BASKETBALL
The Maine Celtics won their seventh straight, beating the Grand Rapids Gold 132-115 Tuesday night in a G League game at Grand Rapids, Michigan.
The Celtics had seven players score in double figures, led by Mfiondu Kabengele with 29. Luka Samanic had 21, Marial Shayock 17, JD Davison 16, Kamar Baldwin 13 and Reginal Kissoonlal and Marvin Smith had 11.
SKIING
American skier Mikaela Shiffrin finished second to Olympic champion Petra Vlhova after feeling ill during a night slalom race Tuesday at Flachau, Austria, as she attempted to break the record for most wins on the women’s World Cup circuit.
Shiffrin was sick between runs and vomited after the second run, a team official said, adding that she would not speak to reporters.
Shiffrin matched Lindsey Vonn’s record of 82 race victories by winning a giant slalom in Kranjska Gora, Slovenia, on Sunday, but wasn’t able to produce another win in her best discipline, slalom, to move past her former teammate.
Vlhova had the fastest time in the first run and then extended her lead over Shiffrin for her first win this season. The Slovakian skier finished 0.43 seconds ahead of Shiffrin, and Lena Duerr of Germany finished 0.85 back in third.
Shiffrin’s next chance to break the record will come in a super-G in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, in 10 days. She plans to sit out speed races in St. Anton this weekend.
MEN’S WORLD CUP: A lack of snow in the unseasonably warm European winter forced organizers to cancel two men’s World Cup ski races in Germany two weeks ahead of schedule.
The International Ski Federation said it is “working on a replacement” venue for the downhill and giant slalom scheduled on Jan. 28-29 at Garmisch-Partenkirchen.
FIS cited the “not favorable weather forecast and the actual snow conditions” on the storied Kandahar slope in Bavaria for the decision.
The hill did manage to stage a men’s slalom last week racing on a narrow strip of white artificial snow surrounded by green fields and forest.
SOCCER
MLS: Taylor Twellman, Marcelo Balboa, Danielle Slaton and Liam McHugh will be the announcers for the first season of MLS Season Pass on Apple TV, the league and Apple announced.
MLS Season Pass will launch on Apple TV on Feb. 1; the 2023 season begins on Feb. 25. The 10-year rights deal allows fans to watch every game without local blackouts or restrictions. The service will be available in over 100 countries exclusively through the Apple TV app.
Twellman previously was ABC and ESPN’s lead soccer analyst for 11 years. Before going to the booth, he played nine seasons for the New England Revolution and scored 101 goals in 174 matches.
Balboa, a former U.S. national team defender and member of the National Soccer Hall of Fame, will be a Spanish-language analyst. He was the lead analyst for ESPN/ABC’s coverage of the 2006 World Cup and was a part of Univision’s MLS and international soccer coverage since 2014.
Slaton, who played on the U.S. women’s team, was part of Fox’s coverage of the men’s and women’s World Cup as an analyst.
McHugh – also the host of TNT’s NHL studio show – will cohost a weekly show that will cover key moments from matches.
Among others announced as analysts are former MLS players Maurice Edu, Sacha Kljestan, Bradley Wright-Phillips, Diego Valeri and Sebastien Le Toux.
Jillian Sakovits will be a pregame studio host while Tony Cherchi will handle studio duties for Spanish-language broadcasts.
Max Bretos and Steve Cangialosi were among the group of five play-by-play announcers announced Tuesday.
BORUSSIA DORTMUND: Less than six months after he was diagnosed with testicular cancer, Sebastien Haller was back on the field in a friendly game.
The Ivory Coast striker came on as a 74th-minute substitute for Dortmund in a 5-1 win over Fortuna Dusseldorf during a winter training camp in Spain before the German season resumes next week.
Haller required chemotherapy and two operations, the second of them in late November, after he was told in July that he had testicular cancer. The diagnosis came two weeks after Haller joined Dortmund and before he played a game.
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