What to watch this weekend in sports

Here are immoderate things for Canadian fans to support an oculus on:

Golf: Conners successful contention astatine the Masters

Canada's Corey Conners birdied 3 of the last 4 holes yesterday astatine Augusta to paper a 4-under opening circular that enactment him successful a necktie for 2nd spot with defending champion and satellite No. 1 Scottie Scheffler of the United States and young Swedish prima Ludvig Aberg. The Canadian stayed blistery today, shooting 2 nether par connected the archetypal 9 to enactment close adjacent the apical of the leaderboard astatine our people time.

England's Justin Rose followed up his sizzling 7-under opening circular with a much pedestrian 1-under contiguous to stay successful the lead. U.S. Open champion Bryson DeChambeau fired a 4-under to determination into 2nd astatine 7 nether for the tournament, but Rory McIlroy was the communicative of the afternoon. After treble bogeying 2 of the last 4 holes yesterday to decorativeness with a disappointing even-par 72, the Northern Irishman bounced backmost with a 6-under circular to ascent to 3rd place.

Canada's Nick Taylor finished his time astatine adjacent par for the tournament, making the chopped successful a large for the archetypal clip since 2020. Mike Weir (5 implicit astatine our people time) and Taylor Pendrith (6 over) looked similar they'd miss the cut. Here's an updated leaderboard.

Women's hockey: Canada, U.S. clash astatine the satellite championship

Canada opened its rubric defence yesterday successful the Czech Republic with a 5-0 triumph implicit Finland before beating Switzerland 4-0 today. Daryl Watts scored her archetypal world-championship goal, Laura Stacey had a extremity and an assistance and skipper Marie-Philip Poulin added 3 helpers portion Ann-Renée Desbiens made 17 saves for the shutout successful her archetypal commencement since suffering a lower-body wounded successful a March 18 PWHL game.

The biggest crippled of the radical signifier is coming up Sunday astatine 1 p.m. ET erstwhile Canada faces the rival United States successful what is precise apt to beryllium a preview of the title final. The Americans besides improved to 2-0 contiguous by defeating the big Czech Republic 4-0.

The Canadians play the Czechs connected Monday day successful their last crippled of the preliminary round. All 5 teams successful Canada's radical automatically beforehand to adjacent Thursday's quarterfinals on with the apical 3 from the different (weaker) group. 

NHL: Playoff representation taking shape

With a week near successful the regular season, the astonishing Montreal Canadiens tin officially assertion the past remaining playoff berth successful the Eastern Conference with a regularisation triumph astatine Ottawa tonight. Montreal has beauteous overmuch already secured its archetypal travel to the post-season successful 4 years, and a triumph contiguous would determination the Habs wrong a constituent of the Senators for the apical wild-card position.

Montreal past visits Toronto connected Saturday nighttime for what could beryllium a preview of a first-round matchup. The Maple Leafs pb the Atlantic Division and are apt to look either the Canadiens oregon Ottawa portion Washington, which clinched the No. 1 effect successful the East past night, gets the different chaotic card.

Winnipeg is connected the verge of clinching the apical effect successful the Western Conference aft blanking the Central Division rival Dallas Stars 4-0 past night. Vezina Trophy shoo-in and MVP contender Connor Hellebuyck earned his league-leading eighth shutout. The Jets sojourn Chicago connected Saturday earlier a Sunday location day with Edmonton, which is adjacent to securing a playoff spot and a apt first-round matchup with Los Angeles. Calgary inactive has a slim accidental of catching the Oilers. 

In different large men's hockey game, Boston University and Western Michigan quadrate disconnected for the NCAA's Frozen Four title connected Saturday nighttime successful St. Louis.

NBA: SGA closes retired his MVP season

With the regular play wrapping up connected Sunday, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is looking to enactment the finishing touches connected what should beryllium the archetypal NBA MVP triumph by a Canadian since Steve Nash won it successful some 2005 and '06.  

After finishing 2nd successful voting to Denver's Nikola Jokic past year, Gilgeous-Alexander leads the league successful scoring with 32.7 points per crippled portion besides averaging 6.4 assists, 5 rebounds and an fantabulous 1.7 steals for the NBA's apical team. SGA's Oklahoma City Thunder person clinched not conscionable the apical effect successful the Western Conference for the 2nd consecutive twelvemonth but besides the champion grounds successful the full league arsenic they adjacent retired their docket with trips to Utah contiguous and New Orleans connected Sunday afternoon.

No. 2 effect Houston and the No. 3 Los Angeles Lakers person besides clinched spots successful the Western Conference playoff bracket. But close down the Lakers is simply a logjam of teams trying to debar the play-in round. Five clubs — Denver, the L.A. Clippers, Golden State, Memphis and Minnesota — are each wrong 1 crippled of each different and wrong 2 of the Lakers for 3rd place, portion Sacramento and Dallas are headed to the play-in.

Surprising Cleveland has locked up the No. 1 spot successful the Eastern Conference, up of defending NBA champion Boston. New York, Indiana, Milwaukee and Detroit are besides going to the playoffs, portion Orlando, Atlanta, Chicago and Miami volition vie successful the play-in. The Toronto Raptors (30-50) are eliminated from playoff contention and volition decorativeness 11th successful the East.

The play-ins commencement Tuesday and the 16-team bracket tips disconnected adjacent Saturday.

Other worldly to watch:

The Grand Slam of Curling circuit wraps up with the Players' Championship successful Toronto. Canada's Rachel Homan is looking to headdress disconnected a fantastic play that saw her spell undefeated astatine the Scotties Tournament of Hearts for the 2nd consecutive twelvemonth earlier capturing her 2nd consecutive satellite title. She's besides won 2 Slams and made it to the last of the different 2 truthful far. On the men's side, everyone volition beryllium looking to instrumentality down Scotland's Bruce Mouat, who won his 2nd satellite rubric successful 3 years past week.

The past six spots successful tennis' Billie Jean King Cup finals are connected the enactment successful a clump of three-team qualifying groups being played successful antithetic parts of the world. The Canadian squad of Rebecca Marino, Marina Stakusic, Victoria Mboko, Kayla Cross and Ariana Arseneault is successful Tokyo, wherever they opened with a 3-0 expanse of Romania contiguous and tin triumph the radical by defeating big Japan connected Saturday astatine 10 p.m. ET connected CBCSports.ca and CBC Gem. Each of the six radical winners volition articulation reigning champion Italy and big China successful the eighth-team finals successful September. Canada won the Cup successful 2023, led by Leylah Fernandez, earlier losing to Great Britain successful the quarterfinals past year.

The Diving World Cup circuit continues successful Windsor, Ont., wherever Canada volition effort to amended connected its results from past week's play opener successful Mexico. Kate Miller and Katelyn Fung placed sixth successful the women's 10m synchronized event, Benjamin Tessier and Matt Cullen earned the aforesaid effect successful the men's 10m synchro, and Canada's champion idiosyncratic placing was an eighth successful women's 3m springboard by two-time satellite title medallist Mia Vallée. Rylan Wiens and Nathan Zsombor-Murray, who earned Canada's lone diving medal astatine the Paris Olympics with a bronze successful the 10m synchro, did not vie past week and are not successful Windsor either. The medal rounds statesman contiguous and proceed done Sunday connected CBC Sports' streaming platforms.

Olympic formation volleyball metallic medallists Melissa Humana-Paredes and Brandie Wilkerson volition play for a spot successful the quarterfinals astatine a Pro Tour Elite 16 lawsuit successful Brazil contiguous astatine 7 p.m. ET against an American duo. The quarterfinals and semis instrumentality spot Saturday, and the women's last is Sunday astatine noon ET. All rounds are being streamed by CBC Sports.

Some of Canada's Olympic swimmers (though not Summer McIntosh) are competing successful the Canada Open successful Edmonton, wherever the notable names see Finlay Knox, Ingrid Wilm, Taylor Ruck, Mary-Sophie Harvey and Paralympians Nicolas Bennett and Shelby Newkirk. Racing continues contiguous and Saturday connected CBC Sports' streaming channels.