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After failed bond request, South Washington County seeking input on school facility plans

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:02:02 GMT

In the wake of voters rejecting a $462 million bond request last year, South Washington County School District officials are seeking public input in developing a new facility plan to handle increased enrollment at its schools.The $426 million bond request — the biggest ever in Minnesota — was rejected by a vote of 14,834 to 7,782 on Aug. 9.“We asked for what we needed,” Superintendent Julie Nielsen said in October. “But I would say that August was probably the perfect storm as we look at what was going on with the economy, returning to school and the largest ask in the state of Minnesota. All of those things played a role in the unsuccessful bond. We knew that it was a big ask for our community, and so this allows us the opportunity to kind of reflect on what we did, and move forward, hopefully, with a plan that our community can support.”The district announced this week that it is holding a series of community meetings to seek public input on a new plan.• 6:30 p.m., Tue...

Jimmy Butler helps Heat salvage weekend with 112-100 win in Detroit

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:02:02 GMT

This was supposed to be the weekend of how the midwest was won.Then came Saturday night’s calamity in Chicago.Followed by 40-plus minutes of desperation in Detroit.Ultimately, a weekend split, the Miami Heat holding off the Pistons 112-100 at Little Caesars Arena, behind the bravado of Jimmy Butler, heroics of Tyler Herro and return of the defense that took the previous night off.No, not as scripted, with the Pistons prioritizing the lottery to the degree that their best perimeter player Sunday arguably was former Heat scavenger Rodney McGruder.So the Heat got back to playing clutch games and got enough from Butler, Herro and Bam Adebayo to salvage the back end of the back-to-back set.Butler led the Heat with 26 points and 10 assists. Adebayo added 22 points and 10 rebounds. Herro finished with 19 points.The Heat are now idle until Wednesday night’s home game against the New York Knicks.Five Degrees of Heat from Sunday’s game:1. Closing time: The Pistons led 29-26 ...

Kiszla: His Blue Jays are in the Sweet 16. His son plays in the NBA. But that’s not what makes Creighton coach Greg McDermott most proud.

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:02:02 GMT

His son has scored more than 5,000 points in the NBA and the Creighton team he coaches is headed to the Sweet 16 of March Madness.But know what gives Creighton basketball coach Greg McDermott the most pride?Being Earl and Mary’s kid.“Yeah, my parents are 89 years old, Earl and Mary are back home watching this tonight. You become who you become because of how you grew up and the expectations that were placed on you when you were a child: What was right and what was wrong,” McDermott said Sunday, after Creighton thumped Baylor 85-76 in the men’s NCAA Tournament.“I am who I am because of Earl and Mary McDermott, and I’m proud to say I’m their son.”The sixth-seeded Bluejays, stuck with a 6-6 record in mid-December after losing six straight, beat the No. 3 Bears, and it didn’t look anything like an upset.Creighton guard Ryan Nembhard scored 30 points, thoroughly outshining Baylor backcourt star Keyonte George, a projected lottery pick in the upcoming NBA draft who shot a ch-ch-chilly 1 o...

Can Creighton beat ‘Bama? Blue Jays, led by Ryan Nembhard this time, make statement in win over Baylor

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:02:02 GMT

Passing the team from his shoulders to the next pair, Ryan Kalkbrenner approached Ryan Nembhard seeking guidance.“What do you want to do on those midrange shots?” the 7-foot-1 Creighton center asked the (generously measured) 6-foot point guard. Baylor’s stellar guard play was matching Creighton’s, and the Blue Jays needed to figure out an adjustment.Nembhard’s career-high 30-points were the attention grabber in Creighton’s 85-76 win Sunday at Ball Arena, but his intelligence and leadership have been every bit as valuable to the Blue Jays’ second trip to the Sweet 16 in three years.His relationship with Kalkbrenner is simple. Nembhard is the communicative floor general; the soft-spoken Kalkbrenner diligently makes himself useful. “I don’t have to talk to him too much because I take a look at him and I kind of know what he means,” Kalkbrenner said, “and he doesn’t have to direct me too much because he says one thi...

Stanford’s season ends in shocking NCAA Tournament second round loss to Ole Miss

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:02:02 GMT

STANFORD — The senior class that led Stanford back to the top of women’s basketball knew Sunday was their final game in Maples Pavilion together heading into the game.Ole Miss made it their final game, period.The No. 8 seed Rebels stifled the No. 1 seed Cardinal all night en route to a 54-49 upset victory, ending Stanford’s season on their home floor in the second round of the NCAA Tournament.After a furious Stanford comeback tied the game with 1:16 to go, Hannah Jump threw the ball directly into the arms of Ole Miss forward Madison Scott, who was fouled by Haley Jones with 18 seconds to go.Scott made two free throws and Stanford tried to feed the ball into Jones. But Ole Miss double-team caused Jones to lose the ball out of bounds. Ole Miss made its two free throws to go up four and, after its final timeout, Stanford committed another turnover on the inbounds pass.The Rebels led by as many as 13 midway through the third and led by eight with six minutes to go. But Stanford held the...

Wong, Miller lead Miami past Indiana, into Sweet 16

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:02:02 GMT

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — Isaiah Wong and Jordan Miller led a decisive second-half spurt for Miami, which beat Indiana 85-69 Sunday night in the second round of the NCAA Tournament to reach its second straight Sweet 16.Wong, the Atlantic Coast Conference player of the year who was limited to five points in a first-round win over Drake, had 27 points and eight rebounds for coach Jim Larrañaga’s fifth-seeded Hurricanes (27-7), the only ACC team left in March Madness.Miller, who had seven points on Friday, scored 19, while Indianapolis native Nijel Pack had 10 of his 12 points in the first half, getting Miami off to a fast start that allowed it to lead most of the game and end Indiana’s hopes of a sixth national title.Miami will face top-seeded Houston in the Midwest Region semifinals in Kansas City, Missouri, on Friday.All-American Trayce Jackson-Davis had 23 points and eight rebounds for the Hoosiers (23-12), who have not been to the Sweet 16 since 2016. Freshman Jalen Hood-Sch...

Florida Atlantic end’s Fairleigh Dickinson run for Sweet 16

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:02:02 GMT

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Fairleigh Dickinson came up just a little short this time.Johnell Davis scored 29 points, Alijah Martin added 14 and Florida Atlantic ended underdog FDU’s magical March by outlasting the No. 16 seed 78-70 on Sunday night in the East Region of the NCAA Tournament.The ninth-seeded Owls (33-3) needed everything they had to put away the Knights (21-16), the nation’s smallest team and a surprising winner Friday night against 7-foot-4 center Zach Edey and top-seeded Purdue in just the second 16-over-1 upset i n men’s tournament history.It will be FAU, not FDU, which will play Tennessee in the Sweet 16 on Thursday at Madison Square Garden in New York.“My team just believed in me,” said Davis, who added 12 rebounds, five assists and five steals. “It’s just a dream come true.”The Knights couldn’t come up with an encore after eliminating Purdue, but not before putting up a fight to the finish. After the final horn, coach Tobin Anderson and F...

Pili helps Utah advance to Sweet 16 with win over Princeton

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:02:02 GMT

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Alissa Pili often had two or three opponents draped on her when she got the ball. No one was strong enough to stop Utah’s All-American.Pili had 28 points and 10 rebounds to lead the second-seeded Utes to a 63-56 win over 10th-seeded Princeton 63-56 on Sunday night in the second round of the NCAA Tournament.“Coming into the game, the coaches told me they were going to key on me and so I just had to let the game come to me,” Pili said.But the Tigers didn’t ever let up. Near the end of the game after a hard foul, Pili squared up and stared down a defender.“Oh, it was expected. So I think just the main thing I tried to do was just keep my cool and … keep my head down and keep working,” said Pili, who wrestled and played tackle football as a youngster.Jenna Johnson added 15 points for the Utes, who made only one 3-pointer but still advanced to their first Sweet 16 since 2006.“They’re a great defensive team,” said Utah’s Kennady McQueen, who had nine points. “T...

McCaughey: White House focus on climate change, not banks

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:02:02 GMT

The failure of three banks in the last two weeks, including Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank, is a saga of utter government incompetence. Call these bank collapses Biden’s Banking Busts. The Biden administration has been obsessing on woke causes while banks teeter toward insolvency.Three days before Silicon Valley Bank collapsed, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen cautioned that climate change puts the banking industry at risk. Yellen was in la-la land, speculating that future storms and tornadoes could diminish the value of banks’ assets.Weather is a risk, but she was oblivious to the much more immediate problem facing banks — the plummeting value of the bonds they own. She was heedless to the impending downfall of SVB and possibly several other small banks that had purchased long-term bonds when interest rates were near zero.In 2022, after doing nothing to tame inflation the previous year, the Federal Reserve hiked rates repeatedly to make up for their previous inac...

Shand: Government needs a civilian cyber reserve

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:02:02 GMT

Cyber attacks are wreaking havoc on government agencies. The U.S. Marshal Service was recently hacked, the agency’s second significant data breach in recent years. And in October, two federal agencies were infiltrated by remote monitoring software.These breaches are just a few of the many cyber security failures recently reported across the government. In the first half of 2022 alone, there were reportedly 2.75 billion malware attacks, with more than 270,000 never-before-seen variants. This problem is widespread and growing more difficult to combat daily. Luckily, the House of Representatives is considering a bill to bolster America’s depleted cyber defense capabilities by marshaling a civilian reserve.In January, Rep. Robin Kelly, D-Ill., and Rep. Tony Gonzalez, R-Texas, introduced the National Digital Reserve Corps Act. This bill would appropriate $30 million annually until 2025 for developing a Digital Reserve Corps, administered by the General Services Administration.This comes ...