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✍ Trade grades: Reactions for every transaction

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Dame Time: Lillard, who hasn't played this season, will be in 3-point contest at All-Star Saturday

Damian Lillard is apparently going to wear his Portland uniform again, in a most unexpected manner.

And he’ll have the Olympics as the television lead-in for his return.

Lillard — who has not played this season while recovering from a torn Achilles tendon — will participate in the 3-point contest on All-Star Saturday, the NBA announced.

Viewers won’t have to wait long to see Lillard’s return. All-Star Saturday will lead off this year with the 3-point contest, a major change from the norm and a move that could command big ratings — with NBC’s coverage of the event immediately following broadcasts from the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics, which the network also airs.

In other words, NBC is going from skating, sliding and skiing to shooting.

Lillard is joining 2018 3-point contest champion Devin Booker of the Phoenix Suns in the field, along with Charlotte’s Kon Knueppel, Philadelphia’s Tyrese Maxey, Cleveland’s Donovan Mitchell, Denver’s Jamal Murray, Milwaukee’s Bobby Portis Jr. and Miami’s Norman Powell.

If Lillard wins, he would join Larry Bird and Craig Hodges as the only three-time winners of the event, which will be held at the Los Angeles Clippers’ home in Inglewood, California.

Saturday night’s 3-point contest will be followed by the return of the Shooting Stars competition, then the dunk contest will close the Saturday night schedule. The skills competition is out, at least for this year.

It would be Lillard’s first time playing — or at least shooting — in front of fans since he rejoined Portland going into this season. Lillard got hurt last spring while a member of the Milwaukee Bucks, who wound up waiving-and-stretching the remaining $113 million on his contract to make him a free agent and give him the opportunity to re-sign with his original NBA club.

He’s not the first 3-point participant without a made 3-pointer in that season: In the 1989 contest, the NBA invited Rimas Kurtinaitis of Lithuania to participate. Kurtinaitis never played in the NBA.

Lillard was the sixth pick in the 2012 NBA draft by the Trail Blazers and spent 11 seasons with Portland before he was traded to Milwaukee just before the 2023-24 season. Lillard won back-to-back 3-point contest titles in 2023 and 2024, before Miami’s Tyler Herro — who has missed most of this season because of injuries — won the event last season.

Herro is not in the lineup of 3-point participants this year.

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AP NBA: https://apnews.com/hub/NBA

Brunson's 31 points power Knicks past Celtics, snapping Boston's five-game winning streak

BOSTON (AP) — Jalen Brunson scored 31 points and Josh Hart added 19 to help the New York Knicks beat the cold-shooting Boston Celtics 111-89 on Sunday.

Karl-Anthony Towns had 11 points and 10 rebounds for the Knicks, who never trailed over the final 42 minutes. Mikal Bridges (14 points) and recently acquired Jose Alvarado (12 points) rounded out the double-digit scorers for New York, which shot 14 of 45 (40%) from behind the 3-point line.

Jaylen Brown socred 26 points and Derrick White added 19 for the Celtics, who saw their five-game winning streak snapped, Baylor Scheierman started in place for the injured Sam Hauser and finished with 10 points, 13 rebounds and five assists.

Boston shot 37% for the game and was 7-of-41 (17.1%) from behind the arc.

The matchup pitted two of the top teams in the Eastern Conference, with Boston entering with a one-game lead over New York for second place. They’ll meet one more time during the regular season on April 9 in New York.

New York pushed its advantage to 85-68 entering the fourth quarter after closing the third on a 20-7 run. The lead kept growing when Brunson scored 10 straight points to give the Knicks a 23-point lead with four minutes left.

Boston revisited the “Hack-a-Robinson” tactic that was introduced during last spring’s playoff meeting with the Knicks. A career 51% shooter from the free-throw line and connecting at a 38% clip this season, Mitchell Robinson had the last laugh when he went 2 of 2 at the line with 2:32 left in the third after the reserve big man clanked all four free throws he attempted during the first half.

The Knicks led 60-53 at halftime. Brunson had 19 points through two quarters, with 12 coming during the first. Boston trailed by as many as 17 points but made it a two-possession game entering the second half despite shooting 5 of 22 (22.7%) from 3-point range.

Up next

Knicks: Host Indiana on Tuesday night.

Celtics: Host Chicago on Wednesday night.

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AP NBA: https://apnews.com/hub/NBA

Pistons prez OK keeping mostly quiet at deadline

The East-leading Detroit Pistons passed on taking a big swing at the trade deadline, opting to lean on their youth and chemistry with the playoffs a little over two months away.

A Super Bowl starting at 12:30 a.m.? Welcome to an Olympic-sized problem for fans in Italy

CORTINA D’AMPEZZO, Italy (AP) — USA Luge men’s doubles slider Zack DiGregorio is a New England Patriots fan. Makes sense: He’s from Massachusetts, his mother has worked for the Patriots for more than two decades and the Patriots are about to play in the Super Bowl for the 10th time since he was born.

He doesn’t miss games. Especially not big games. And games get no bigger than the Super Bowl.

Welcome to a Super-sized Olympic dilemma: What does one do when football’s biggest game collides with the Milan Cortina Games? In Italy, the game between the Patriots and the Seattle Seahawks kicks off Monday at 12:30 a.m., a time when Olympians like DiGregorio should be asleep and not exhausting themselves before taking part in their own Super Bowl of sliding.

“If I happen to wake up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom,” DiGregorio said, “I may be tuning in.”

He won’t be the only one in Italy with a gaze locked on a TV, laptop or phone screen in the wee hours of Monday morning. There are 15 members of this U.S. Olympic team from Massachusetts, eight more from Washington and who knows how many else with reason to watch.

Gold-medal pursuits may be forgotten, for a few hours anyway, to watch two teams play for a silver trophy. And yes, some Olympians with major rooting interests in this game say they’ll go without and make sure their sleep cycles aren’t interrupted.

“I’m not going to be able to watch because that’s going to be real late here,” said curling Olympian Korey Dropkin, who was born in Massachusetts. “But as my form of support, I’m going to wear my Pats jersey to bed.”

Then again, some athletes at the Olympics won’t have to stay up to watch. It seems a few already are somehow aware of the outcome.

“It’ll be the middle of the night here so I think we will see the score afterwards,” said short track speed skater Corinne Stoddard, a Seattle native. “We don’t want to be up all night. But the Seahawks are going to win. I don’t have any doubt in my mind about that one. We’ve proved it all year. So, good luck, Patriots.”

Women’s hockey player Alex Carpenter — a dual citizen of sorts for this Super Bowl, a Massachusetts native who plays for the PWHL’s Seattle Torrent — has a game on Monday, so she said she’ll just “check the score in the morning.”

And Boston Bruins star Charlie McAvoy — part of the U.S. men’s hockey team in Milan — told NBC he might just go to bed really early Sunday night.

“That could look like a 5 a.m. wake-up to catch the second half,” McAvoy said.

The collision of a Super Bowl and an Olympics is a fun headache for some. For the Olympic movement, it represents a bigger issue.

Sunday (or Monday in Italy, technically) will mark only the second time that the Super Bowl and the Winter Games will be happening on the same day. They collided in 2022 as well, and with NFL seasons now several weeks longer than they were a generation or two ago these conflicts are probably going to keep happening.

“You’ve got big events all working and overlapping,” International Olympic Committee President Kirsty Coventry told the Olympic Information Service coming into the Milan Cortina Games. “So, the next part of the question is, when are we all going to sit down as one big sporting family and have these conversations around how we prioritize, how do we talk, how do we make space for each of us so that we’re also not competing against each other?”

For now, those involved will just enjoy having two big things to root for at basically the same time.

Mark Henderson’s daughter is U.S. Olympic freestyle skier Grace Henderson, who is scheduled to compete at 10:30 a.m. Monday.

That’s a few hours after the Super Bowl ends. Prediction: Mark Henderson is going to be tired.

He found a bar in Livigno, Italy that has agreed — with the help of some cash — to stay open until the end of the Super Bowl to ensure the Henderson clan of about 15 to 20 people have enough food and drink past the scheduled 2 a.m. closing time.

“I said, ‘What would it take to stay open a few more hours?’” Mark Henderson said. “I named a price and they took it. Food and drink included.”

Krista DiGregorio, Zack’s mom, is looking for a similar establishment. She probably would have been at the Super Bowl this year — she works in the suites at Gillette Stadium, and that part-time role basically funded her son’s costly luge career as he was becoming an Olympian.

Her plan: Find a bar that’ll stay open in Cortina d’Ampezzo.

“We’ll beg, if need be,” she said. “I am not above begging or perhaps sliding a few euros in their direction.”

The main focus for the DiGregorio clan right now is, of course, the Olympics. Zack has his Drake Maye jersey with him. The family’s rental home has all the necessary fan touches: more Pats jerseys, signs, banners, even a towel with the team’s “We all we got, we all we need” theme.

But the way Krista DiGregorio sees it, she already got her championship parade Friday night when her son was in the Olympic opening ceremony and got to march with teammates through the streets of Cortina.

A Super Bowl win would be wonderful. Either way, it’s been a pretty good season for her.

“Unreal. Unreal,” Krista DiGregorio said. “I didn’t anticipate being as emotional as I was at that parade. To be there and see how happy he is, how happy his teammates are, the people he’s grown up with and gotten close to, it’s been wonderful.”

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AP Sports Writers Joseph Wilson and James Ellingsworth contributed to this story.

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AP Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics

Stone scores 22, Mitchell has 20 and 11 rebounds for Mizzou in 78-59 win over South Carolina

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — Jayden Stone scored 22 points, Mark Mitchell added 20 points and grabbed 11 rebounds, and Missouri took down South Carolina, 78-59 on Saturday.

Stone was an efficient 7-for-9 shooting from the field (3 for 4 from deep), and Mitchell went 7 for 11 (1 for 2 from deep) for the Tigers (16-7, 6-4 Southeastern Conference). Mizzou was 25-for-54 shooting from the field overall.

T.O. Barrett added 14 points and seven rebounds, but struggled shooting (4 for 12).

The Tigers did not trail for the entire game, taking their first lead 37 seconds into the contest. They led 34-30 at halftime, and a 10-3 run to start the second half pushed their lead to double-digits.

Stone hit a 3-pointer with 7:17 remaining to start an 8-0 run that gave Mizzou a comfortable 15-point lead.

Meechie Johnson scored 13 points for the Gamecocks (11-13, 2-9), but was just 2-for-13 shooting from the field and 1 for 7 from beyond the arc. Kobe Knox and Elijah Strong each added 12 points, and Eli Ellis had 11.

Up next

Mizzou visits Texas A&M on Wednesday.

South Carolina visits Alabama next Saturday.

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