Barcelona are still very much in charge of LaLiga’s title race, especially so ahead of a trip to Girona in a match that feels like a classic mismatch poised to showcase their dominance in Spain’s top flight. There are questions that loom large for Barcelona, though, especially with Thursday’s defeat to Atletico Madrid still top of mind.

Hansi Flick’s side return to play for the first time since a startling 4-0 defeat to Atleti in the first leg of the Copa del Rey semifinals, one in which Atleti unrelentingly exposed Barcelona’s weaknesses – perhaps because those vulnerabilities have been easy to spot over the course of the season. Barcelona’s defensive shakiness has been a defining feature since Flick took over at the start of the 2024-25 season, a frailty usually overcome by a mighty attack. It is an approach that guided them to the domestic double last season but is not foolproof. It may come as little surprise that a team like Atleti could find a way through Barcelona’s porous defense but there have been openings for a wide range of opponents including Club Brugge, who Barcelona tied 3-3 with in the UEFA Champions League, and Slavia Praha, who kept things nervy despite losing 4-2 in the end.

It perhaps comes as little surprise, then, that Flick’s all gas, no breaks strategy is under scrutiny as Barcelona return to league play on Monday. Players reportedly told Flick that he should adjust his tactical preferences occasionally in the wake of the loss to Atleti, according to The AThletic, especially when the likes of Raphinha and Pedri are unavailable to pitch in from an attacking standpoint. Flick, meanwhile, took issue with the players’ intensity levels during the first half.

How to watch Girona vs. Barcelona, odds

• Date: Monday, Feb. 15 | Time: 3 p.m. ET
• Location: Estadi Montilivi — Girona, Spain
• TV: ESPN2 | Live stream: ESPN Select
• Odds: Girona +600; Draw +470; Barcelona -290

Monday’s trip to Girona may not provide the answer but as the season progresses, Flick once again faces an existential question about whether or not his preferred style has its limits. The visitors will be the oddsmakers’ favorites to take all three points at Girona, in large part because the opponents have their own defensive woes. Girona have conceded 37 goals so far this season, three fewer than the league’s worst team in that regard, Levante, putting them just two points above the relegation zone heading into Monday’s match. They may like their chances against Barcelona’s chaotic back line but even then, Girona are not known for their goalscoring ability – only four teams have fewer than their 22 goals in LaLiga this season.

It makes for a favorable situation for Barcelona, who need a win to restore their one point lead over Real Madrid atop the table. Again, though, they are likely to be understaffed – Marcus Rashford and Pedri are dealing with injuries that will keep them out of Monday’s match, while there are still question marks around Raphinha’s availability. The Brazil international has not played since a win against Elche on January 31 while dealing with a short-term issue, but he did train Friday and could make a much-waited return on Monday.

How many minutes he will be able to play is currently unclear, though his importance to the team certainly is not. Ferran Torres, Lamine Yamal and Robert Lewandowski have held down the fort well with 10-plus goals each across all competitions but Raphinha has an oversized impact for Barcelona when he is available. He has 13 goals and five assists in all competitions, a sizable output for someone who has only been able to play 22 games so far this season, almost irreplaceable even though he has spent large chunks of the campaign on the sidelines. Case in point – they have lost just five matches in all competitions this season and Raphinha did not start in any of them, only coming off the bench in one of those matches.

Raphinha’s return will be a welcome one for Flick and company, who will prefer to call upon him as the push for silverware enters its final stages, and serves as a stark reminder that a closely-contested title race could very much be decided by fine margins, something the comeback of an impactful player should be very helpful with.

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Michael Jordan now owns another ring.

Thanks to a buzzer-beater move every bit as stunning as a long-range NBA Finals dagger against the Utah Jazz or Cleveland Cavaliers, Tyler Reddick swerved his No. 45 Toyota — co-owned by Jordan and three-time Daytona 500 winner Denny Hamlin — through crashing traffic as if he were deking Craig Ehlo to stroke a game winner. The biggest game that stock car racing has to offer, the Daytona 500.

“I’m going to be honest: I’m not even sure what happened because I was so focused in the moment and I haven’t seen the tape yet,” the 30-year-old said in Victory Lane between hugs from family and drags off a champagne bottle. “But here’s what I’ve learned from the two bosses that I have: You have to be in position to win it when it’s time to win it, or guess what? You won’t win it!”

The race itself was a near-perfect representation of what the Daytona 500 has become in recent years. A legendary speedway and its signature event, built largely around the idea of speed since 1959, for now at least has become a chess game of saving fuel and tires. That’s not a new approach to the 500, but it has never been this widely prevalent for this long. It was a philosophy more utilized on short tracks and road courses. Preservation of equipment and body, timetable plans drawn up on laptops in the pits, with the goal of being near the front late so that the drivers can finally unleash their own plan of attack when the “laps to go” counter finally reaches single digits.

Now, thanks to more parity between cars and talent, the Great American Race, after hours set to a deliberate pace, becomes a very intense, short race. A sprint race. And Reddick, raised on the same Midwestern dirt tracks that brought us Jeff Gordon, Tony Stewart and even Mario Andretti, is a sprint racer by nature.

“You hire a driver like Tyler because he is a wheelman, and anyone who follows racing knew that already,” said Hamlin, who joined Victory Lane in progress after his bid for a fourth 500 victory ended with a 31st-place finish thanks to a late crash. “Patience isn’t easy, especially for race car drivers.”

Reddick took the green flag in the 26th starting position. At the end of the race’s first stage, he was running 20th. At the end of the second stanza, he was eighth. When the white flag was shown to signify one lap remaining, Chase Elliott led and Reddick ran third … or maybe it was fifth … sitting smack in the middle of a three-wide, 30-deep sandwich. By the end of that lap, with cars spinning both in front of and behind him, he was suddenly first.

He spent only 18 of 200 laps inside the top five and led exactly one lap. The last one.

“Games aren’t won in the first quarter, or even the third. They can be lost then, for sure,” Jordan said before stealthily ducking out of the celebration. “But you can’t make a buzzer-beater if you aren’t there for the buzzer.”

This team, 23XI Racing, has felt as if it has been in a perpetual buzzer-beater situation for years.

In 2024, Reddick won the regular-season points title but was not able to carry that success to a Cup Series title in the NASCAR postseason. The following year brought a frightening health scare for his infant son that resulted in the removal of a kidney.

Last November, Hamlin, driving his day job ride for Joe Gibbs Racing, failed to end his lifelong quest for a championship in excruciating fashion. In December, he lost his already-ailing father to injuries sustained in a house fire.

And all of this took place while 23XI was in the process of suing NASCAR on the grounds of antitrust. Ultimately, that ended in a settlement that leaned in favor of the team, but not until exposing a lot of hurt feelings and raw emotion that largely overshadowed everything else in the NASCAR garage.

So, when NASCAR executives lined up for their traditional congratulatory handshakes and photographs with the Daytona 500 victors, it felt like the final period on a chapter of stock car racing history that everyone in the sport was eager to close.

Former legal combatants hugged it out. Hamlin, although much more reserved than normal, was smiling. Reddick ended a 38-race winless streak. Both his sons, both healthy, were in Victory Lane to greet him.

And yes, Jordan made sure he caught a glimpse of Reddick’s Daytona 500 championship ring before he departed. A piece of jewelry plenty shiny enough to take its place alongside MJ’s drawer full of basketball bling forged in buzzer-beaters.

Reddick looked down at that ring and choked a lump down his throat.

“There are a lot of people in here with us right now that have wanted to feel good about something for a long time,” he said. “I can’t imagine much feeling better than this.”

Kansas State fired fourth-year basketball coach Jerome Tang on Sunday, a source told CBS Sports. 

Athletic director Gene Taylor subsequently revealed late Sunday night he made the decision to fire Tang following K-State’s loss at houston on Saturday. The move comes less than four days after Tang’s postgame rant went viral following an embarrassing 91-62 home loss to Cincinnati on Thursday. a

“This was a decision that was made in the best interest of our university and men’s basketball program,” Taylor said in a statement. “Recent public comments and conduct, in addition to the program’s overall direction, have not aligned with K-State’s standards for supporting student-athletes and representing the university. We wish coach Tang and his family all the best moving forward.”

The Wildcats are 10-15 and in the midst of their second-worst season in the past 20-plus years. Kansas State ranks 101st at KenPom.com and is 1-11 in the Big 12. The team is headed toward a second straight sub-.500 season despite being one of the bigger spenders in the transfer portal the past two offseasons. 

Kansas State will attempt to fire Tang for cause. Tang has a buyout of more than $18 million, per the terms of his contract, but Taylor believes Tang’s public criticisms of the players and the response that press conference spurred in the national media violated the terms of his contract.

Tang released a statement disputing Kansas State’s assessment of the program.

“I am deeply disappointed with the university’s decision and strongly disagree with the characterization of my termination. I have always acted with integrity and faithfully fulfilled my responsibilities as head coach,” Tang said. “I am grateful to the players, staff, and fans who make this program so special. I remain proud of what we built together and confident that I have always acted in the best interests of the university and our student-athletes.”

Associate head coach Matthew Driscoll has been named interim head coach for the rest of the season. 

LISTEN: Matt Norlander breaks down Tang’s final days at K-State on this emergency edition of the Eye on College Basketball podcast.

Tang went 71-57 in less than four seasons on the job, including a 29-39 mark in the Big 12. He was hired in 2022 and an immediate success: He guided the Wildcats to the Elite Eight with a No. 3 seed and finished 26-10 thanks to the dynamic duo of point guard Markquis Nowell and forward Keyontae Johnson. Nowell’s 19 assists in a Sweet 16 victory vs. Michigan State at Madison Square Garden set both an NCAA Tournament record and an optimistic tone for the Tang era, but it’s been a litany of letdowns ever since.

K-State is coming off a 78-64 loss at No. 3 Houston on Saturday. Tang had the players’ names removed from the back of their jerseys for that game in a questionable move that followed his criticism of KSU players following the Wildcats’ loss to the Bearcats.  

“This was embarrassing,” Tang said Wednesday night at his press conference. “These dudes do not deserve to wear this uniform. There will be very few of them in it next year. I’m embarrassed for the university, I’m embarrassed for our fans, our student section. It is just ridiculous.”

That’s the quote that has Tang’s legal team and Kansas State’s lawyers set to battle in the weeks ahead. If K-State wins, it won’t pay Tang another dime. If it loses, Tang will have more than $18.5 million coming his way. There is also the realistic possibility that the parties wind up settling somewhere in the wide gulf between those two numbers.

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