Horvath leads No. 22 Navy past Cincinnati in Liberty Bowl

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — Blake Horvath threw a pair of touchdown passes and rushed for a score to lead No. 22 Navy to its 11th victory of the season, 35-13 over short-handed Cincinnati in the Liberty Bowl on Friday.

Horvath scored on a 2-yard run and had scoring passes of 30 and 13 yards. The senior QB, who helped open up the passing game this season for the run-heavy Midshipmen (11-2), finished 9 of 15 for 108 yards.

Alex Tecza rushed for 80 yards and a touchdown for Navy, which finished the season on a four-game winning streak, includinga 17-16 victory over Armyin its most important game of the year. Eli Heidenreich ran for 62 yards and had five receptions for 64 yards.

Cincinnati (7-6) was missing several key players, including quarterback Brendan Sorsby, who threw for 2,800 yards and 27 touchdowns this season, and its leading tackler, linebacker Jake Golday. The absences of Sorsby and running backs Tawee Walker and Evan Pryor left the Bearcats without their top three rushers.

ARMED FORCES BOWL

TEXAS STATE 41, RICE 10

FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) — Quarterback Brad Jackson threw for 173 yards and three touchdowns, plus ran in another score on the ground for Texas State in a win over Rice.

Lincoln Pare rushed for 106 yards on 11 carries for one touchdown for the Bobcats (7-6), totalling 1,022 rushing yards in his final season. Chris Dawn Jr. caught two touchdown passes.

Jackson opened the scoring for Texas State off a 6-yard rush in the second quarter and the Bobcats went into halftime up 10-7. After the break, Jackson threw a 69-yard pass to Beau Sparks. Dawn Jr. caught passes from 12 and 14 yards out to score.

Pare broke away on a 63-yard run up the middle in the fourth quarter.

Kicker Tyler Robles hit two field goals for Texas State, from 30 and 28 yards out.

Aaron Turner caught Rice's (5-8) only touchdown of the day, a 2-yard pass up the middle from quarterback Patrick Crayton Jr. Crayton Jr. finished the day completing four passes for 70 yards and one interception.

HOLIDAY BOWL

SMU 24, NO 17 ARIZONA 19

SAN DIEGO (AP) — Kevin Jennings threw for 278 yards, highlighted by an 80-yard completion on a razzle-dazzle play on the second play from scrimmage, and SMU beat Arizona.

Jennings completed 21 of 32 passes, and set up two touchdown runs by T.J. Harden and one by Stone Eby for the Mustangs (9-4). They snapped a five-game postseason losing streak that included a 38-10 defeat to Penn State in the opening round of last season's College Football Playoff. Arizona also finished 9-4.

SMU was up 24-0 at halftime, a big enough lead to overcome three interceptions by Jennings in the second half and three touchdown passes by Arizona's Noah Fifita.

Fifita threw a 15-yard touchdown pass to Cameron Barmore with 33 seconds left but SMU recovered the ensuing onside kick.

DUKE'S MAYO BOWL

WAKE FOREST 43, MISSISSIPPI STATE 29

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) — Robby Ashford threw for 303 yards and three touchdowns and ran for 50 yards and two scores, Koredell Bartley scored on a 100-yard kickoff return and Wake Forest beat Mississippi State, earning coach Jake Dickert a mayonnaise bath.

Ashford threw TD passes of 14 yards to Kamrean Johnson, 64 yards to Jack Foley and 62 yards to Ty Clark III and had scoring runs of 2 and 1 yards for the Demon Deacons (9-4). They won seven of their final nine games.

Clark finished with 153 yards from scrimmage after taking over the starting role after second-team All-ACC selection Demond Claiborne opted out of the game after declaring for the NFL draft.

Freshman quarterback Kamario Taylor, making his second college start, had a big second half for Mississippi State (5-8) and finished 13 of 22 for 241 yards and a touchdown. He ran for 60 yards and another score before suffering what appeared to be a significant leg injury with 1:46 left in the game. He was carted off the field and there was no immediate word on the extent of the injury.

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Horvath leads No. 22 Navy past Cincinnati in Liberty Bowl

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — Blake Horvath threw a pair of touchdown passes and rushed for a score to lead No. 22 Navy to its 11...

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Ole Miss Player Slams Ex-Coach Lane Kiffin for 'Trying to Steal Our Shine' Ahead of Their Sugar Bowl Upset Win

Justin Ford/Getty; David J. Griffin/Icon Sportswire via Getty

NEED TO KNOW

• Lane Kiffin's sudden departure from the Ole Miss Rebels last month felt like "a slap in the face" to players, defensive tackle Zxavian Harris told ESPN

• Harris added that Kiffin is "just trying to steal our shine" and said the former head coach "was trying to be a troll" before their Sugar Bowl win

• The Ole Miss Rebels defeated the Georgia Bulldogs on Jan. 1 and will take on the Miami Hurricanes in the College Football Playoffs semifinal on Jan. 8

Former Ole Miss head coachLane Kiffin's sudden exit from the team last month left players feeling disrespected.

Rebels defensive tackle Zxavian Harris toldESPNhe thinks Kiffin's behavior amid his transition to rival LSU is Kiffin "just trying to steal our shine," particularly after the coach said he wanted to attend Ole Miss' Sugar Bowl game on Thursday, Jan. 1.

Harris added, "That's all he's trying to do. That's all he's been trying to do is steal our shine."

After Ole Miss's win over the Georgia Bulldogs on New Year's Day, which secured their spot in the College Football Playoff semifinal, the former head coach congratulated the Rebels on social media,writing, "What a great finish!!! So much fun!! Only two more to go @OleMissFB," alongside photos of his family celebrating the win.

What a great finish!!! So much fun!! Only two more to go ⁦@OleMissFB⁩ 🇹🇹 🪄 🏆#BTApic.twitter.com/axTTTHP5pO

— Lane Kiffin (@Lane_Kiffin)January 2, 2026

Harris told ESPN that Kiffin's sudden exit from the Rebels just before they competed in the College Football Playoffs felt like "a slap in the face" adding, "Like a slap and the backhand."

"He was trying to be a troll," Harris said. "We're going to troll him. We got something for him."

Tyler Kaufman/Getty

Kiffin accepted the head coaching job at LSU — a more storied program with multiple national championships which had recently faltered under former head coach Brian Kelly, who was fired earlier this season — on Nov. 30, a shocking move midway through the college football season.

Ole Miss opted to not let Kiffin finish out the season and fired him, which meant leaving the team during one of their best seasons. After the announcement, aphotoshared on social media appeared to show that Ole Missleft Kiffin's clothing rackout on the street outside of an athletic facility.

A spokesperson for the Ole Miss athletic department did not respond to PEOPLE's request for comment on the image, shared by Ole Miss football podcaster Ben Garrett.

Kiffin'sdaughter Landry, 20, trolled "angry football fans" in a TikTok video following her father's move to LSU, sharing an eight-second TikTokvideoset to the song "The Joke Is On You" by Niki Watkins, of herself singing and blowing kisses to the camera.

Over the video, Landry wrote, "Wish I could be as creative as angry football fans," adding a heart-hands emoji.

In her caption, the Ole Miss student wrote about her father, who accepted the head coaching job at LSU: "It's not that deep."

Read the original article onPeople

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Ole Miss Player Slams Ex-Coach Lane Kiffin for 'Trying to Steal Our Shine' Ahead of Their Sugar Bowl Upset Win

Justin Ford/Getty; David J. Griffin/Icon Sportswire via Getty NEED TO KNOW Lane Kiffin's sudden departure from the Ole Miss Rebels la...

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SMU avoids collapse, holds off No. 17 Arizona at Holiday Bowl

T.J. Harden ran for two touchdowns, Kevin Jennings amassed 278 yards through the air and SMU defeated No. 17 Arizona 24-19 to win the Holiday Bowl on Friday night in San Diego.

SMU (9-4) was ahead 24-0 at halftime but had to overcome Jennings' three second-half interceptions to pick up its first bowl win since 2012. Yamir Knight led all receivers with seven catches for 104 yards in the win.

"It's all just preparation in practice," said Knight, who had four receptions of 20 yards or longer and was selected the game's offensive MVP. "We go hard all week, every week in practice, and we just came out here and paid attention to the details, and we got things done."

Jennings said in the postgame TV interview, "We fought our butts off each and every week, but we came out here and still grinded every single day, so I'm just proud of this group right here. I had a terrible second half ... but this team got my back no matter what. I love these guys."

Noah Fifita led Arizona's comeback efforts, going 28 of 43 for 265 yards, three touchdowns and one interception. He was also the game's leading rusher with 73 yards on 13 attempts, but the Wildcats (9-4) saw their five-game winning streak come to an end.

Each of the Mustangs' first two possessions after halftime resulted in third-down interceptions. The first, by Michael Dansby at his own 4-yard line, set up Arizona for a 15-play, 96-yard drive. Fifita hit Javin Whatley for a 28-yard touchdown with 2:37 left in the third, but the two-point conversion failed.

Arizona got another interception but turned it over on downs. However, the Wildcats forced a three-and-out and later scored on fourth-and-2 from the 10 when Fifita hit Tre Spivey in the end zone. Fifita's two-point pass was knocked down, leaving it 24-12.

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SMU was driving to bleed the fourth-quarter clock, but Arizona linebacker Riley Wilson dropped into zone coverage and Jennings threw straight to him with less than five minutes to play.

Four plays later, however, Fifita's pass was batted at the line and Alexander Kilgore intercepted it for SMU.

Still, Arizona forced a punt for one more chance, and Fifita connected with Cameron Barmore on third-and-10 from the 15 for a touchdown with 33 seconds left. But the Wildcats could not recover the onside kick necessary to continue their rally.

On the game's second play from scrimmage, Jennings lofted a pass to a wide-open Matthew Hibner down the right sideline and the tight end raced toward the goal line before being marked down at the 1 for an 80-yard pitch and catch. Harden followed with his first touchdown of the game.

The Mustangs doubled their lead before the quarter ended. Arizona committed pass interference on a third-and-9 incompletion to give SMU new life. Harden ran it in from the 3 on the next play.

The next SMU possession turned into a 16-play, 94-yard march. Tight end Stone Eby had an 18-yard catch on the drive before he lined up as a fullback and pushed in a 1-yard touchdown.

Sam Keltner's 24-yard field goal in the final minute of the half made it 24-0 at intermission.

--Field Level Media

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SMU avoids collapse, holds off No. 17 Arizona at Holiday Bowl

T.J. Harden ran for two touchdowns, Kevin Jennings amassed 278 yards through the air and SMU defeated No. 17 Arizona 2...

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Big Tech's fast-expanding plans for data centers are running into stiff community opposition

SPRING CITY, Pa. (AP) — Tech companies and developers looking to plunge billions of dollars into ever-bigger data centers to powerartificial intelligenceand cloud computing are increasingly losing fights in communities where people don't want to live next to them, or even near them.

Communities across the United States are reading about — and learning from — each other's battles against data center proposals that are fast multiplying in number and size to meet steep demand as developers branch out in search of faster connections to power sources.

In many cases, municipal boards are trying to figure out whether energy- and water-hungry data centers fit into their zoning framework. Some have entertained waivers or tried to write new ordinances. Some don't have zoning.

But as more people hear about a data center coming to their community, once-sleepy municipal board meetings in farming towns and growing suburbs now feature crowded rooms of angry residents pressuring local officials to reject the requests.

"Would you want this built in your backyard?" Larry Shank asked supervisors last month in Pennsylvania's East Vincent Township. "Because that's where it's literally going, is in my backyard."

Opposition spreads as data centers fan out

A growing number of proposals are going down in defeat, sounding alarms across the data center constellation of Big Tech firms, real estate developers, electric utilities, labor unions and more.

Andy Cvengros, who helps lead the data center practice at commercial real estate giant JLL, counted seven or eight deals he'd worked on in recent months that saw opponents going door-to-door, handing out shirts or putting signs in people's yards.

"It's becoming a huge problem," Cvengros said.

Data Center Watch, a project of 10a Labs, an AI security consultancy, said it is seeing a sharp escalation in community, political and regulatory disruptions to data center development.

Between April and June alone, its latest reporting period, it counted 20 proposals valued at $98 billion in 11 states that were blocked or delayed amid local opposition and state-level pushback. That amounts to two-thirds of the projects it was tracking.

Some environmental and consumer advocacy groups say they're fielding calls every day, and are working to educate communities on how to protect themselves.

"I've been doing this work for 16 years, worked on hundreds of campaigns I'd guess, and this by far is the biggest kind of local pushback I've ever seen here in Indiana," said Bryce Gustafson of the Indianapolis-based Citizens Action Coalition.

In Indiana alone, Gustafson counted more than a dozen projects that lost rezoning petitions.

Similar concerns across different communities

For some people angry oversteep increases in electric bills, their patience is thin for data centers that could bring still-higher increases.

Losing open space, farmland, forest or rural character is a big concern. So is the damage to quality of life, property values or health by on-site diesel generators kicking on or the constant hum of servers. Others worry that wells and aquifers could run dry.

Lawsuits are flying — both ways — over whether local governments violated their own rules.

Big Tech firmsMicrosoft, Google, Amazon and Facebook — which are collectively spending hundreds of billions of dollars on data centers across the globe — didn't answer Associated Press questions about the effect of community pushback.

Microsoft, however, has acknowledged the difficulties. In an October securities filing, it listed its operational risks as including "community opposition, local moratoriums, and hyper-local dissent that may impede or delay infrastructure development."

Even with high-level support from state and federal governments, the pushback is having an impact.

Maxx Kossof, vice president of investment at Chicago-based developer The Missner Group, said developers worried about losing a zoning fight are considering selling properties once they secure a power source — a highly sought-after commodity that makes a proposal far more viable and valuable.

"You might as well take chips off the table," Kossof said. "The thing is you could have power to a site and it's futile because you might not get the zoning. You might not get the community support."

Some in the industry are frustrated, saying opponents are spreading falsehoods about data centers — such as polluting water and air — and are difficult to overcome.

Still, data center allies say they are urging developers to engage with the public earlier in the process, emphasize economic benefits, sow good will by supporting community initiatives and talk up efforts to conserve water and power and protect ratepayers.

"It's definitely a discussion that the industry is having internally about, 'Hey, how do we do a better job of community engagement?'" said Dan Diorio of the Data Center Coalition, a trade association that includes Big Tech firms and developers.

Data center opposition dominates local politics

Winning over local officials, however, hasn't translated to winning over residents.

Developers pulled a project off an October agenda in the Charlotte suburb of Matthews, North Carolina, after Mayor John Higdon said he informed them it faced unanimous defeat.

The project would have funded half the city's budget and developers promised environmentally friendly features. But town meetings overflowed, and emails, texts and phone calls were overwhelmingly opposed, "999 to one against," Higdon said.

Had council approved it, "every person that voted for it would no longer be in office," the mayor said. "That's for sure."

In Hermantown, a suburb of Duluth, Minnesota, a proposed data center campus several times larger than the Mall of America is on hold amid challenges over whether the city's environmental review was adequate.

Residents found each other through social media and, from there, learned to organize, protest, door-knock and get their message out.

They say they felt betrayed and lied to when they discovered that state, county, city and utility officials knew about the proposal for an entire year before the city — responding to a public records request filed by the Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy — released internal emails that confirmed it.

"It's the secrecy. The secrecy just drives people crazy," said Jonathan Thornton, a realtor who lives across a road from the site.

Documents revealing the extent of the project emerged days before a city rezoning vote in October. Mortenson, which is developing it for a Fortune 50 company that it hasn't named, says it is considering changes based on public feedback and that "more engagement with the community is appropriate."

Rebecca Gramdorf found out about it from a Duluth newspaper article, and immediately worried that it would spell the end of her six-acre vegetable farm.

She found other opponents online, ordered 100 yard signs and prepared for a struggle.

"I don't think this fight is over at all," Gramdorf said.

Follow Marc Levy on X athttps://x.com/timelywriter.

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Big Tech's fast-expanding plans for data centers are running into stiff community opposition

SPRING CITY, Pa. (AP) — Tech companies and developers looking to plunge billions of dollars into ever-bigger data centers...

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Six people injured in the fatal fire at a Swiss bar remain unidentified. It's an unbearable wait

CRANS-MONTANA, Switzerland (AP) — Sixteen-year-old Arthur Brodard went to theLe Constellation barwith friends to celebrate the New Year. Nearly 48 hours after a devastating fire, his mother still held out hope he might be one of the six injured people who remained unidentified after one of Switzerland's worst tragedies.

Those half-dozen people gave a glimmer of hope for families whose loved ones were missing in the aftermath of the fire at the Alpine ski resort of Crans-Montana that killed 40 people and injured 119 others, 113 of whom have been formally identified.

"I'm looking everywhere. The body of my son is somewhere," Laetitia Brodard, from Lausanne, Switzerland, told reporters. "I want to know, where is my child, and be by his side. Wherever that may be, be it in the intensive care unit or the morgue."

The severity of the burns has made it difficult to identify both the injured and deceased, requiring families to supply authorities with DNA samples. In some cases, wallets and any identification documents inside turned to ash in the flames. An Instagram account has filled up with photos of people who were unaccounted for, and friends and relatives begged for tips about their whereabouts.

Officials in the Valais regional government acknowledged the prolonged heartache.

"You will understand that the priority today is truly placed on identification, in order to allow the families to begin their mourning," Beatrice Pilloud, the Valais region's attorney general, told reporters Friday during a news conference.

Mathias Reynard, head of the regional government, added: "We are aware of the particularly difficult hours, of the unbearable side of every minute that passes without answers."

'You can't imagine the pain I saw'

Investigators said Friday that they believe sparkling candles atop Champagne bottles ignited thefatal firewhen they came too close to the ceiling of the bar crowded with New Year's Eve revelers, two hours after midnight Thursday.

"We were bringing people out, people were collapsing. We were doing everything we could to save them, we helped as many as we could, we saw people screaming, running," Marc-Antoine Chavanon, 14, told The Associated Press in Crans-Montana on Friday, recounting how he rushed to the bar to help the injured. "There was one of our friends: She was struggling to get out, she was all burned. You can't imagine the pain I saw."

Many of the injured were in their teens to mid-20s, police said. Authorities planned to look into whether sound-dampening material on the ceiling conformed with regulations and whether the candles were permitted for use in the bar.

Officials said they would also look at other safety measures on the premises, including fire extinguishers and escape routes. The region's top prosecutor warned of possible prosecutions if any criminal liability is found.

Injured hailed from across Europe

The injured included 71 Swiss nationals, 14 French and 11 Italians, along with citizens of Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Luxembourg, Belgium, Portugal and Poland, according to Frédéric Gisler, police commander of the Valais region. The nationalities of 14 people were still unclear.

Emanuele Galeppini, a promising teenage Italian golfer who competed internationally, was officially listed as one of Italy's missing nationals. His uncle, Sebastiano Galeppini, told Italian news agency ANSA that their family is awaiting the DNA checks, though the Italian Golf Federation on its website announced that he had died.

Dazio reported from Berlin. Associated Press journalists Geir Moulson in Berlin, Graham Dunbar in Geneva, and Nicole Winfield and Giada Zampano in Rome contributed to this report.

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Six people injured in the fatal fire at a Swiss bar remain unidentified. It's an unbearable wait

CRANS-MONTANA, Switzerland (AP) — Sixteen-year-old Arthur Brodard went to theLe Constellation barwith friends to celebrat...

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Russia files diplomatic request asking US to stop pursuing oil tanker originally bound for Venezuela

Russia filed a formal diplomatic request that the United States stop pursuing anoil tankeroriginally bound for Venezuela that has evaded US custody for almost two weeks, two sources familiar with the matter told CNN.

The demarche sent to the State Department on New Year's Eve comes as the vessel, called the Bella 1, appeared on Russia's official register of ships under a new name.

It is unclear if the diplomatic request, first reported byThe New York Times, will halt the US efforts to interdict the oil tanker, which was initially headed for Venezuela before turning around to avoid seizure by the US Coast Guard.

Russia's request comes as the Trump administration continues intense efforts to end Moscow's war in Ukraine. Trump has spoken twice with Russian PresidentVladimir Putinin the past week.

The tanker is currently in the North Atlantic, according topublicly available datawhich was also first reported by The Times.

The White House, State Department and Russian Embassy in Washington, DC, did not respond to requests for comment.

The Coast Guard's pursuit of the aging, rusted oil tanker is part of a series of increasingly escalatory actions taken by the United States against Venezuela and its leader, Nicolás Maduro, including a military buildup in the Caribbean and dozens of strikes against boats that the US has accused of trafficking drugs

Those strikes have killed scores of people and raised questions about the legality of the attacks. The boat strikes have also garnered criticism as they have come despite President Donald Trump's campaign pledge to extract the US from foreign entanglements.

The US has also begun to strike within Venezuela,CNN previously reported, with the CIA carrying out a drone strike last month on a port facility on the country's coast.

The pursuit of the Bella 1 comes after Trump last monthdeclared a complete blockadeof sanctioned oil tankers transiting to or from Venezuela. The US seized two other oil tankers earlier in December.

The Coast Guard has been chasing this vessel for nearly two weeks, which first resisted seizure on December 21 when it made a U-turn in the Caribbean after the Coast Guard attempted to interdict the ship as it was on its way to Venezuela to pick up oil.

While Trump has repeatedly said his hardline actions against Venezuela are part of an effort to stymie the flow of drugs into the United States, some of his closest advisers have undercut that claim.

White House chief of staff Susie Wiles suggested in a series of interviews to Vanity Fair published last month that regime change, not drug enforcement, was the administration's goal.

She said Trump wants to "keep on blowing boats up until Maduro cries uncle."

This story has been updated with additional details.

CNN's Avery Schmitz contributed to this report.

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Russia files diplomatic request asking US to stop pursuing oil tanker originally bound for Venezuela

Russia filed a formal diplomatic request that the United States stop pursuing anoil tankeroriginally bound for Venezuela that has evaded US...

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Freshman Ebuka Okorie leads Stanford to an 80-76 win over No. 16 Louisville

STANFORD, Calif. (AP) — Freshman Ebuka Okorie scored 28 points, Benny Gealer made a crucial pair of free throws with 8.2 seconds left, and Stanford beat No. 16 Louisville 80-76 on Friday.

Okorie shot 9 of 18 and went 8 of 10 on free throws in 38 minutes to pace Stanford (12-3, 1-1 Atlantic Coast Conference) to its first win over a ranked opponent since beating then-No. 4 Arizona on Dec. 31, 2023.

It was Stanford's first victory in five meetings with Louisville, an ACC rival as of last season.

Chisom Okpara scored 13 of his 17 points in the second half for Stanford, and Ryan Agarwal added 12 points.

Ryan Conwell scored 18 points on 6-of-21 shooting for Louisville (11-3, 1-1), which fell short in coach Pat Kelsey's first attempt at his 300th victory. Isaac McKneely added 17 points, Sananda Fru scored 15 and J'Vonne Hadley had 14.

Louisville's Khani Rooths made a 3-pointer with 4:49 left to tie the game at 65-all, but Agarwal responded with a 3 for Stanford and the Cardinal held on from there. Gealer's free throws made it a two-possession game after Louisville had moved within two.

Louisville didn't look very sharp whenit beat Californiaon Tuesday, and things didn't get much better when Kelsey's team traveled across the San Francisco Bay.

Stanford took control early and benefited from Conwell's slow start.

Louisville's leading scorer at 27.8 points per game, Conwell missed his first nine shots, including eight from behind the arc. Conwell's first point came on a free throw and he didn't make his first basket until late in the first half. He finished 2 of 14 on 3-pointers.

Louisville: Hosts No. 6 Duke on Tuesday.

Stanford: At Virginia Tech on Wednesday.

Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign uphereandhere(AP News mobile app). AP college basketball:https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-college-basketball-pollandhttps://apnews.com/hub/college-basketball

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Freshman Ebuka Okorie leads Stanford to an 80-76 win over No. 16 Louisville

STANFORD, Calif. (AP) — Freshman Ebuka Okorie scored 28 points, Benny Gealer made a crucial pair of free throws with 8.2 ...

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