Long-running Mexican band Los Tigres Del Norte will make their local arena debut when they headline St. Paul’s Grand Casino Arena on April 18.

Tickets go on sale at 10 a.m. Friday via Ticketmaster.

Jorge Hernández, his brothers and their cousins formed the band in the mid-’60s while living in Mexico. They began recording after moving to San Jose in 1968.

Three years later, the group heard a Los Angeles mariachi singer perform a number about a pair of drug runners. There had been ballads about the cross-border drug trade for decades, but this song was more cinematic. Los Tigres del Norte went on to cover “Contrabando y traición” (“Contraband and Betrayal”) in 1974. It was a hit on both sides of the border, inspired a series of movies and served as the launching pad for a successful career.

The band is one of the biggest acts in regional Mexican music and has become famous for its political ballads. They’re the only Mexican group to win seven Grammy Awards and 13 Latin Grammys.

The current lineup features three founding members in Jorge Hernández, Hernán Hernández and Óscar Lara.

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More than just about any major sport, rust seems to be a factor in hockey. If a player goes two days without hitting the ice, the results can be rough; for a time anyway.

So, it’s not at all surprising, after missing the season’s first two months, that Wild center Nico Sturm would take some time to get up to speed.

Acquired in the free-agent market over the summer, Sturm suffered a back injury on Day 1 of Minnesota’s training camp, and after a surgery to repair the damage, did not see game action until a Nov. 23 game in Winnipeg. Sturm himself admitted that it was taking him some time to get his groove back.

But after his faceoff win in the first period Tuesday in Edmonton set up the game’s only goal in a 1-0 Wild victory, coach John Hynes admitted that Minnesota is getting exactly what it bought when the penalty-killing German came back for his second career stint in red and green.

“He’s been good. It’s really good to have him back in,” Hynes said, speaking to reporters following the team’s Thursday morning skate in Calgary. “He’s good on faceoffs, he’s such a responsible, strong, two-way player. Big, strong kid, highly competitive, adds to our penalty kill, so it’s nice to see.”

Sturm won 60% of his faceoffs versus the Oilers, which is around his career average, and makes him an important tool for Hynes to have on penalty kills and in the defensive zone, when starting with possession of the puck is so vital.

Versus the Oilers, Sturm won the faceoff and directed the puck back to Jonas Brodin at the blue line, who zipped a shot past the Edmonton goalie for the eventual game-winner.

“We had the shot called before, but obviously you don’t always get it on a tee for the D-man like that,” said Sturm, who has made his off-season home in the Twin Cities since he started his NHL career with the Wild in 2019. He wore jersey No. 7 in his first go-round in Minnesota. But with defenseman Brock Faber wearing that digit now, Sturm has switched to No. 78, which he wore in previous stints with the Avalanche and Sharks. Sturm wore No. 8 last season in Florida, where he won a Stanley Cup with the Panthers.

Whether or not it leads immediately to a goal, faceoff wins are Sturm’s specialty, which is becoming more evident as he shakes off any remaining rust.

“I think even coming back, he seems to be getting better and better,” Hynes said. “We’re starting to see more of his speed and he’s getting better in the faceoff circle, so he’s been a good addition for us.”

Rossi not yet ready

While injured center Marco Rossi did not join the team’s western Canada road trip from the start, with him skating more often as he recovers from a lower-body injury, there was hope that Rossi might meet the Wild in Vancouver or Seattle later in the trip. On Thursday, Hynes said that won’t happen.

“Rossi will not be on the trip. He’s skating on his own and he’s going to take a little bit more time, actually, than we originally thought,” Hynes said. “Originally, we thought maybe it would be a little bit quicker, like on this trip, but it’s not going to be on this trip. And then we’ll see where he’s at when we get back.”

Rossi, who had been an iron man the previous two seasons, last played on Nov. 11 in an overtime loss at home versus San Jose.

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By MARK SHERMAN, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Thursday came to the rescue of Texas Republicans, allowing next year’s elections to be held under the state’s congressional redistricting plan favorable to the GOP and pushed by President Donald Trump despite a lower-court ruling that the map likely discriminates on the basis of race.

The justices acted on an emergency request from Texas for quick action because qualifying in the new districts already has begun, with primary elections in March.

The Supreme Court’s order puts the 2-1 ruling blocking the map on hold at least until after the high court issues a final decision in the case. Justice Samuel Alito had previously temporarily blocked the order while the full court considered the Texas appeal.

The justices have blocked past lower-court rulings in congressional redistricting cases, most recently in Alabama and Louisiana, that came several months before elections.

The Texas congressional map enacted last summer at Trump’s urging was engineered to give Republicans five additional House seats.

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The effort to preserve a slim Republican majority in the House in next year’s elections touched off a nationwide redistricting battle.

Texas was the first state to meet Trump’s demands in what has become an expanding national battle over redistricting. Republicans drew the state’s new map to give the GOP five additional seats, and Missouri and North Carolina followed with new maps adding an additional Republican seat each. To counter those moves, California voters approved a ballot initiative to give Democrats an additional five seats there.

The redrawn maps are facing court challenges in California and Missouri. A three-judge panel allowed the new North Carolina map to be used in the 2026 elections.

The Trump administration is suing to block the new California maps, but it called for the Supreme Court to keep the redrawn Texas districts in place.

The justices are separately considering a case from Louisiana that could further limit race-based districts under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. It’s unclear how the current round of redistricting would be affected by the outcome in the Louisiana case.

In the Texas case, U.S. District Judges Jeffrey V. Brown and David Guaderrama concluded that the redistricting plan likely dilutes the political power of Black and Latino voters in violation of the Constitution. Trump appointed Brown in his first term while President Barack Obama, a Democrat, appointed Guaderrama.

“To be sure, politics played a role in drawing the 2025 Map,” Brown wrote. “But it was much more than just politics. Substantial evidence shows that Texas racially gerrymandered the 2025 Map.”

The majority opinion provoked a vituperative dissent from Judge Jerry Smith, an appeals court judge on the panel.

Smith accused Brown of “pernicious judicial misbehavior” for not giving Smith sufficient time before issuing the majority opinion. Smith, an appointee of President Ronald Reagan, a Republican, also disagreed strenuously with the substance of the opinion, saying it would be a candidate for the “Nobel Prize for Fiction,” if there were such an award.

“The main winners from Judge Brown’s opinion are George Soros and Gavin Newsom,” Smith wrote, referring to the liberal megadonor and California’s Democratic governor. “The obvious losers are the People of Texas and the Rule of Law.”

By RONALD BLUM, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — FIFA has invited more teams than ever for a World Cup priced largely for fans in the 1%. The process of figuring out which teams in the expanded 48-nation field will play where begins with Friday’s draw at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

Cape Verde, Curaçao, Jordan and Uzbekistan will appear in soccer’s premier event for the first time when next year’s tournament is played from June 11 to July 19 at 16 sites in the United States, Mexico and Canada.

“I’m quite optimistic because to qualify you need to beat the other teams of your confederations, and that’s a sign of quality,” former Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger said Thursday as red carpets were installed at the Kennedy Center. “The teams are not there by coincidence.”

The red carpet is delivered prior to the final draw for the 2026 soccer World Cup at the Kennedy Center in Washington, Thursday, Dec. 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Chris Carlson)

President Donald Trump of the U.S. and Claudia Sheinbaum of Mexico are expected along with Canada Prime Minister Mark Carney. Instead of soccer gear, the Kennedy Center gift shop still was filled with socks of Shakespeare, Beethoven and Verdi along with shelves of red and white holiday nutcrackers.

The world’s top 11-ranked teams have all qualified, with No. 12 Italy among 22 nations competing in playoffs for the final six berths to be decided March 31.

Led by captain Lionel Messi, who turns 39 during the tournament, Argentina seeks to become the first nation to win consecutive World Cups since Brazil in 1958 and 1962. Messi will look to extend his record of 26 games played and enters with 13 career goals, three shy of Miroslav Klose’s record.

Games will be played at 11 NFL stadiums along with three in Mexico and two in Canada, where construction is underway to add 17,000 temporary seats to BMO Field, raising capacity to around 45,000. Attendance will top the record 3.59 million in 1994.

“We basically set the new tone in terms of attendance, in terms of surrounding the tournament with a lot of entertainment and glamor,” said Alan Rothenberg, head organizer of the 1994 World Cup in the U.S. “We did a lot of things that kind of broke the ice with respect to how you present the tournament as something other than just a soccer tournament.”

The red carpet is delivered prior to the final draw for the 2026 soccer World Cup at the Kennedy Center in Washington, Thursday, Dec. 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Chris Carlson)

FIFA announced initial ticket prices of $60-$6,730, saying they would be dynamic, up from $25-$475 for the 1994 tournament in the United States. It has refused to release a complete list of prices, as it had for every other World Cup since at least 1990. The governing body also is selling parking passes for up to $175 for a single match, a semifinal in Arlington, Texas.

FIFA spokesman Bryan Swanson did not respond to a request for FIFA President Gianni Infantino to discuss ticket prices.

Sixty-four nations will participate in the draw, 30% of FIFA’s members, but just 42 countries are assured of sports. Among the playoff teams, Albania, Kosovo, New Caledonia and Suriname are trying to reach the World Cup for the first time.

With the expansion, the top two teams in each of 12 groups advance along with the eight best third-place teams. Some nations could reach the new round of 32 with three points.

“I think we’re going to be in pretty good shape,” said former U.S. midfielder Tab Ramos, who during his playing days mapped out permutations for advancement. “We have a good team, so I’m not worried as much as I’ve been in the past about about this draw.”

Opta Analyst’s computer projects the U.S. has a 0.9% chance of winning — the Americans haven’t reached the semifinals since the first World Cup in 1930. Spain tops the forecast at 17%, followed by France (14.1%), England (11.8%), Argentina (8.7%), Germany (7.1.%), Portugal (6.6%), Brazil (5.6%) and the Netherlands (5.2%).

In a new twist, FIFA said the top four teams in the rankings — Spain, Argentina, France and England — will avoid each other until the semifinals if they finish first in their first-round groups.

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Specific sites for most matchups and kickoff times won’t be announced until Saturday. In 1994, there were just seven night games.

A team’s group play sites will be restricted to an Eastern, Central and Western regional

The 1994 World Cup draw in Las Vegas was apolitical, featuring performances by Stevie Wonder, Barry Manilow, James Brown and Vanessa Williams plus comedian Robin Williams, who called the draw screen “the world’s largest keno board,” yelled “Bingo!” when Greece was selected.

This draw figures to be more akin to the ceremony for 2018 tournament in Moscow, opened by Russian President Vladimir Putin. Trump, who has campaigned for a Nobel Peace Prize, is expected to be awarded FIFA’s own peace prize that Infantino established after traveling to several events with Trump.

But the main event is the pulling of balls from bowls to create groups. Retired tars Tom Brady of the NFL, Shaquille O’Neal of the NBA and Wayne Gretzky of the NHL along with three-time AL MVP Aaron Judge will assist in a ceremony to be run by former England captain Rio Ferdinand.

“There is the angst and the looks of sheer terror and disappointment and/or joy and elation from the coaches and from the staffs,” said former U.S. defender Alexi Lalas, now Fox’s lead soccer analyst. “It really gets kind of real for people.”