Kupp’s late TD lifts Rams over Bengals 23-20 in Super Bowl

INGLEWOOD, Calif. (AP) — In a venue built for champions, the Los Angeles Rams carried off the crown jewel: a Super Bowl trophy.

It took a precise 79-yard drive capped by Cooper Kupp’s 1-yard touchdown reception with 1:25 remaining for a 23-20 victory Sunday over the Cincinnati Bengals to give the Rams their first NFL title since the 1999 season — and their first representing Los Angeles since 1951.

“Those guys just did a great job,” coach Sean McVay said. “They took over that game.”

They did so in their home, the $5 billion SoFi Stadium, making the Rams the second consecutive host to win the championship after Tampa Bay became the first a year ago.

“As far as building this stadium,” said Rams owner Stan Kroenke, the man who moved them back from St. Louis in 2016, “I think it turned out all right.”

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Super Bowl ads go heavy on nostalgia and star power

NEW YORK (AP) — On the field, the Los Angeles Rams and Cincinnati Bengals played a nail biter during Super Bowl 56, with the Rams emerging victorious.

Off the field, Super Bowl advertisers were in a tough competition of their own. Advertisers shelled out up to $7 million for 30 seconds of airtime during the Super Bowl, so they pulled out all the stops to win over the estimated 100 million people that tune into the game. Big stars, humor and a heavy dose of nostalgia were prevalent throughout the night.

“The Super Bowl featured positive, up-beat advertising,” said Northwestern University marketing professor Tim Calkins. “For the most part there was no mention of the pandemic, COVID or masks.”

Chevrolet recreated the opening sequence to “The Sopranos” to tout its all-electric Chevy Silverado — one of several auto ads promoting electric vehicles. This time, however, Jamie-Lynn Sigler, who played Meadow Soprano on the show that ran from 1999 to 2007, is in the driver’s seat instead of the Sopranos patriarch played by the late James Gandolfini.

“As soon as they started playing the music from ‘The Sopranos’ they had me riveted,” said Kelly O’Keefe, managing partner of Brand Federation. “Great link to a well-loved favorite with music that can silence a crowd. When it played you could hear a pin drop.”

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War, peace, stalemate? Week ahead may decide Ukraine’s fate

WASHINGTON (AP) — Even if a Russian invasion of Ukraine doesn’t happen in the next few days, the crisis is reaching a critical inflection point with European stability and the future of East-West relations hanging in the balance.

A convergence of events over the coming week could determine whether the stalemate is resolved peacefully or Europe is at war. At stake are Europe’s post-Cold War security architecture and long-agreed limits on the deployment of conventional military and nuclear forces there.

“This next 10 days or so will be critical,” said Ian Kelly, a retired career diplomat and former U.S. ambassador to Georgia who now teaches international relations at Northwestern University.

The Biden administration on Friday said an invasion could happen at any moment, with a possible target date of Wednesday, according to intelligence picked up by the United States, and Washington was evacuating almost all of its embassy staffin Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital.

A phone call between President Joe Biden and Russian leader Vladimir Putin on Saturday did nothing to ease tensions. Biden and Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, spoke on Sunday.

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At Winter Olympics, virus fight waged with worker sacrifices

BEIJING (AP) — In her mind, Cathy Chen pictures a scene that she herself says could be drawn from a TV drama: Falling into the arms of her husband after long months apart, when he meets her off the plane from Beijing. Scooping up their two young daughters and squeezing them tight.

“I just imagine when we’re back together,” the Olympic Games worker says, “and I just can’t control myself.”

So athletes from countries where the coronavirus has raged can compete in the Olympic host nation with few infections, China’s workforce at the Winter Games is making a giant sacrifice.

Severing them from lives they were busy living before the Olympic circus came to town, more than 50,000 Chinese workers have been hermetically sealed inside the Great Wall-like ring-fence of virus prevention measures that China has erected around the Games, locked in with the athletes and Olympic visitors.

The Olympians jet in for just a few weeks with their skis, skates, sleds and other gear. Chinese workers who cook, clean, transport, care for them and otherwise make the Winter Games tick are being sequestered inside the sanitary bubble for several months. As Olympians bank memories to cherish for a lifetime, their Chinese hosts are putting family life on ice.

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Ivan Reitman, producer, ‘Ghostbusters’ director, dies at 75

Ivan Reitman, the influential filmmaker and producer behind beloved comedies from “Animal House” to “Ghostbusters,” has died. He was 75.

Reitman died peacefully in his sleep Saturday night at his home in Montecito, Calif., his family told The Associated Press.

“Our family is grieving the unexpected loss of a husband, father, and grandfather who taught us to always seek the magic in life,” children Jason Reitman, Catherine Reitman and Caroline Reitman said in a joint statement. “We take comfort that his work as a filmmaker brought laughter and happiness to countless others around the world. While we mourn privately, we hope those who knew him through his films will remember him always.”

Known for big, bawdy comedies that caught the spirit of their time, Reitman’s big break came with the raucous, college fraternity sendup “National Lampoon’s Animal House,” which he produced. He directed Bill Murray in his first starring role in “Meatballs” and then again in “Stripes,” but his most significant success came with 1984’s “Ghostbusters.”

Not only did the irreverent supernatural comedy starring Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis, Ernie Hudson, Sigourney Weaver and Rick Moranis gross nearly $300 million worldwide, it earned two Oscar nominations, spawned a veritable franchise, including spinoffs, television shows and a new movie, “Ghostbusters: Afterlife,” that opened this last year. His son, filmmaker Jason Reitman directed.

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Erin Jackson of US 1st Black woman to win speedskating gold

BEIJING (AP) — Erin Jackson has never viewed herself as some sort of trailblazer. She just likes to skate really, really fast, whether it’s on wheels or blades.

Yet the 29-year-old from balmy Ocala, Florida knew this moment was special, her chance to really make an impact on the generations that follow.

She’ll forever be known as the first Black woman to win a speedskating medal at the Winter Olympics — and a gold one, at that.

“Hopefully, this has an effect,” Jackson said. “Hopefully, we’ll see more minorities, especially in the USA, getting out and trying these winter sports.”

Jackson won the 500 meters Sunday with a time of 37.04 seconds, giving the American speedskating program its first medal of the Beijing Games and first individual medal since 2010.

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Doping decision imminent for Russian skater at Olympics

BEIJING (AP) — After a marathon doping hearing that ended early Monday morning, 15-year-old Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva awaits to hear whether she can compete for the gold medal at the Beijing Olympics.

The Court of Arbitration for Sport didn’t announce its hearing at a hotel in Beijing was over until after 3 a.m. local time Monday. The judges began to deliberate after nearly six hours of online testimony. An announcement is expected Monday afternoon, a day before Valieva’s next competition begins.

Valieva is the heavy favorite for the gold medal when the women’s event begins with the short program Tuesday. She has set world-record scores in her first season in senior competition and landed the first quadruple jump by a woman at the Olympics.

Her Olympic push was thrown into turmoil last week when a drug-testing lab in Sweden reported the sample she gave at the Russian nationals on Dec. 25 contained the heart medication trimetazidine, which is banned in sports.

The case has prompted concern for the welfare of Valieva and other child athletes, and questions over the Olympic status of Russia, which is already banned from having its anthem and flag at the Games because of past doping cases.

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Police clear way to key US-Canada bridge, but still closed

WINDSOR, Ontario (AP) — Police moved in to clear and arrest the remaining protesters near the busiest U.S.-Canadian border crossing Sunday, ending a demonstration against COVID-19 restrictions that has hurt the economy of both nations even as they held back from a crackdown on a larger protest in the capital, Ottawa.

The protest in Ottawa has paralyzed downtown, infuriated residents who are fed up with police inaction and turned up pressure on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who presided at a Cabinet meeting late Sunday.

The demonstrations have reverberated across Canada and beyond, with similar convoys in France, New Zealand and the Netherlands. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security warned that truck convoys may be in the works in the United States.

Windsor police said about 25 to 30 people were peacefully arrested and seven vehicles were towed just after dawn near the Ambassador Bridge that links their city — and numerous Canadian automotive plants — with Detroit.

“Today, our national economic crisis at the Ambassador Bridge came to an end,” said Windsor’s Mayor Drew Dilkens, who expressed hope the bridge would reopen Sunday. “Border crossings will reopen when it is safe to do so and I defer to police and border agencies to make that determination.”

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US suspends Mexican avocado imports on eve of Super Bowl

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico has acknowledged that the U.S. government has suspended all imports of Mexican avocados after a U.S. plant safety inspector in Mexico received a threat.

The surprise, temporary suspension was confirmed late Saturday on the eve of the Super Bowl, the biggest sales opportunity of the year for Mexican avocado growers — though it would not affect game-day consumption since those avocados had already been shipped.

Avocado exports are the latest victim of the drug cartel turf battles and extortion of avocado growers in the western state of Michoacan, the only state in Mexico fully authorized to export to the U.S. market.

The U.S. government suspended all imports of Mexican avocados “until further notice” after a U.S. plant safety inspector in Mexico received a threatening message, Mexico’s Agriculture Department said in a statement.

“U.S. health authorities … made the decision after one of their officials, who was carrying out inspections in Uruapan, Michoacan, received a threatening message on his official cellphone,” the department wrote.

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Halftime Review: Dre, Snoop and friends deliver epic show

INGLEWOOD, Calif. (AP) — Dr. Dre & Co. took the weight of the hip-hop culture on the Super Bowl stage, shouldered the pressure from skeptics and delivered a strong halftime show to prove that edgy rap can work at the world’s biggest sporting events.

All it took was hip-hop’s most controversial figures — and one knee taken by music’s most prominent white rapper.

Dre, Snoop Dogg, Mary J. Blige, Eminem and Kendrick Lamar were headliners along with 50 Cent as a special guest at the Super Bowl halftime show on Sunday. Their collective performance is one of the best since Beyoncé and Bruno Mars’ halftime set in 2016.

Each performer offered their own element: Dre, Snoop Dogg and Lamar brought their West Coast flavor. Blige — known as the “Queen of Hip-Hop Soul” — sang and danced her heart out. 50 Cent hit the musical rewind button with “In Da Club.”

When Eminem’s turn came, he performed a couple of his hits starting with “Forgot About Dre” with Anderson .Paak playing the drums. But he seemingly defied the NFL by kneeling after performing “One Shot.”