Former Los Angeles Lakers guard and current South Bay Lakers player Andre Ingram knows a thing or two about cashing in. He’s the NBA G-League’s all-time leader in 3-pointers, boasts a career 45% shooting mark from behind the arc and shot 2-of-3 from downtown in his game against the Salt Lake City Stars on Wednesday.

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On Friday, the 36-year-old guard secured the bag on the hit game show “Wheel of Fortune,” appearing as a guest for their Secret Santa episode that aired.

Ingram won $31,750, missing out on a potential $39,000 by failing to solve the game’s final puzzle. Although he earned the money, he isn’t keeping it. Instead, a lucky fan will receive the lump sum courtesy of Ingram. After the show, Ingram said that he was more nervous playing the game than a professional basketball contest.

Ingram is best known for his short tenure in the NBA after a 10-year stint in the G-League. Los Angeles signed him to a 10-day contract in March 2018, and he played in the team’s final two regular-season games of that year. He averaged 12 points, 3.5 assists, 3.0 rebounds per contest, shot 47% from the field and 55% from 3-point range.

He was scheduled to play Friday at 10 p.m. ET at the Stockton Kings, as his Lakers squad looks to extend its win streak to six. Unfortunately, that means he won’t be home to watch the episode as soon as it airs, but there’s always time to catch the replay.

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More than five years after winning his second Most Valuable Player award, Golden State Warriors superstar Stephen Curry could be on his way to claiming a third.

Curry, who is second in the NBA in scoring and first in both 3-pointers made and attempted, got 94 of the 100 first-place votes cast in the 2021-22 debut of ESPN’s MVP straw poll, which was conducted from Dec. 3 through Dec. 6.

If Curry goes on to win the MVP award, he would tie Wilt Chamberlain for the largest gap between wins (six years) in NBA history. Curry, who will turn 34 in March, also would become the third-oldest MVP in league history, trailing Karl Malone in 1999 and Michael Jordan in 1998.

While Curry is firmly planted in the MVP spotlight, Los Angeles Lakers star LeBron James, another mainstay in the poll discussion, did not receive a vote for the first time across eight straw polls conducted since the 2016-17 season.

To gauge where the race stands roughly 30% into the season, ESPN asked 100 media members to participate in an informal poll that mimics the postseason award voting. To make the balloting as realistic as possible, there were at least two voters from each of the league’s 28 markets, along with a cross-section of national and international reporters.

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As with the NBA’s official vote at the end of season, voters were asked to submit a five-player ballot, and results were tabulated using the league’s scoring system: 10 points for each first-place vote, seven points for second, five points for third, three points for fourth and one point for fifth.

Curry (978 points) was followed by Brooklyn Nets forward Kevin Durant (610 points, two first-place votes) and Milwaukee Bucks forward Giannis Antetokounmpo (471 points, three first-place votes). Last year’s MVP, Denver Nuggets center Nikola Jokic (256 points), got the other first-place vote and came in fourth overall.

Phoenix Suns guard Chris Paul (160 points) rounded out the top five.

Others receiving votes: Chicago Bulls forward DeMar DeRozan (sixth); Miami Heat forward Jimmy Butler and Suns guard Devin Booker tied for seventh; Dallas Mavericks guard Luka Doncic (ninth); Atlanta Hawks guard Trae Young (10th); and LA Clippers guard Paul George (11th). Philadelphia 76ers center Joel Embiid, Utah Jazz guard Donovan Mitchell and Bulls guard Zach LaVine each got one vote to tie for 12th.

Curry’s 94 first-place votes creates the highest percentage of first-place votes received in any of the straw polls, surpassing the 91 votes James Harden received in the spring of 2018, the season he would win his lone MVP award while with the Houston Rockets.

Both Kevin Durant and Stephen Curry have their teams atop their conferences. Nathaniel S. Butler/NBA/Getty Images

Curry, Durant and Antetokounmpo were named to all 100 ballots — the first time as many as three players were unanimous selections in any iteration of the straw poll, and a sign of the separation between them and the rest of the pack.

In fact, there is far more separation across the board at this point in the season than last year, when James, Embiid and Jokic were separated by only 164 points, and combined to get 94 first-place votes. Curry, on the other hand, received that many by himself, and there are 368 points separating him and second-place Durant, the NBA’s current scoring leader. That is more than double the gap between first and third in the first edition of last season’s poll.

There is clear stratification between each of the top-six finishers.

Curry has led Golden State’s return to the top of the NBA standings after the team missed the playoffs each of the past two seasons — following five straight trips to the NBA Finals. He is averaging 27.5 points and is on pace to make 445 3-pointers, which would shatter his single-season record of 402 set in 2016 when he became the only unanimous MVP in league history.

Durant is off to a stellar start for Brooklyn, which is in first place in the Eastern Conference. He leads the league in scoring at 28.4 points and is shooting over 50% from the field for a ninth consecutive season. Antetokounmpo is averaging 27.0 points, 11.6 rebounds and 5.7 assists for the Bucks, who have surged back toward the top of the East standings after an injury-filled first month.

Jokic has picked up where he left off for an even more injury-plagued Nuggets team, one without guard Jamal Murray because of a torn ACL suffered in April, and now without forward Michael Porter Jr. for an indefinite period following back surgery on Dec. 1. Jokic is averaging 26.1 points, 13.4 rebounds and 7.2 assists, and his Player Efficiency Rating of 34.07 would easily be the highest in NBA history for a full season.

Friday, Dec. 10
Nets at Hawks, 7:30 p.m.
Celtics at Suns, 10 p.m.

Wednesday, Dec. 15
Lakers at Mavericks, 7:30 p.m.
Clippers at Jazz, 10 p.m.

All times Eastern

Paul, whose 10.1 assists per game leads the NBA, and Booker both received credit for Phoenix’s perch atop the NBA standings after the Suns’ 18-game winning streak. They are the third set of teammates to finish within the top seven in voting in the straw polls, joining Curry and Durant, who did so in both polls taken during the 2017-18 season, as well as James and Anthony Davis, who did it in both polls taken during the 2019-20 season.

Who didn’t receive votes is just as telling.

While James is still putting up spectacular numbers — 25.5 points, 5.9 rebounds and 6.9 assists — he has played in only 14 of the Lakers’ 26 games.

It also should be noted there wasn’t a poll conducted during the 2018-19 season, when James missed many games with a groin injury. That leaves Antetokounmpo as the only player who has received at least one MVP vote over each of the eight straw polls that have been conducted over the past six seasons.

But while James has spent nearly half the season off the court, the same can’t be said for Harden and Davis, both of whom have played nearly every game and were also noteworthy absences from the voting.

Harden is shooting a career-low 40.1% from the field and his 20.9 points per game is his lowest since he was a sixth man for the Oklahoma City Thunder. Davis is averaging 24.0 points and 10.2 rebounds, but Los Angeles is 13-13 and fighting for a play-in spot in the Western Conference.

Damian Lillard, who made all four polls over the past two seasons, also didn’t receive a vote after a sluggish start to the season for both he and the Portland Trail Blazers (11-15).

At the other end of the spectrum sits DeRozan, who, before entering the NBA’s health and safety protocols Monday, had been the driving force behind the Bulls’ launch to contention in the Eastern Conference. DeRozan is leading the league in fourth-quarter scoring and his 26.4 points per game ranks fourth in the league.

It is only the second time DeRozan has received votes in a straw poll, and the first time since 2018, when he was with the Toronto Raptors. That also was the only season in DeRozan’s career he received MVP votes at the end of the season.

This also marked the first time that both Young and LaVine have received straw poll votes. Young is fifth in the league in scoring and third in assists. LaVine is seventh in scoring at 25.8 points per game while starring alongside DeRozan in Chicago.

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PHILADELPHIA — Golden State Warriors star guard Stephen Curry continues to say that the pursuit of Ray Allen’s all-time 3-point record is not weighing on his mind as he sits on the precipice of earning one of the bigger records in basketball.

After another lackluster shooting performance — at least by his own lofty standards in Saturday’s 102-93 loss to the 76ers — Curry insisted as much, as he sits just seven 3-pointers from passing Allen.

“If you take away the context of these last couple games, I played the exact same way,” Curry said after a 6-for-20 performance, including going just 3-for-14 from beyond the arc. “I just got to make shots and understand the opposition’s not going to want that to happen on their own floor. And they defend accordingly so I think for the most part try to keep it out of my head and just play basketball and just take the shots I normally take, play the game I normally do.

“There’s obviously a lot of attention on it which is well-deserved, it’s an all-time NBA record, and it’s one that’s been standing for 10, 11 years, so I appreciate the attention on it and it will happen when it happens. You got to continue to try and win games in the process.”

Curry is now 35-for-104 from the field and 27-for-72 from beyond the arc over his past six games. Warriors coach Steve Kerr noted that a major reason why Curry struggled on Saturday night was due to the fact that Sixers swingman Matisse Thybulle played so well on Curry and didn’t allow for the usual space for the two-time MVP to operate.

“I give Thybulle credit,” Kerr said. “I thought he was fantastic defensively. He’s a rare combination of length and athleticism and brains and he did as good a job on Steph as anybody I’ve seen in a long time.”

It was a defensive performance by Thybulle that reverberated inside the Sixers’ locker room as well.

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“It was amazing,” Sixers center Joel Embiid said. “I’ve been saying this, this is a guy who is probably the best perimeter defender in the league, and I think he has a chance to win defensive player of the year.”

While Kerr and several Warriors were quick to praise the Sixers’ defense, especially Thybulle’s performance, they also acknowledged that they didn’t knock down the open looks that they did get.

“I missed three or four I normally make,” Curry said. “Usually when you have a defender like that that’s running you around you’re very selective about the shots that you do get because their game plan is to take away good looks. … They were flying around most possessions. Out of the 48 threes we got, I bet you 40 of them were really good looks. Not just me, but everybody. So it’s tough to win games if you only shoot 25% on those type of shots. Just got to stick with the program and how we play basketball.”

Thybulle took the performance in stride, understanding that with all the extra energy in the building surrounding the potential of Curry breaking the record, he was just trying to focus on doing his job.

“There’s, like, no secrets to guarding people like that,” Thybulle said. “You’ve got to play really hard, you’ve got to be willing to get scored on. He’s going to make some spectacular plays and you have to be able to play through that and just trying to be a consistent force and not let his success take you on a roller coaster.”

In the short-term, the Warriors now 21-5, have to decide if they are going to play Curry, who has played in all but one contest this season, in both Monday’s and Tuesday’s games in Indianapolis and New York. Another set of back-to-back games in Boston and Toronto will be staring at them at the end of the week. Curry deflected the question when asked about the possibility of sitting at some point.

“I always want to play,” Curry said. “It’s also understanding the situation, the big picture. And reassessing after every game how your body feels. I don’t want to give too much away but you have things that you’re doing regular maintenance on and understanding where we are throughout the season, so we’ll make the right decision accordingly.”

Curry demurred when asked whether he expects to play in both games. “We’ll make the right decision accordingly,” he said.

As the Warriors decide on the schedule they want to take with Curry, forward Draymond Green noted that the talk of the 3-point record is not something that is weighing on the group as it continues the rest of this five-game east coast swing.

“I think it’s hanging over the world,” Green said. “I think we all want to see it. But if you’re asking me if it’s negatively affecting the team, no.”

ESPN staff writer Tim Bontemps contributed to this report.

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Two more Bulls players — Ayo Dosunmu and Stanley Johnson — landed in the NBA’s health and safety protocols Saturday, bringing Chicago’s total to seven players sidelined amid a teamwide COVID-19 outbreak.

Johnson just signed a 10-day contract with the Bulls on Thursday after the team was granted a hardship exception to add another roster spot with so many players out. However, he and Dosunmu, who started the prior two games, missed Saturday’s 118-92 loss to the Miami Heat.

“We need a hardship for a hardship right now,” Bulls coach Billy Donovan said before the game.

The two players join DeMar DeRozan, Coby White, Javonte Green, Matt Thomas and Derrick Jones Jr. in the league’s protocols.

Since the start of the outbreak, the Bulls have begun testing players and coaches multiple times per day to try to monitor the spread of the virus. Chicago’s G-League affiliate, the Windy City Bulls, postponed their games on Saturday and Sunday because they didn’t have eight players available due to positive tests within the team.

Jones entered the protocol on Friday while he was with the Bulls in Miami, but Donovan confirmed Saturday that Jones had returned to Chicago to begin his isolation period. After landing in health and safety protocols, players must remain in isolation for at least 10 days or until they return two negative PCR tests in a 24-hour period.

“Maybe some of it’s because of the vaccination, we’ve got a lot of guys sitting at home with no symptoms right now,” Donovan said. “That’s obviously a good thing, too, because I think when guys have gone through a real difficulty of getting really, really sick, it’s really made it a lot harder for them coming back.

“We do have some guys that have felt under the weather, we have guys that have very, very mild symptoms, and some guys that just don’t have any.”

The Bulls have not been the only team trying to manage outbreaks. The Charlotte Hornets, who played the Bulls at the United Center about two weeks ago, have five players in the health and safety protocols.

Others who recently landed in the league’s COVID protocols include Memphis Grizzlies guard Ja Morant, Washington Wizards forward Kyle Kuzma, Indiana Pacers coach Rick Carlisle and Toronto Raptors executive Masai Ujiri.

Both the Heat and Bulls have been fully vaccinated and some players on each team have received a booster shot.

The Heat have started to ramp up testing for players and staff before and after games; they learned hours before tipoff Saturday that forward Caleb Martin needed to enter health and safety protocols. A few Heat players even wore masks on the court while warming up Saturday.

“It’s kind of the world we live in right now,” Heat guard Kyle Lowry said after Saturday’s win. “It’s tough for a guy like Caleb to be going through this situation, it’s tough for the Bulls to be going through this situation, it’s tough for the real world to be going through this situation. The basketball [side] — we want health. We want our guys to be healthy. There’s still people getting sick by this virus and it’s something we just can’t control right now. We’ve got to find ways to be safe.”

As the NBA navigates another season amid the pandemic, one major difference from last year is that, so far, the league has not needed to postpone any games.

The Bulls still had 11 players available Saturday night in Miami, including two two-way players, another in Alfonzo McKinnie, who signed a 10-day contract Friday, and guard Alex Caruso, who played after missing the past two games with a hamstring injury.

That gave them well above the eight-player minimum the NBA used as a threshold to postpone games last season.

“I would totally understand if somebody on our team’s like, ‘Listen, I don’t feel comfortable with this. We’re together, we’re practicing and I don’t feel comfortable playing,'” Donovan said. “We haven’t had any of that, but certainly COVID has impacted people in a lot of different ways, and I think people have, at least inside of our team, have had loved ones that have really suffered from it.

“It is a scary time. Our guys have really done a good job of just trying to put their best foot forward to try to really stay locked in on, ‘This is what I have to do,’ or, ‘This is what I can control,’ and try to move forward with it.”

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Vicente Fernandez performs onstage during the 20th annual Latin GRAMMY Awards at MGM Grand Garden Arena on November 14, 2019 in Las Vegas, Nevada. | Kevin Winter, Getty

Vicente Fernandez was known for hits such as “El Rey,” “Volver, Volver” and “Lastima que seas ajena.”

MEXICO CITY — Vicente Fernandez, a beloved Mexican singer who was awarded three Grammys and nine Latin Grammys and inspired a new generation of performers, including his son Alejandro Fernandez Jr., died on Sunday. He was 81 years old.

Fernandez was known for hits such as “El Rey,” “Volver, Volver” and “Lastima que seas ajena,” and his command of the ranchera and mariachi styles of music attracted fans far beyond Mexico’s borders.

“It was an honor and a great pride to share with everyone a great musical career and give everything for the audience,” Fernandez’s family said on his official Instagram account. “Thank you for continuing to applaud, thank you for continuing to sing.”

Fernandez, known also by his nickname ?Chente,? died at 6:15 a.m. in a hospital in Jalisco state, his family said. Funeral plans were not announced. In August, he had suffered a serious fall and had been hospitalized since then for that and other ailments.

“One of the most important artists of Mexican popular culture, the undisputed symbol of ranchera music, dies. A million mariachis accompany you on your way, ” Alejandra Frausto, Mexico’s culture secretary, said on Twitter.

She alluded to the fact that Fernandez often sang on Dec. 12 to mark the Catholic pilgrimage to the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City, an event that attracts vast crowds. The commemoration was being held on Sunday after it was canceled last year because of the pandemic.

Fernandez sold more than 50 million records and appeared in more than 30 films. In April 2016, he said goodbye to the stage before about 85,000 people in Azteca Stadium in Mexico City. Spectators had traveled from northern Mexico as well as the United States, Colombia and other Latin American countries for the occasion.

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From Freeport to Jonesboro: how seven Illinois towns honor the debates that took place on their soil.Read More

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In this April 25, 2006, file photo, writer Anne Rice arrives to the opening night of the new Broadway musical “Lestat,” in New York. Rice, the gothic novelist widely known for her bestselling novel “Interview with the Vampire,” died late Saturday, Dec. 11, 2021, at the age of 80. Rice died due to complications from a stroke, her son Christopher Rice announced on her Facebook page and his Twitter page. | AP

Rice died due to complications from a stroke, her son Christopher Rice announced on her Facebook page and his Twitter page.

Anne Rice, the gothic novelist widely known for her bestselling novel “Interview With the Vampire,” died late Saturday at the age of 80.

Rice died due to complications from a stroke, her son Christopher Rice announced on her Facebook page and his Twitter page.

“In her final hours, I sat beside her hospital bed in awe of her accomplishments and her courage,” Christopher Rice wrote in the statement.

Anne Rice was the author of the 1976 novel “Interview With the Vampire,” which was later adapted, with a script by Rice, into the 1994 movie directed by Neil Jordan and starring Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt. It’s also set to be adapted again in an upcoming TV series on AMC and AMC+ set to premiere next year.

“Interview With the Vampire,” in which reporter Daniel Molloy interviews Louis de Pointe du Lac, was Rice’s first novel but over the next five decades, she would write more than 30 books and sell more than 150 million copies worldwide. Thirteen of them were part of the “Vampire Chronicles” begun with her 1976 debut.

Born Howard Allen Frances O’Brien in 1941, she was raised in New Orleans, where many of her novels were set. Her father worked for the postal service but made sculptures and wrote fiction on the side. Her older sister, Alice Borchardt, also wrote fantasy and horror fiction. Rice’s mother died when Rice was 15.

Raised in an Irish Catholic family, Rice wrote about her fluctuating spiritual journey, including the 2008 memoir “Called Out of Darkness: A Spiritual Confession.” But in 2010, she announced that she was no longer Christian, saying “I refuse to be anti-gay. I refuse to be anti-feminist. I refuse to be anti-artificial birth control.”

“I believed for a long time that the differences, the quarrels among Christians didn’t matter a lot for the individual, that you live your life and stay out of it. But then I began to realize that it wasn’t an easy thing to do,” Rice told The Associated Press then. “I came to the conclusion that if I didn’t make this declaration, I was going to lose my mind.”

Rice was expected to be interred during a private ceremony at a family mausoleum in New Orleans on an undisclosed date, according to the statement. A public celebration of life was to take place next year.

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A small-billed elaenia in Waukegan. | Dr. Elizabeth Pector

A small-billed elaenia in Waukegan, an Eagle Scout doing his own deer mount, Michigan’s long-standing record for yellow perch, and breeding habits of burbot are among the notes from around Chicago outdoors and beyond.

Notes from around Chicago outdoors and beyond.

Dr. Elizabeth Pector photographed the small-billed elaenia last Saturday in Waukegan. “This South American flycatcher has been hanging out in some yews eating berries instead of a warm beach or forest in Rio! . . . Only a handful have ever been seen in North America; two times in Chicago area and once recently in Quebec.”

WOTW, the celebration of wild stories and photos around Chicago outdoors, runs most weeks in the special two-page outdoors section in the Sun-Times Sports Saturday. To make submissions, email [email protected] or contact me on Facebook (Dale Bowman), Twitter (@BowmanOutside) or Instagram (@BowmanOutside).

WILD TIMES

FISH GATHERINGS

Tuesday, Dec. 14: Southeast Wisconsin guide Joel Michel, Chicagoland Muskie Hunters chapter of Muskies, Inc., North Branch Pizza & Burger Co., Glenview, 7:30 p.m.

Tuesday, Dec. 14: Capt. Harley Goodman from Jackpot Charters, Thornwood Restaurant & Lounge, Wood Dale, 7 p.m., salmonunlimitedinc.com

ILLINOIS PERMITS/SEASONS

Today, Dec. 12: Muzzleloader-only deer season ends

Monday, Dec. 12: Applications begin for second lottery, spring turkey

Tuesday, Dec. 13: First scaup season, central zone, ends

Wednesday, Dec. 14: Second scaup season, central zone, begins

YOUTH HUNTING

Dec. 31: Deadline to register for 2022 Central Illinois Youth Goose Hunt on Jan. 17, (217) 785-8060

DALE’S MAILBAG

“Just wanted to share with you this picture. Garrett did the mount himself. He plans to find a nice piece of natural wood to put it on.” Randy Glennon, Garrett’s father.

A: I ran into them the evening of opening day when they were loading Garrett’s big buck at Des Plaines State Fish and Wildlife Area.

The photo made me ask if Garrett was an Eagle Scout and his father replied, “Troop 196 out of St. Peter Lutheran church in Schaumburg. His group of scouts his age all made Eagle, about eight to 10 of them.”

Click here for the column on Garrett and his big buck.

BIG NUMBER

3.75: Pounds of the Michigan hook-and-line record yellow perch. The 21-incher was caught in 1947 from Lake Independence in Marquette County.

LAST WORD

“Reproduction occurs in pairs or sometimes in groups of dozens or even in the hundreds, in shallow water over sand or gravel bottoms. There is no nest built and no care for the eggs or newly hatched young.”

Minnesota DNR, on the mating habits of burbot, click here for more

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The rumors of Ryan Pace’s dismissal from the Chicago Bears are music to the ears of all Bears fans. If it is true, Pace was not where the Bears should’ve started. Pace has shown his ability to make smart decisions for the team and the betterment of the future as a whole. While the Bears […] Firing the GM shouldn’t be the only Chicago Bears move made – Da Windy City – Da Windy City – A Chicago Sports Site – Bears, Bulls, Cubs, White Sox, Blackhawks, Fighting Illini & MoreRead More