But Italy appears set to lose

(And good news: No NBA Finals games conflict with Stanley Cup Final dates!)June 25 — NBA draft, first round.

June 26 — NBA draft, second round.— Indiana is the only team yet to face elimination in these playoffs.— This is the second time a No. 1 seed (Oklahoma City) has met a No. 4 seed (Indiana) in the NBA Finals. Both previous times were Lakers-Celtics matchups, one in 2010 and the other in 1969. Both went seven games, both saw the Lakers as the No. 1 seed out of the Western Conference (or division, as they were called in 1969), the Celtics won in 1969 (Bill Russell’s final game as a player and 11th championship) and the Lakers won in 2010 (Kobe Bryant’s fifth and final title).

“We’ve got our work cut out for us.” — Pacers guard Tyrese Haliburton.NEW YORK (AP) — The New York Knicks went further than they’d gone in 25 years, just not as far as they hoped.

They signaled they were serious about making a run at the NBA title when they traded for Mikal Bridges in the summer and then Karl-Anthony Towns in a preseason blockbuster, adding a top perimeter defender and an All-Star center to a lineup headlined by Jalen Brunson.

Their all-in moves just couldn’t get them all the way there.: RaMell Ross’ sensational “Nickel Boys,” the indie stunner “Ghostlight” and a recently unearthed, never-before-released concert album by Ella Fitzgerald.

(streaming Friday, Feb. 28 on MGM+) adapted from Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel,. It’s up for two Oscars: best picture and best adapted screenplay. The film, about two young men who have been sent to an abusive, mid-century Florida reform school called Nickel Academy. Ross films it almost entirely from the first person of those two boys, played by Ethan Herisse and Brandon Wilson.

, AP Film Writer Lindsey Bahr called “Nickel Boys” “a lyrical, heartbreaking and haunting journey into the darkness of a brutal reform school in the Jim Crow South.”— One of 2024’s small revelations was