Mikel Arteta has claimed Arsenal "have the resources to cope" with Gabriel's season-ending injury, hinting both Ben White and Jurriën Timber could soon return to action.

Arsenal confirmed on Thursday that Gabriel would not play again this season after undergoing an operation on a hamstring injury sustained in Tuesday's 2-1 win over Fulham.

Gabriel forms a key centre-back pairing with William Saliba in an Arsenal team that boasts the best defensive record in the Premier League.

The Brazil international's absence comes at a critical time with the north London side due to face Everton at Goodison Park on Saturday before hosting Real Madrid in Tuesday's Champions League quarterfinal first leg.

"It was a tough one to digest because we just got Bukayo [Saka] back [from a hamstring injury] and then we lose Gabi. It was tough but the team reacted like they have all season," Arteta told a news conference on Friday.

"Really proud of that, and we know he is going to be out for a while. We need to find different solutions and keep competing like we have been all season.

"We've come so far and now we have the most important, beautiful part of the season. We have to react to those things. That means that other players are going to have opportunities to play. The team has to find other ways. It is a big miss undoubtedly but we have the resources to cope with that."

The imminent returns of White and Timber would certainly help. Both players have been struggling with a knee problem -- the latter also picking up his injury against Fulham -- and Arteta said "there is a chance" the pair could play at Goodison Park.

Riccardo Calafiori also has a similar issue and will not be involved at Everton on Saturday.

Ruben Amorim said he would be "crazy" to think Manchester United can win the Premier League next season.

United are languishing 13th in the table and will kick off against neighbours Manchester City on Sunday 36 points behind leaders Liverpool.

Amorim has been charged with bringing the title back to Old Trafford after a 12-year drought. But ahead of the meeting with City -- champions in six of the last seven seasons -- he admits it will not happen quickly.

"We are doing a lot of things, putting some standards, sometimes we change players so they have to adjust to our new standards," Amorim told a news conference on Friday.

"I know it is difficult to do that in just one year. I am not saying we are going to win the title next year, I am not crazy. We are suffering a lot to be, next year, a lot better and that is our goal."

- Man United vs Man City: Time, how to watch, stats, team news

United have targeted the 2027-28 campaign to win their first title since 2013 to coincide with the club's 150th anniversary. It puts a three-year timeframe on becoming champions. And while Amorim admits he is "in a rush" to do it, the Portuguese coach is conscious of how much ground there is to make up on the likes of City, Liverpool and Arsenal.

"I know that we are not going to be the biggest contender in the next year or two years," he added. "I know we need to do a lot of things. We are in a rush. What I don't want to think is that we need a lot of years to be competitive, I cannot think like that. I cannot manage that. It is not in me.

"Not just Manchester City but other teams, they already are in a place that we need a lot to catch them and they will improve for sure again next season.

"I just want to focus on our strengths and then try to use our club to try to bring one or two players, big players, sometimes big players for me is different for you [the media]."

Amorim is hopeful of having Kobbie Mainoo available to feature against City after the England midfielder returned to training following a two-month absence.

Matthijs de Ligt is a doubt after picking up an injury during the 1-0 defeat to Nottingham Forest on Tuesday. "I think Kobbie is returning to training, we will see, he cannot play a full game," Amorim said.

"I think Matthijs has an issue. He has something in the game [against Forest] and we have to assess."

When you think of who the most prolific goal-scorer in Europe's top five leagues this season, your mind might understandably go to marquee names like Erling Haaland, Kylian Mbappé or Mohamed Salah.

However, while those superstars are at the top of the overall scoring charts in the Premier League and LaLiga, none of them are leading in their respective leagues when it comes to the best goals-per-minute ratio.

And while the hotshot striker at the top of that list is a Barcelona player, they are not hardly one of the club's biggest stars and are not even a regular in their starting lineup.

Of all forwards to have played a minimum of 10 games and 500 minutes for a team in Europe's top five leagues across domestic league, domestic cup and European competitions this season, it is Ferran Torres who currently boasts the best goals-per-minute return.

The Spain international is in a rich vein of form, scoring five goals in his last four games. Most recently, he scored the only goal of the Copa del Rey semifinal second leg at Atletico Madrid on Wednesday, which was enough to book his team a place against bitter rivals Real Madrid in the final on April 26 (stream LIVE on ESPN+).

Here is how Ferran has become Europe's most prolific forward, and who leads the other top leagues in Europe by that measure.

LaLiga

Ferran currently commands the best goal-per-minute return of any forward in Spain's top flight, having successfully registered at least one goal for Barça in every competition he's appeared in during 2024-25.

The former Manchester City attacker has scored 16 goals in 33 appearances (totalling 1,266 minutes of game time) for Barça this season, meaning he's hit the back of the net once every 79.1 minutes this term -- a rate which puts him in a class of his own as we enter the penultimate month of the season.

Torres is fending off strong competition from teenage Real Madrid forward Endrick (1 goal per 80.4 minutes) and Barça teammate Robert Lewandowski (83.9), while Villarreal striker Ayoze Pérez (95.7) is the only other player in LaLiga to have delivered a scoring ratio better than a goal every 100 minutes this season.

Premier League

The Premier League's most efficient marksman for 2024-25 actually left the country in January. Jhon Durán's prolific half-season with Aston Villa seeing the Colombia international leave for the Saudi Pro League having scored once every 86.9 minutes -- a rate that's yet to be bettered. However, his former teammate Marco Asensio, on loan at Villa Park from Paris Saint-Germain, comes close, but his phenomenal rate of a goal every 60.1 minutes comes from less than 500 minutes of game time so far this season (481, to be precise).

Marc Guiu of Chelsea is the surprising No. 2 on the list, having played 580 minutes across 13 games in all competitions this season. Despite finding first-team football a little thin on the ground, the 19-year-old Spaniard's performances in the UEFA Conference League have seen him score six goals (1 goal every 96.7 mins) for the Blues this campaign.

A Manchester City player in third on the list - that's right, James McAtee has netted six goals in 648 first-team minutes so far this term, at a rate of 1 goals every 108 minutes. McAtee's teammate Haaland is tied for fourth with Newcastle United's Alexander Isak (111.5).

Bundesliga

No prizes for guessing that Bayern Munich frontman Harry Kane has racked up the best goal-per-minute return among Bundesliga strikers this season with the England captain hitting 33 goals in 38 games (2,952 mins) to produce a goal every 89.5 minutes on average.

Kane is out-scoring Bayer Leverkusen's Patrick Schick (92.5) and Bochum's Myron Boadu (93.0) in all competitions despite missing a clutch of games through injury around the turn of the year.

There are two players who technically have better average goal-per-minute ratios than Kane this campaign -- Andreas Albers of St. Pauli and Keke Topp of Werder Bremen -- but neither striker has come remotely close to playing more than 500 minutes for their respective club.

Serie A

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Riding high at the top of the overall Serie A scoring chart, Atalanta goal machine Mateo Retegui (98.3) is the only striker in the Italian top flight who can boast an average goal-per-minute rate beneath the 100-minute mark.

Marko Arnautović of Inter Milan isn't far behind (102.7) but has played exactly half the amount of games in all competitions, with 20 appearances as opposed to Retegui's 40 outings for La Dea this season, though he totals far fewer minutes (616 to 2,458).

Further down the order, Retegui's teammate Ademola Lookman (122.1) and Fiorentina forward Moise Kean (132.9) are nestled in the upper reaches of the Serie A rundown.

Ligue 1

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The resurgent form of Ousmane Dembélé has seen the fleet-footed winger pitch in with 31 goals in 38 games (2,515 minutes in total) for Paris Saint-Germain this season, which also represents the best goal-per-minute ratio (1 goal every 81.1 mins) among every forward in the French top flight.

PSG also have the second highest return on their books with Portugal international striker Gonçalo Ramos (83.7) almost matching Dembélé's ratio having also amassed 14 goals in 29 games (totalling 1,172 minutes).

Also inside the top five are Georges Mikautadze of Lyon (121.7) and Bamba Dieng of Angers (122.0) who have scored at a sufficiently consistent rate this campaign to rub shoulders with the PSG pair.

Two-time WNBA MVP Elena Delle Donne has retired from basketball, saying her body "seemed to make this decision before my mind accepted it" in an Instagram post.

Delle Donne won a WNBA title with the Washington Mystics in 2019 but was hampered by multiple back surgeries and did not play in the league in 2024.

"One of my favorite children's books asked, 'How did it get so late so soon?'" Delle Donne wrote in her post. "I have asked myself that over and over again in the process of coming to the decision to retire from playing basketball. Being able to say that out loud was one of the hardest parts of my career. My body seemed to make this decision before my mind accepted it but I now truly know this is the right thing for me at the right time."

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Delle Donne was drafted by the Chicago Sky in 2013 and pushed for a trade to the Mystics after the 2016 season. She won the 2019 title with Washington while playing with three herniated disks. But she didn't play in the 2020 season in the COVID-19 bubble in Bradenton, Florida, and was limited to three games by back issues in 2021 before playing 25 games in 2022 and 23 in 2023.

She missed the 2024 season after deciding not to sign a one-year supermax offer from the Mystics.

Delle Donne, 35, won the WNBA MVP award in 2015 and 2019. She was a seven-time All-Star and four-time all-WNBA first-team selection. She played college basketball at Delaware, where she was a two-time All-American and led the Blue Hens to the Sweet 16 in 2013.

"Words cannot adequately express how thankful I am to my family, all of my incredible teammates, friends, executives, sponsors, staff and most importantly the amazing fans that have accompanied me on this journey," Delle Donne wrote. "This game has been my life and I am grateful for the memories and how much it's given me. It feels good to close this chapter knowing I gave it my all and I can't wait for what's next!"

Johni Broome made a declaration to ESPN in February.

"I think I am the best player in college basketball, but that's something that doesn't have to be said," Broome said.

After surviving a gauntlet of record-breaking SEC regular-season battles and battling through injuries -- including an elbow injury that sidelined him for five minutes of game time in the Elite Eight -- the Auburn Tigers star has a chance to prove his claim.

Broome heads into the Final Four as Cooper Flagg's primary competition in the national player of the year race with a possible rematch against him and the Duke Blue Devils in Monday's national championship game. But first, Broome will have to lead his team past Florida on Saturday.

Despite the challenges Auburn has weathered over the course of an otherwise dominant season -- including losses to Duke in December and Florida in February, the latter of which snapped a 14-game winning streak -- Broome's confidence in the Tigers' ability to win their first national title or in his status atop the heap of college basketball talent has not wavered.

"It's one of those things where you let your work speak for itself and let everybody else talk about it," he told ESPN.

Broome is not a five-star prospect who began his collegiate career as a projected first-round NBA pick. He started at Morehead State, where he had to work on his quickness and develop into a player marketable to high-level Division I programs. When he transferred to Auburn ahead of the 2022-23 season, he was stepping onto a roster that had been anchored by Jabari Smith and Walker Kessler -- former big men who went No. 3 and No. 22 in the 2022 NBA draft -- but lacked the lofty credentials they had brought with them to the Tigers.

Broome had to earn praise with continuous growth. And he did, improving from 14.2 points and 8.4 rebounds per game in his first season to a double-double of 18.7 points and 10.9 rebounds this season.

As the sport continues to grapple with backlash over the high number of players who transfer and the turbulence the portal can sometimes cause, there is a silver lining: This new era has given players such as Broome the opportunity to change their careers and futures. And if Broome's story ends with a national title, he will leave Auburn as not only a legend among Tigers fans but also as the poster child of the transfer portal era, validating the ambitions of players who have sought a second chance elsewhere.

"I would think that he's got a chance to have been maybe the most impactful transfer in college basketball history," Auburn coach Bruce Pearl said during the NCAA tournament's South Regional in Atlanta. "A lot of that's going to depend on how this finishes up."

As Broome sat on the floor of State Farm Arena and clutched his elbow, Auburn's followers on X had a meltdown.

In an attempt to block a shot, Broome landed awkwardly on his left leg and then right elbow. When he walked to the locker room during the final 10 minutes of the Elite Eight matchup against Michigan State, the Auburn-heavy crowd stopped cheering -- the uncertainty had turned excitement over the Tigers' 10-point lead into anxiousness over the status of the team's star.

Minutes later, Broome sprinted back onto the court as the thousands of fans roared.

"Obviously, it's a sigh of relief because we felt like we could still win the game without him, but obviously, we'd have our hands full in San Antonio [without him]," said assistant coach Steven Pearl, Bruce's son.

As Broome made his way to the locker room before returning, Chaney Johnson said, Broome told his teammates to "finish the game for me" -- a testament to the culture Broome has helped instill. Because not only is he the star of the team, but Broome is also the glue guy. He had to be, as the leader of a roster featuring three starters attending their second schools.

The change that comes with integrating transfers has been a challenge for a lot of programs, but Broome and his teammates are proof of what can happen when things jell.

"When I got here, [Pearl] brought me in because he thought I was a good person," Broome said. "When he brought in more transfers like [Chad Baker-Mazara], [Denver Jones] and [Johnson], he said they were going to be good people. I think when you're able to build a team how you want it, you can organize it by getting good guys in a good system."

For three months, Auburn's résumé was nearly spotless.

Between Dec. 4 and March 4, the Tigers lost just one game, spending most of the season as America's No. 1 team before taking a 1-3 stumble heading into the NCAA tournament. Broome's magnificence on the court has been a key component in the Tigers' Final Four run; he has also matured into a relatable leader along the way.

His teammates say Broome keeps the vibes light and brings everyone together. One of his best friends on the team is 19-year-old freshman Tahaad Pettiford. And he has developed close relationships with others.

"Johni is a playful, goofy guy," Miles Kelly said. "I mean, off the court, there is never a dull, serious moment. We just play around all the time, and we like to joke and have fun off the court."

As a point of illustration, Kelly and Broome are roommates when the team travels -- and the two banter about who is the cleanest.

"I try to keep him clean," Kelly said. "I don't like to have my space all dirty and stuff like that. He'll just come in and throw stuff on the ground."

"[Kelly] is the type to drink a water bottle and put it on my side," Broome countered. "He walks in and puts it on the dresser right there, so technically, it is on my side of the room. ... That's my brother, so we always go back and forth about who is being dirty."

That carefree approach helped Auburn weather the pressure of chasing a national title and competing for the SEC regular-season championship in the same year the conference set a record for the most NCAA tournament bids (14) in college basketball history. It's a lighthearted atmosphere Pearl has encouraged -- practices are full of trash talk and laughter.

Still, Broome can change the tone in a split second. His teammates know that once his alter ego arrives, it's time to lock in.

"I'll tell him, 'You need to turn on that alter ego: JB4,'" Baker-Mazara said. "Outside the court, he's Johni Broome. On the court, he's JB4."

JB4 is a double-double machine. His 25-point, 14-rebound effort in Sunday's win over Michigan State was his 20th double-double of the season. Yes, Flagg -- the projected top pick in this summer's NBA draft -- has a series of monster games and "SportsCenter" highlights that Broome can't match. But the Auburn star also produced some of the year's most dominant efforts by any player.

Broome finished with 20 points, 9 rebounds, 5 blocks and 2 steals in a November victory over Houston. He went on to post 21 points, 16 rebounds, 6 assists and 4 blocks in a Maui Invitational win over Memphis. Then he scored 19 points and connected on two of his four 3-point attempts in his team's February win over rival Alabama.

"My teammates always say JB4 ... that's when I'm playing," Broome said. "I say there isn't a difference, but they say, when I get into one of those modes, I'm a different player. I mean, I'm a very fun guy, a good guy to be around, but I think once you step on the court, it's a different level of seriousness that comes with it. This is my career. This is my craft, so I take it very seriously, and every time I step onto the court, I want to dominate."

Auburn did not reach the NCAA tournament for the first time until 1984, Charles Barkley's junior season and his last before making the leap to the NBA. Thirty-five years later, Pearl led the program to its first Final Four in 2019. But this year's run, fueled by Broome's rise, is significant because the rules about which programs can and can't be great have been rewritten in the transfer portal and NIL era. As schools such as North Carolina and Kansas search for the formula to hold on to the blue-blood label, schools such as Auburn could crash the party with a national championship. That's why Broome's push to reach the pinnacle of the sport is significant.

That ambition could cause a headache for Florida, and perhaps the ultimate blue blood: Duke.

"I think we're all aware [of] how lethal [Broome] is on the block and getting to where he wants to get to and drawing fouls," Michigan coach Dusty May said before the Wolverines' loss to the Tigers in the Sweet 16. "He's added a 3-point shot, and then he's a very good passer, and he kind of quarterbacks their offense, so he's a challenge on a number of levels."

Added Tom Izzo following Michigan State's loss to Auburn in the Elite Eight: "We did most of the things we wanted to do except guard Broome a little bit better. It wasn't the points he scored that got us. We're used to giving up points and making sure they don't get 3s. They're a pretty good 3-point shooting team. We held them to 28%. It was just [Broome] was 10-for-13. That's why he's an All-American. That's why he's a player of the year candidate. He did a hell of a job."

Broome is the face of a new wave of programs that might lack the traditions of college basketball's pillar programs but know how to assemble a team in this new climate. For Auburn, Pearl's dreams have required cash -- it's a minimum $1 million donation to even be considered for season tickets -- and the Tigers' supporters have been willing to write those checks. But the team's success goes against the historical grain. With just one five-star on the roster, Auburn might set the blueprint for future title contenders in this new era.

As Broome stood on the court in Atlanta and celebrated the second Elite Eight victory in school history with the young men he calls his brothers, "Celebration" by Kool & the Gang blasted through the speakers of State Farm Arena.

Surrounded by cameras, he took it all in and wondered how he might be remembered when all of this is over.

"I hope I go down as one of the best," he said.

Then he paused.

"I've still got two more games."

DRAPED IN A towel, Anthony Edwards burst into the Target Center home locker room befuddled.

The Minnesota Timberwolves had just rallied from a double-digit fourth-quarter deficit to beat the Denver Nuggets. Still, Edwards, too confused to celebrate, knew something was amiss after their Nov. 1 win. The All-Star playfully pinpointed Minnesota assistant coach Micah Nori, a former Denver staffer who worked closely with Nikola Jokic during the Nuggets superstar's first three NBA seasons.

"I'm sorry, y'all," Edwards said, apologizing to reporters for interrupting the scrum around Rudy Gobert's locker. "Hey, I was just telling Micah, how this mother---er knew the play we was runnin'?"

"We have a spy on the bench, man," Gobert said.

Midway through the fourth quarter, coming out of a timeout, Jokic saw Edwards and Gobert line up just above the two elbows. He then gestured to his teammates exactly what the Timberwolves were running.

"Jokic knew the play, but we didn't say anything," said Gobert, who, in the moment, exchanged a baffled glance with Edwards before staring at Jokic in bewildered awe. "He knew the play better than us."

Down the hall, in the visitors locker room, Jokic shrugged when confronted with the accusation. He noted how often the Nuggets had faced the Timberwolves the previous season when the teams played four regular-season games and a seven-game Western Conference semifinal series.

The three-time MVP's basketball IQ doesn't surprise most by now. He's one of the best players in the world for a reason, averaging 29.7 points and 10.2 assists. But his unconventional tactics on the other end of the floor, whether it's purposely kicking the ball or memorizing opponent's plays, often leave players, coaches and fans in awe. And despite his obvious athletic limitations, the 6-foot-11 big has grown into a defensive analytics darling.

And in Minnesota's locker room that night, one of Joker's best tricks was puzzling the Wolves.

"Me and Rudy looked at each other and said, 'How the f--- do he know?'" Edwards asked, exasperation dripping from his voice. "That motherf---er cheating, bruh." "Yeah," Gobert said, addressing the scrum again. "We got to launch an investigation."

AFTER BEING PICKED in the second round of the 2014 draft by the Nuggets, Jokic went to the P3 Applied Sports Science lab in Santa Barbara, California, for testing. The then-20-year-old's athleticism results were bleak.

Most glaringly, Jokic did a standing vertical leap and only got 17 inches off the ground; the worst recording for any of the 1,000-plus NBA players the lab has ever tested. It'd be an obvious concern for any player, let alone a center who would be tasked with protecting the rim.

On top of that, when looking at rotation players who log an average of 2 miles of distance each game, Jokic ranks third-to-last this season in the NBA in terms of how often he's running "fast," doing so just 2.9% of the time, according to Second Spectrum. It would mark the sixth time in a seven-season span that he ranks in the NBA's bottom 10 in speed.

And during the 2019-20 season, one year before winning his first MVP award, Jokic was the slowest player in the league.

"I'm patient because I cannot really run fast, and that's my only option," Jokic said then of his plodding pace.

Despite his inability to run or jump like other players, Jokic has accomplished something remarkable: The center is a perennial advanced-metrics juggernaut on defense, routinely finishing with better big-picture numbers than Gobert, a four-time Defensive Player of the Year, or future Hall of Fame defender Draymond Green.

Defensive box plus-minus, which measures a player's box-score defensive impact and value to his team per 100 possessions, has been pointing to Jokic as the NBA's most valuable defender for years now. He has finished No. 1 in the metric for the past three seasons and is within striking distance of doing it for a fourth.

How could that be the case, given his obvious physical limitations? What are the analytics seeing in Jokic that traditional observers can't, even after all this time?

Those around the star say it all starts with Jokic's impeccable recall and anticipation of opponents' tendencies and playcalls.

"A lot of times on out-of-bounds plays, he'll literally move you into the spot. He does it every single game. [Viewers] may not see it, and it might be subtle, but he moves you into your spot," wing Christian Braun told ESPN. "He's going to look at you and tell you, 'Hey, this is what's coming; this was their call.' You'll see him looking at the other coach to hear their call. He knows what's coming and knows the best way to guard it."

Added Nuggets forward Peyton Watson: "I haven't seen him be wrong [when calling out a play]," he told ESPN. "Dude's on another level intellectually with the game. ... So we'll be waiting on the day when he's wrong."

Jokic's memory bank as a defender is robust, according to Nuggets assistant coach Popeye Jones. "If a team tries to go back to [the exact same out-of-bounds play] the next year, he'll still remember it," Jones told ESPN.

Still, calling out plays is far from Jokic's only defensive skill. Despite his lack of speed, he has quietly been one of the NBA's most active stoppers.

HIS WORLD-CLASS talent on the court is well known -- with Jokic having won Most Valuable Player three out of the past four seasons. But over the years, Jokic has given the impression he could be good at just about any sport.

Weeks after winning Finals MVP and leading the Nuggets to the NBA title in 2023, Jokic became a horse-racing champion in his native Serbia. He has shown off his stellar QB talent by rifling a one-armed 66-foot lob -- an inbound pass from the sideline, no less -- that resulted in an Aaron Gordon dunk against Memphis in 2023. Plus, mostly recently nailing a half-court, one-handed buzzer-beater against the Jazz on March 28. And countless times in his career, Jokic has spun around after grabbing a board and, in one fluid motion, flung a water-polo-style pass the length of the floor to a teammate.

Early in his career, the Nuggets played far more drop coverage on defense, with Jokic often sinking into the paint for rim protection. In recent years, though, he has played much further up against pick-and-rolls -- closer to the arc -- as a way to impede the ball handler and force complicated passes to the roll man.

Wing players generally have a split second to decide to throw a pocket pass to their screener, who streaking behind the defense towards the basket. For defenders, there's even less time to disrupt that pass.

But for the Joker -- currently on pace to lead NBA centers in deflections (240) for a sixth straight season -- a split second is plenty of time to knock a pass out of the way.

"We have him up at the level [of the screen] a lot, and when teams try to find that pass to the big, to get behind us, Nikola's shown that he has an uncanny ability to break those passes up," Denver coach Michael Malone said. "Hands. Feet. Whatever he's got to use."

And Jokic uses his feet a lot.

So frequently that players throughout the NBA have noticed. Green, when asked by ESPN to discuss Jokic's unorthodox defense, the Golden State stalwart, already knew where the conversation was headed.

"Is it gonna be about his million kick ball [violations]?" Green asked with a laugh.

Indeed, in recent years no one in the NBA has stopped the game more by kicking the ball than Jokic. Since the start of 2020, the superstar has been whistled for a whopping 127 kicked-ball violations, between his regular-season and postseason games. In the 2022-23 season alone, Jokic logged 56 kicked balls; more than any other team did. For perspective, the league's next-closest player, Chicago Bulls center Nikola Vucevic, has recorded just 66 kicked-ball violations total since the start of 2020.

Aside from the sheer wildness of those numbers -- or the fact that Jokic is extremely balanced, having committed 67 violations with his right foot and 60 with his left -- is the idea that the center has essentially found a cheat code on defense. In being able to time the plays perfectly, Jokic can effectively press pause and short-circuit the opposing team's offense whenever he feels like it, forcing a possession to restart.

Take, for instance, a play from Game 4 of the 2023 NBA Finals, in which Jokic quickly extended his left leg into the path of a backdoor pass from Bam Adebayo to Duncan Robinson. "It's a kick-ball violation, but it stops what probably would have been a layup," ABC play-by-play announcer Mike Breen during the telecast. The stoppage marked Jokic's fourth kicked ball of the contest. (The center has had as many five kicks in a game, and somehow managed to log three kicks in six minutes against Miami another time.)

Few players have had more passes disrupted by Jokic than Green, who explained the wisdom of the tactic. "What all of us are trying to do in the NBA is avoid having to face a set defense," Green, a former Defensive Player of the Year, told ESPN. "So if you have them in a bad way, where you've got a clear 2-on-1, he just kicks the ball, stops the play, and it's a side out. Guess what? That allows them to reset their defense." In all, Green has had a total of nine passes impacted by a Jokic kicked ball since 2020.

Green said there was a time when Jokic, newer to the league still, seemed not to care about defense. But despite how otherworldly Jokic was becoming on offense, the Nuggets knew better than to take the ultimate step without him being a better defender.

"He knew that if they wanted to win at a high level and become a champion, he couldn't be a liability. Now he's become a strength on that side of the floor and learned how to anchor a defense," Green said. "He literally willed himself to become better on defense."

Undoubtedly some of the improvement stemmed from sheer experience. And a great deal can likely be attributed to him getting in better physical shape after his first few years in the league. But at a certain point, Jokic began letting his brainpower and photographic memory make up for what he lacked in footspeed or athleticism.

"[A player's] mind isn't limited to one end of the floor, and he's obviously an elite thinker out there," Thunder coach Mark Daigneault said. "He's got instincts, and they translate to every part of his game."

United States captain Kate Zackary has signed a contract extension at Premiership Women's Rugby side Trailfinders Women.

Thy 35-year-old back-row will begin a third campaign in Ealing having moved from Exeter in 2023, making 26 appearances.

This past season she scored six tries as the London side finished seventh in the table with five wins and 11 losses.

Zackary, who has played in the last two World Cups, was one of the biggest names to move to the club after they were awarded a place in the women's top flight two years ago.

"Kate's level of professionalism is unmatched," head coach barney Maddison told the club website.

"She leads by her performances and the team naturally just looks to her as a leader.

"She has a wealth of experience, and her work with our youth programme has been invaluable.

"We're delighted to see her continue to lead and perform at the highest level."

Zackary added: "We're finding our momentum as a team and club, and I want to be a part of that process.

"Our team is filled with diversely talented players who have a desire to become a contender in the PWR and I can't wait to step back on the pitch with them."

Glasgow Warriors will create a little bit of history at Scotstoun on Saturday when they face Leicester Tigers in the Champions Cup - the Scottish side's first-ever home knockout tie in the competition.

As special as that will be, they will be aiming for bigger landmark moments this season - namely going further in this competition than they ever have before.

Twice Glasgow have reached the quarter-finals - in 2017 under Gregor Townsend and 2019 under Dave Rennie - but on both occasions were on the receiving end of a hiding at the hands of Saracens.

Having won the URC last season, there is a feeling Franco Smith's side may just be ready to go deeper into Europe's premier club competition than ever before.

Scotland's record points scorer, Chris Paterson, told the BBC's Scotland Rugby Podcast: "I think it's a want, a goal and aim of the players as much as it is the fans.

"It's not just in your hands whether you break through that glass ceiling. At that level, you need an element of luck in terms of the opposition, of injuries, and Glasgow are still missing some key players.

"But they've got the components to win every game they play.

"Franco Smith was asked: 'Do you feel you're in a better place than you were last year?' And he said, 'definitely', which I would agree with."