from an endorsement agreement helped keep him financially sound, but an investment in a new outdoor gear company proved to be a disaster. The financial irregularities of a partner, who was convicted of felony bank fraud, doomed the venture, and Whittaker was left holding the financial bag.
He was nearly wiped out but got back on his financial footing when a venture capitalist asked him in 1986 to be chairman of the board, with stock options, of a new company called Magellan. It was a pioneer in GPS consumer electronics and holds numerous patents in the field.
Appropriately, Whittaker called one of the chapters midway through his book “Roller Coaster.” But he finished it with “Life Well Lived.”
“If you aren’t living on the edge,” he wrote, “you’re taking up too much space.”
Whittaker is survived by his wife, Dianne Roberts, and children Bobby, Joss and Leif.
Mariners left-hander Gabe Speier (0-2) walked Zach Neto intentionally to open the bottom of the 11th, and both runners advanced on Oswald Peraza’s sacrifice bunt.
Schanuel, who grounded into a double play with runners on first and third to end the eighth, lofted a fly ball to left fielder Randy Arozarena, whose throw home was off line.
Shaun Anderson (1-0) struck out Cal Raleigh with the bases loaded to end the top of the 11th. Anderson gave up a run in two innings.
Mike Trout, who doubled and scored in the third, exited in the eighth after being hit on the left hand by Casey Legumina’s 94-mph fastball. X-rays were negative, and Trout is listed as day-to-day.
The teams exchanged runs in the 10th, Seattle scoring on Randy Arozarena’s single and the Angels (5-5) on Logan O’Hoppe’s sacrifice fly.
The Angels were one out away from victory in the top of the ninth when Raleigh blooped a two-out double and Julio Rodríguez poked Sam Bachman’s 91-mph slider to left for a single and a 6-6 tie. Mariners closer Andres Munoz threw a 1-2-3 bottom of the ninth.
Cole Young hit a three-run homer to give the Mariners (4-6) a 5-4 lead in the fifth, but Jo Adell and Frazier drove in runs with singles in the home half.
Seattle’s Leo Rivas hit a two-run single in the second.
Jorge Soler hit RBI singles in the first and third before the Angels took a 4-2 lead in the fourth when Josh Lowe scored on Rivas’ fielding error at third and Schanuel hit a two-out RBI single.
Up next for Angels: José Soriano (2-0, 0.00 ERA) will oppose Atlanta’s Chris Sale (2-0, 0.75 ERA) at home Monday to kick off a three-game set.
Former two-time champion loses his fourth straight bout after being stopped by Pyfer in the second round.
Published On 29 Mar 202629 Mar 2026
Joe Pyfer sent former Ultimate Fighting Championship middleweight champion Israel Adesanya back to the drawing board in Saturday’s UFC Fight Night headliner in Seattle, stopping Adesanya at 4:18 of the second round to cap the night.
Before the technical knockout (TKO) finish, both fighters exchanged their best punches in a stand-up battle until a Pyfer (16-3 MMA) takedown signalled the beginning of the end.
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“I just have this mentality where I don’t care; I’m going to search and destroy,” Pyfer said, following the stoppage, securing the finish in top control.
Adesanya (24-6 MMA), fighting out of New Zealand, has not won a bout since regaining middleweight gold in April 2023 at UFC 287, and confirmed he has no plans to retire.
“I’m just going to keep going and going and going,” Adesanya said.
Pyfer, left, delivers a right-hand punch to Adesanya [Steven Bisig/Imagn Images via Reuters]
Grasso dominates Barber in rematch
A rematch five years in the making commenced at flyweight as former champion Alexa Grasso made short work of Maycee Barber with a TKO stoppage at 2:42 of the opening round. The Mexican used a left hook to down Barber before jumping on top of her immediately as the referee stepped in.
The two first met in February 2021, with Grasso earning a decision. Grasso (17-5-1 MMA) snapped a two-fight losing skid, whereas Barber (15-3 MMA) had not lost since the first meeting with Grasso, having won her previous seven fights.
In his final MMA fight, welterweight Michael Chiesa (20-7 MMA) had a hometown send-off as he submitted Niko Price (16-11 MMA) with a first-round rear-naked choke. Chiesa needed just 63 seconds to put a bow on his UFC career, one that spanned a decade-plus and included winning the 15th season of The Ultimate Fighter in June 2012.
Chiesa ended his UFC career at 15-7, while Price, who has been in the promotion for over a decade himself, now sits at 8-11, with two no contests in the Octagon and has dropped four straight fights.
The finishes were a theme on the night, as featherweight Lerryan Douglas (14-5 MMA) of Brazil needed 3:33 of the opening round to deliver a devastating TKO against Julian Erosa (31-13 MMA). Douglas has now won his last six in a row while Erosa continues to struggle at 9-9 in the UFC.
At middleweight, Yousri Belgaroui of the Netherlands scored a third-round TKO stoppage against Mansur Abdul-Malik by landing a perfectly timed knee to end the fight in a back-and-forth battle. Belgaroui (10-3 MMA) has won five straight and remains undefeated in the UFC. Conversely, it was Abdul-Malik’s (9-1-1 MMA) first professional loss, as he had won seven of his 11 outings by KO/TKO.
The main card got under way in emphatic fashion in the opener, with lightweight Terrance McKinney needing just 24 seconds to dispatch Canadian Kyle Nelson with a series of punches following a head kick. McKinney (18-8 MMA) has won three of his last four, while Nelson (17-7-1 MMA) has lost two of his last three.
CHICAGO — The eventual end of the USC men’s basketball season came the same way that it fizzled out during the past month, with yet another second-half collapse that featured the added pain of overtime.
The Trojans led the Huskies by 13 in the second half and had chances to win at the end of regulation and overtime, only to miss all three potential game-winning or game-tying shots and go 2-for-5 from the free-throw line in overtime. For a team that was once in NCAA tournament consideration before stumbling, that failure to finish was a persistent flaw.
USC guard Alijah Arenas talks with coach Eric Musselman during the Trojans’ loss to the Huskies in the Big Ten tournament on Wednesday in Chicago.
(Michael Reaves / Getty Images)
“That’s been the story of our last eight games,” Musselman said. “I think we’ve led at halftime four of our last eight games, and as a group, we haven’t figured out how to close games, the last 20 minutes with a lead. It’s a disappointing last eight games of the season. I thought up until that point we played good basketball.”
With the Trojans likely to decline any postseason invitation, Musselman said, he was headed to the team hotel Tuesday night to get back to work filling out next season’s recruiting class, starting with more freshmen before the transfer portal officially opens next month.
That group already includes two top-30 recruits in the Ratliff twins, Adonis and Darius, but if USC learned anything from the way this season ended, all too similar to the way last season ended, it’s that whatever depth and talent Musselman has assembled in his two years at USC hasn’t been enough, whether that’s freshmen or transfers.
“We want a blend of both,” Musselman said. “It’s early in our tenure, and we’ve got to figure out a way to get better than what we’ve done the last two years.”
Tuesday, the Trojans had no shortage of chances to fend off the end.
They had a double-digit lead with 13 minutes to play. They had the ball at the end of regulation with the score tied. They had a chance to win it in overtime and were gifted a last-chance shot to tie it.
They missed all three pivotal shots — the first two by Kam Woods, the last a 3-pointer by Jordan Marsh — to see a game they once led comfortably slip away again and again.
“On the last one, I feel like I missed Ezra [Ausar] on that cut,” said Woods, a grad transfer who joined the team in midseason. “Coach trusted me with the ball in my hands, and I feel like I let him down.”
Woods finished with 24 points while Jacob Cofie scored 14, Marsh 13 and Ausar and Ryan Cornish 10 each for 13th-seeded USC (18-14) as the 12th-seeded Huskies (16-16) beat the Trojans for the third time this season.
Freshman Alijah Arenas, who led the Trojans in scoring in both games without Baker-Mazara, was held to six points on 3-for-10 shooting and sat out the final six minutes of regulation and all but eight seconds of overtime. Musselman said that was his decision, as was the virtual absence of senior Terrance Williams, who played only one minute.
That left USC with what was essentially a six-player rotation to conclude a season that began without the injured Arenas and ended without Rodney Rice and Amarion Dickerson, both hurt, as well as the departed Baker-Mazara — all of which factored into Musselman’s position on any postseason plans.
“I haven’t had in-depth conversations with the administration yet about that, but I would assume we’re not going to play, just based on the number of bodies and how we played the last eight games,” Musselman said.
It was not all that long ago that USC was thinking about the NCAA tournament. Winners of the Maui Invitational, USC was 18-6 and above .500 in the Big Ten standings after a February 8 win at Penn State, solidly in a workable position on the NCAA tournament bubble.
But as the injuries mounted and momentum waned, second-half struggles just like the Trojans’ on Tuesday became an increasingly fatal flaw as they slumped to their longest losing streak in a decade. The loss to Washington compounded the misery of a second straight frustrating season, in familiar fashion.
“As a team, we faced a lot of adversity,” Cofie said. “I felt like we did a good job sticking with it and trying to play for each other. We had to deal with a lot of injuries. I felt like that played a huge deal in it. We still fought. We tried our best.”
