A former schoolteacher had one wish when she entered hospice care: to reconnect with one of her students, NBA great Michael Jordan.

Ms. Etta was the transportation coordinator at Emsley A. Laney High School in Wilmington, North Carolina when Jordan, 63, was a teenager. She said she wanted to give her former student one last hug.

Getting ahold of the basketball legend didn’t prove easy, but when a hospice care worker named Wendy received a call from an unknown number, the voice on the other end was unmistakable.

“Is this Ms. Etta,” Jordan asked.

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Wendy put Ms. Etta on the phone and the two talked, reconnecting nearly 50 years after Jordan was her student.

“They laughed, reminisced, picked at each other, and shared a moment that brought tears to everyone in the room,” Ms. Etta’s facility, Lower Cape Fear LifeCare, wrote via Instagram on May 12 alongside photos of Jordan and Ms. Etta talking via video chat. “A memory her family will carry with them forever.”

“Our patient, Ms. Etta, taught Michael at Laney High School many years ago, and as she reflected on her favorite memories and former students, his name kept coming up,” the caption read. “Ms. Etta had an interesting bucket list wish…to hug Michael’s neck one more time.”

In a Facebook post the same day, LifeCare wrote that “this is what hospice is about.”

“It is about living as comfortably and fully as possible,” they wrote. “It is about creating moments of connection, peace, laughter, and love. Sometimes those moments are quiet. Sometimes they are unforgettable. And sometimes… they even involve the GOAT.”

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Jordan graduated from Laney in 1981 after famously not making the school’s varsity basketball team as a sophomore. He went on to play college basketball at North Carolina, bursting onto the national scene with a game-winning shot over Georgetown as a freshman.

The Chicago Bulls drafted Jordan as the third overall pick in the 1984 NBA Draft, where he won six championships and five NBA MVP awards, retiring as arguably the greatest basketball player of all-time.

In 2019, he donated $1.1 million to his former high school, half of which went to the Laney athletic department, according to ABC11.

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“Mike decided that he wanted to take care of Laney High School with him and his attorneys wanting to make sure that it would go entirely to Laney High School,” Laney Athletic Director Fred Lynch, who was Jordan’s high school basketball coach, said at the time. “So, Mike is still the man.”

He added that the portion of the money that did not go to athletics would “help everybody.”

“A school our size with 2,200 kids, there is always a need for laptops, computers and tech stuff that will benefit all the kids,” Lynch said.

Jonathan Young finds himself on the verge of winning the biggest Survivor season ever, and if he does, he might have Survivor legend Boston Rob Mariano to thank.

Young, 32, struck up a friendship with Mariano, 50, after his original run in Survivor 42. Mariano is a five-time Survivor player himself and winner of Survivor: Redemption Island. He spoke exclusively with Us Weekly and revealed what he told Young before he headed out to Fiji last year to film Survivor 50: In the Hands of the Fans.

“I tried to coach him up a little before he went there, and so far he’s hanging in it,” Mariano told Us as part of his partnership with Dramamine. “I told Jonathan, like there’s a lot of things you can control, and the things you can’t control, you can’t worry about.”

Young placed fourth in his first time playing Survivor, back in 2022, where he lost to Mike Turner in the finale night fire-making challenge. Maryanne Oketch went on to win Survivor 42.

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This time, he goes up against three other new-era all-stars in Tiffany Ervin (Survivor 46), Joe Hunter (Survivor 48) and Rizo Velovic (Survivor 49), as well as four-time old era Survivor veteran Aubry Bracco. The winner will not only earn the title of Sole Survivor, but will also earn $2 million, matching season 40 for the biggest grand prize in the show’s history.

As for Mariano, he confirmed to Us what he has said in the past — that his playing days are over. (He previously said he declined the opportunity to play Survivor 50, wanting his spot to “go to someone else.”)

“I love Survivor. It’s been a huge part of my life,” he told Us. “I feel like I’ve gotten everything out of it. I didn’t play 50. I’m not playing 51 or 52. So it’s been amazing, but that chapter as a player is closed.”

For now, Mariano is keeping busy in other ways. He and wife Amber Brkich, whom he met on Survivor All-Stars, which she won, now share daughters Lucia, 16, Carina, 15, Isabetta, 14, and Adelina, 11. With summer vacation approaching, he again has his mind on an island getaway — but this time without the camera crews and Survivor production staff.

“I love to travel and we’re not really sit-on-the-beach so much,” Mariano said of his family. “We like to get out there and do it, so sometimes sports, or anything from sports to bungee jumping to fishing to boating, we’re an active family.”

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That sense of adventure is the Mariano family’s “why,” and, as he points out, Dramamine’s campaign is all about finding “your why,” not letting nausea slow you down.

“I’m not afraid to go for new things and try new things, and I think that’s what [the campaign with Dramamine] embraces, not letting something like motion sickness or nausea hold you back,” he said.

Mariano jokingly added that he wished he had Dramamine on Survivor with him, particularly the first time he played in 2001, when the boats themselves were even more nausea-inducing than his competition.

“I remember…going back and forth to the press day and throwing up over the side of the boat taking us there. It’s pretty miserable,” he recalled.

The season finale of Survivor 50: In the Hands of the Fans airs on CBS Wednesday, May 20 at 8 p.m. ET.

Kansas City Chiefs wide receiver Rashee Rice will miss his team’s minicamp to serve a 30-day jail sentence after testing positive for marijuana, violating his probation, Matt Foster of Kansas City’s KSHB first reported on Tuesday, May 19.

His probation stemmed from charges related to a multi-car crash in 2024. Rice, 26, was booked at 1:25 p.m. ET on Tuesday, per Dallas County jail records, and is due to be released on June 16. Chiefs minicamp runs from June 9 to 11.

The March 2024 crash left multiple people injured after prosecutors say Rice drove 119 miles per hour along a Dallas highway. He was charged with one count of aggravated assault, one count of collision involving serious bodily injury and six counts of collision involving injuries.

Rice was sentenced to five years of probation and ordered to serve 30 days in jail. He received Deferred adjudication, meaning had he not violated his probation, the case would have been dismissed.

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ESPN’s Nate Taylor and Adam Schefter reported that Rice’s upcoming stay in jail will be the 30 days he was originally sentenced to.

Four months after the crash, Rice released a statement through his attorney, urging others to “drive smart.”

“Last March, I was involved in a high-speed accident in Dallas,” he said. “There have been a lot of sleepless nights thinking about the damages that my actions caused, and I will continue working within my means to make sure that everyone impacted will be made whole.”

Rice added, “I urge everyone to mind the speed limit, drive safe and drive smart. Last and certainly not least, I am profoundly sorry for the physical damages to person and property. I fully apologize for the harm I caused to innocent drivers and their families.”

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The news also comes just over a month after the NFL decided it would not punish Rice after he was accused of domestic abuse by his ex-girlfriend, Dacoda Jones. The league said in a statement in April there was “insufficient evidence” that he violated the NFL’s personal conduct policy.

“Mr. Rice wants to thank the NFL for their thorough investigation, and looks forward to the start of the 2026-27 NFL season,” his attorney, Sean Lindsey, said in a statement to The Associated Press.

“On October 9th, 2025, well after the parties’ relationship had ended, Ms. Jones stated under penalty of perjury in a sworn Affidavit for Non-Prosecution that ‘Mr. Rice and I had a verbal argument, but he did not punch me.’ We will allow the legal process to run its course and have no further comment at this time,” Lindsey said in a separate statement in February.

Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver A.J. Brown married his longtime partner, Kelsey Riley, last weekend, but it appears many of his teammates were not in attendance — including old friend and quarterback Jalen Hurts.

The intimate ceremony happened at the Montage Laguna Beach resort in California on Saturday, May 16, against the backdrop of reported turmoil surrounding the team. Hurts, 27, did not attend the wedding, according to TMZ Sports.

Former Eagles running back LeSean McCoy suggested that the relationship between Hurts and Brown, 28, is “not what it used to be.”

“I think sometimes, when it’s a work relationship and where friends outside a work relationship are not delivering on the field, maybe because of his fault (or the others’), the relationship might get affected,” McCoy, 37, said in an appearance on the Monday, May 18 episode of the “Speakeasy” podcast. “And I think this is the problem we have right here. … Now there’s a little bit of friction there.”

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He added, “I don’t make a big deal about it. … It’s time to move on . … I think the issue here is, football has messed up their relationship.”

Though it’s unclear if any current members of the Eagles were at the ceremony, the relationship between Hurts and Brown is different. The two have been friends since high school and Hurts is the godfather to Brown’s daughter.

“A former teammate once described them as ‘an old married couple,’ but I’m told they’re not that close these days,” NFL insider Dianna Russini, formerly of The Athletic, reported in October 2025. “Like any friendship, life happens. Family responsibilities, the grind of being pros, shifting priorities.”

Now, the Eagles are reportedly looking to trade Brown and multiple outlets have reported they are likely to reach a deal with the New England Patriots on or around June 1.

Russini’s report came around the time reports began surfacing that Eagles teammates were frustrated with Hurts. The veteran quarterback responded in November 2025 by trying to redirect focus back to the field.

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“I’m not surprised by anything. This is kind of the nature of the position,” he told reporters at the time. “But I put my energy and my focus on trying to go out there and do my best and trying to learn, trying to build, trying to take in the things that I can to try and improve.”

He continued, “I guess I get a lot of attention when things are going well and when things are not going so well. I never run away from holding myself accountable, and I think that’s exactly what I’ve taken the approach of doing.”

Hurts also took responsibility for the team’s struggling offense. After entering the 2025 season as the defending Super Bowl champions, the Eagles sputtered all season and eventually lost to the San Francisco 49ers in the Wild Card Playoffs.

“I take great pride in what we do on offense,” he said. “I take great pride in how we go out there and play as a team and what our flow is. I think we’ve got work to do, and that obviously starts with me. That’s always my approach. That’s always me looking internally first in everything that we do and then in due time rising above.”

Tennis star Aryna Sabalenka is looking back at the moment in March 2024 when she learned that her ex-boyfriend, former professional hockey player Konstantin Koltsov, had died.

She was on the practice courts in Miami ahead of the Miami Open when, as she recalled to Vogue, she was approached by police with the news that he had died by apparent suicide.

“I was fighting with the cop — like, I couldn’t accept it,” Sabalenka, 28, said in the outlet’s May cover story, published on Monday, May 18.

Koltsov, who was 42 at the time, was in Miami to support Sabalenka when he died at the St. Regis Bal Harbour Resort. Though Sabalenka clarified at the time that she and Koltsov were no longer together, she said her heart was “broken.”

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She ultimately played in the Miami Open just three days later, facing criticism for returning to the court so soon following her ex’s death. Sabalenka told Vogue that for her, the decision to compete was part of her personal grieving process.

“I don’t know if there’s any cliché about how you’re supposed to grieve,” she said. “I feel like in this situation, there is no right and wrong. We all need different things. For me, going back to work is the only way. I’m 28, but sometimes I think I’ve had everything in life that you could imagine.”

Sabalenka has said in the past that she went through something similar in 2019 when her father died suddenly of meningitis.

“Once, I lost my father and tennis helped me to go through that loss,” she told The Guardian in August 2024. “So at that moment [of Koltsov’s death] I thought I had to just keep going, keep playing, keep doing my thing to separate my personal life from my career life.”

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She continued, “But at the end I would say I was struggling a lot healthwise because I didn’t stop. It was really emotional and really stressful, and kind of damaged my mental health at that point.”

It was ultimately a shoulder injury that forced Sabalenka to withdraw from Wimbledon in 2024, proving to the determined athlete that she needed to slow down.

“I realized it only after I was injured and had to step back that actually it was something much needed,” she told The Guardian. “It was really sad and I was struggling a lot not to play Wimbledon, of course, but at the same time I was able to take all the benefits from the time. I was doing a lot of rehab and treatment, but I was able to enjoy my life and my time away from tennis, and take all the good sides of not competing on tour.”

SUNY Potsdam women’s basketball guard Emily Smith died on Saturday, May 16, after she was struck by a vehicle in an alleged hit-and-run near campus, the school announced on Sunday, May 17. She was 20.

Potsdam police arrested the alleged driver, Jakob Krise, Saturday morning, according to North Country Now. Krise, 18, was reportedly driving a black Cadillac Escalade when he allegedly struck Smith while traveling on New York State Route 56. The car reportedly had visible front-end damage at the time of his arrest.

Krise faces charges of leaving the scene of a motor vehicle crash resulting in death, zero tolerance driving while intoxicated and driving across hazardous markings. He was arraigned in Town of Pierrepont Court and released under probation supervision. He is scheduled to appear in court again on Wednesday, May 20.

“I am heartbroken by the loss of our captain, Emily,” Potsdam head coach Brittany Cohen said in a statement. “She was an extraordinary young woman, beloved by her teammates, coaches and everyone she met. Her presence will be greatly missed. Our thoughts and prayers are with her family during this very difficult time.

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Smith spent one season with Potsdam after transferring from SUNY Plattsburgh. She appeared in 19 games for the Bears in 2025-26, and while she wasn’t a scorer, she made an impact on defense, tallying 24 steals and 24 blocks in that time.

A Dean’s List student, Smith was a business administration major on track to graduate in 2028.

“In her first year here at SUNY Potsdam, Emily was already excelling academically, being named to the Dean’s List, and had built a tight knit circle of friends and mentors,” university president Dr. Suzanne Smith said in a statement.

She added that Smith was with “teammates and friends” when the accident occurred, just hours before the university’s commencement ceremony. Many more friends then joined her in the hospital where she was later pronounced dead.

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“We mourn Emily’s loss as one campus community, and hold her family, friends, and loved ones in our hearts at this difficult time,” Dr. Smith added.

The team said in a release that it will “share plans to remember Emily with a special commemoration” at a later date. In the meantime, the Bears’ home of Jerry Welsh Gymnasium will serve as a memorial space. All are welcome to leave flowers or other items there in her memory. University counseling services are also available to students, faculty and staff.

The Potsdam women’s basketball Instagram account posted a tribute to Emily on Sunday as friends and fans shared their condolences and memories of her in the comments. Even the Bears’ conference foes, Buffalo State University and Morrisville State University, shared messages of support from their athletics accounts.

The NBA Playoffs have reached the conference finals, but the real excitement seems to be happening off the court.

After ESPN personality Stephen A. Smith took multiple shots at Boston Celtics forward Jaylen Brown, the five-time All-Star unloaded with a lengthy Twitch rant on Sunday, May 17, that included him saying, “f*** Stephen A., Stephen B., Stephen C.”

Earlier this month, Smith, 58, told Brown, 29, to “be quiet” after he criticized the league’s officiating. Brown took to X in response, writing, “I’ll ‘be quiet’ [or] stop streaming if you ‘be quiet’ and retire. Let’s give the people what they want.”

On Sunday, Brown unleashed a tirade against Smith, First Take and Smith’s brand of journalism.

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“Tell this motherf***** to retire, because he’s the face of clickbait media,” Brown said. “And maybe with his retirement, we could spark a movement to get the rest of these motherf*****s out of here. Or to also have some type of, forget journalistic integrity, actual integrity in order to hold themselves accountable to the bulls*** takes they put out…Just for the sake of just pushing a weak narrative. Just purely out of that.”

Brown then played a clip from First Take where Smith questioned why Celtics superstar Jayson Tatum hadn’t appeared on Brown’s Twitch streams, seeming to imply that Tatum, 28, was upset with him.

“What type of journalism is this?” Brown asked. “Jayson Tatum hasn’t been on my stream, and this is what we’re talking about on First Take? What if [Tatum] just don’t like being somewhere in an uncontrolled environment? Why are you doing journalism on me having guests on my stream? And this is a part of the reason why I started streaming. This is a part of the reason why people use the term ‘clown,’ and it synchronizes with someone like Stephen A. Smith. Because this is what you’re using your platform for.”

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Brown continued the clip, which showed Smith blasting him for saying that 2025-26 was his favorite season in the pros, despite the Celtics blowing a 3-1 lead in their first round playoff series.

“This is a narrative that he’s creating. This isn’t journalism.” Brown said. “This is him making his own opinion and formulizing it about what I have to say, on his platform.”

He then listed other reasons why this was his favorite season, including the team exceeding preseason expectations and watching younger Celtics players come into their own in the NBA.

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“My offer still stands,” Brown continued. “You want me to be quiet and stop streaming? Well, I want you to be quiet and get off these networks. Because you’re not using your platform to do real journalism. You’re using your platform to use clickbait.”

Smith responded to Brown’s rant during the Monday, May 18, episode of First Take.

“Jaylen Brown, be careful what you wish for,” Smith said. “You really want me to start reporting on that level? Locker room? How the organization might think about you? How the city may feel about you? How Jayson Tatum may or may not feel about you? Sneaker deals? Endorsement deals? The list goes on and on. The season is over, bro. You are on Twitch, doing what I do and talking about me needing to step away. It makes no sense.”