Like a senior scorer willing her team to victory, Dawn Plitzuweit didn’t hesitate to take her shot on Monday.

Speaking to reporters, the Gophers women’s basketball coach was asked if she thinks her 20-win team will be an NCAA tournament team regardless of what happens in Minnesota’s first-round Big Ten tournament game Wednesday against Washington.

“I really can’t answer that,” Plitzuweit said.

As far as whether the Gophers deserve a shot, she said, “I absolutely do.”

In the leadup to Wednesday’s 2:30 p.m. CT tip against the Huskies, the Gophers (20-10, 8-10) are absolutely on the bubble to get one of the NCAA tournament’s 68 invitations. Further, they probably need to beat Washington (18-12, 9-9) to convince some, if not all, of the selection committee.

Minnesota lost fairly convincingly to the Huskies on Feb. 26, and in fact lost seven of their last 10 regular-season games. They finished 0-7 against ranked opponents, 0-7 in Quad 1 games — a key metric in determining the field — and finished 13th in the 18-team Big Ten.

The Big Ten has never sent more than seven teams to the NCAA tournament in one year, a feat matched last year, when Iowa, one of four top seeds, lost to South Carolina in the championship game. Thirteen seems like a push.

But Plitzuweit doesn’t think so, and she has a point. And took her shot.

“I would say this. The landscape of college athletics is totally different; it completely changed, 100 percent changed,” she said. “So, if you look at historical numbers of teams that get in from conferences, that all has to go right out the window. It has to.”

After adding Oregon, Southern Cal, UCLA and Washington this season, the Big Ten is up to 18 teams. All four are among the Top 43 in NET (NCAA Evaluation Tool) rankings, which take into account metrics such as results, strength of schedule, game location, offensive and defensive efficiency, and the quality of a team’s wins and losses. UCLA is ranked fifth, Southern Cal sixth, tops among the conference’s 11 teams in the top 41 in a poll the selection committee uses to choose 37 at-large participants in the 68-team tournament.

Heading into Wednesday’s game, Minnesota is ranked No. 38.

“You’ve added four really good teams to our already strong conference and then the other teams have gotten better, too,” Plitzuweit said.

One of those teams is Minnesota, which won five conference games in a 14-team league last season, then advanced to the WNIT final. This season, the Gophers won eight league games but still finished under .500 in conference, another indicator.

“You’re looking at 13 teams in the Top 43 or so of the net. That’s unbelievable,” the Gophers coach added. “When you listen to, or read up on the bracketologists, they’re saying there are 13 teams that are NCAA tournament teams.”

ESPN, in fact, had Minnesota and Washington among the “last four in” on Monday. So does Megan Gauer of herhoops.com, which presumably means they think neither team has to win on Wednesday to make it.

USAToday has three Big Ten teams with Top 4 seeds: UCLA (1), Southern Cal (1) and Ohio State (4). The Gophers lost to all three on the road, getting clobbered by the Bruins but putting a late scare into USC and pushing the Buckeyes to overtime.

All seven of the Gophers games against ranked teams, in fact, were on the road — Nebraska was ranked No. 24 when they played — and seven of their 10 losses were to opponents ranked among the NET’s top 31 teams. The problem is Minnesota has more good losses — slim setbacks at No. 15 Maryland, No. 3 Ohio State and No. 2 USC — than good wins Illinois (No. 31 NET) and Indiana (No, 39).

“This is unprecedented. This is the best, in my opinion,” Plitzuweit said. “The Big Ten women’s basketball conference is the deepest ever in the history of NCAA women’s basketball. It’s never been like this before.”

There’s one way, of course, for the Gophers to take the guess work out of it. The winner of Wednesday’s game advances to play Oregon, a 76-70 winner against Minnesota, on Thursday afternoon.

“I think because our young ladies have competed and knocked off some decent teams, really good teams, and competed with the best teams. I think we have earned an opportunity,” Plitzuweit said. “Now, would it help us to get to work and do some work in the Big Ten tournament? Absolutely.”

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By ZEKE MILLER, JOSH BOAK and ROB GILLIES, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Monday that 25% taxes on imports from Mexico and Canada would start Tuesday, sparking renewed fears of a North American trade war that already showed signs of pushing up inflation and hindering growth.

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“Tomorrow — tariffs 25% on Canada and 25% on Mexico. And that’ll start,” Trump told reporters in the Roosevelt Room. “They’re going to have to have a tariff.”

Trump has said the tariffs are to force the two U.S. neighbors to step up their fight against fentanyl trafficking and stop illegal immigration. But Trump has also indicated that he wants to even the trade imbalance with both countries as well and push more factories to relocate in the United States.

His comments quickly rattled the U.S. stock market, with the S&P 500 index down 2% in Monday afternoon trading. It’s a sign of the political and economic risks that Trump feels compelled to take, given the possibility of higher inflation and the possible demise of a decades-long trade partnership with Mexico and Canada.

Yet the Trump administration remains confident that tariffs are the best choice to boost U.S. manufacturing and attract foreign investment. Before Trump’s statement on tariffs in response to a question on Tuesday, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said that the c omputer chipmaker TSMC had expanded its investment in the United States because of the possibility of separate 25% tariffs.

In February, Trump put a 10% tariff on imports from China and reemphasized on Monday that the rate would be doubling to 20% on Tuesday.

Trump provided a one-month delay in February as both Mexico and Canada promised concessions. But Trump said Monday that there was “no room left for Mexico or for Canada” to avoid the steep new tariffs, which were also set to tax Canadian energy products such as oil and electricity at a lower 10% rate.

“If Trump is imposing tariffs, we are ready,” said Canadian Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly. “We are ready with $155 billion worth of tariffs and we’re ready with the first tranche of tariffs, which is $30 billion.”

Joly said Canada has a very strong border plan and explained that to Trump administration officials last week. She said the diplomatic efforts are continuing. She spoke after Trump made his comments Tuesday.

Mexico President Claudia Sheinbaum went into Monday waiting to see what Trump would say.

“It’s a decision that depends on the United States government, on the United States president,” Sheinbaum said ahead of Trump’s statement. “So whatever his decision is, we will make our decisions and there is a plan, there is unity in Mexico.”

Both countries have tried to show action in response to Trump’s concerns. Mexico sent 10,000 National Guard troops to their shared border to crack down on drug trafficking and illegal immigration. Canada named a fentanyl czar, even though smuggling of the drug from Canada into the United States appears to be relatively modest.

As late as Sunday, it remained unclear what choice Trump would make on tariff rates. Lutnick told Fox News Channel’s “Sunday Morning Futures” that the decision was “fluid.”

“He’s sort of thinking about right now how exactly he wants to play it with Mexico and Canada,” Lutnick said. “And that is a fluid situation. There are going to be tariffs on Tuesday on Mexico and Canada. Exactly what they are, we’re going to leave that for the president and his team to negotiate.”

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Mexico has also offered to place 20% taxes on all imports from China as part of talks with the United States.

Bessent told CBS News on Sunday that China would “eat” the cost of the tariffs, instead of passing them along to the U.S. businesses and consumers that import their products in the form of higher prices.

But companies ranging from Ford to Walmart have warned about the negative impact that tariffs could create for their businesses. Similarly, multiple analyses by the Peterson Institute for International Economics and the Yale University Budget Lab suggest that an average family could face price increases of more than $1,000.

Trump also plans to roll out what he calls “reciprocal” tariffs on April that would match the rate charged by other countries, including any subsidies and and value added taxes charged by those countries.

The U.S. president has already announced the removal of exemptions from his 2018 tariffs on steel and aluminum, in addition to tariffs on autos, computer chips, copper and pharmaceutical drugs.

By PAUL WISEMAN and CHRISTOPHER RUGABER, Associated Press Economics Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) — When Donald Trump started the biggest trade war since the 1930s in his first term, his impulsive combination of threats and import taxes on U.S. trading partners created chaos, generated drama — and drew criticism from mainstream economists who favor free trade.

But it didn’t do much damage to the U.S. economy. Or much good. Inflation stayed under control. The economy kept growing as it had before. And America’s massive trade deficits, the main target of Trump’s ire, proved resistant to his rhetoric and his tariffs: Already big, they got bigger.

The trade war sequel that Trump has introduced in his second term is likely to be a different matter altogether. Trump appears to have grander ambitions and is operating in a far more treacherous economic environment this time.

FILE – President Donald Trump holds up a proclamation on steel imports during an event at the White House in Washington, March 8, 2018. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File)

His plans to plaster tariffs of 25% on goods from Mexico and Canada and to double a 10% levy on China Tuesday – and to follow those up by targeting other countries – would threaten growth, and push up prices in the United States, undermining his campaign pledge to eliminate the inflation that plagued President Joe Biden.

The tariffs would be paid by U.S. importers, who would then try to pass along the higher costs to consumers through higher prices.

Trump himself has warned of possible fallout. “WILL THERE BE SOME PAIN? YES, MAYBE (AND MAYBE NOT!),” Trump said in a social media post last month. “BUT WE WILL MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN, AND IT WILL ALL BE WORTH THE PRICE THAT MUST BE PAID.”

For a while, most of the hostilities were on hold. Trump, who had said he would hit Canada and Mexico on Feb. 4, delayed imposing the tariffs for 30 days. Now they’re scheduled to start Tuesday. He went ahead with 10% import taxes on Chinese goods — and Beijing promptly retaliated by hitting U.S. coal, big cars and other items — and plans to double them Tuesday.

Trump views tariffs – taxes on imports – as an economic elixir that can restore factories to the American heartland, raise money for the government and pressure foreign countries to do what he wants.

During his first term, Trump put tariffs on most Chinese goods and on imported solar panels, washing machines, steel and aluminum. The tax increases might have raised prices on those items, but they had little or no impact on overall inflation, which remained modest. Nor did they do much to restore factory jobs.

Economists agree that a second Trump trade war could be far costlier than the first.

“That was then. This is now,’’ said trade analyst William Reinsch of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

During Trump’s first term, his trade team carefully focused its tariff hit list to avoid or at least delay the impact on consumers. They targeted industrial products and not those “that would show up on Walmart’s shelves,” said Reinsch, a former U.S. trade official. “That tamped down the impact.’’

This time, by contrast, the tariffs are across the board – although the tariffs Trump plans Tuesday would limit the levy on Canadian energy to 10%, showing that he was mindful of how much Americans in northern and midwestern states depend on oil and electricity from north of the border.

In Boca Raton, Florida, the toy company Basic Fun is preparing to raise prices and absorb a hit to profits when the tariffs land.

Ninety percent of Basic Fun’s toys come from China, including Tonka and Care Bears. CEO Jay Foreman says the price on the Tonka Classic Steel Mighty Dump Truck is likely to rise later this year from $29.99 to as much as $39.99.

Five years ago, the Trump administration spared toys, exempting them from its China tariffs. This time, Foreman said, “we are now just going to forecast a lot of money draining out of the company.”

Also worrying, economists say, is a retaliation clause the Trump team inserted in the tariff orders he signed last month.

If other countries retaliate against Trump’s tariffs with tariffs of their own – as China did and Canada and Mexico have threatened — Trump will lash back with still more tariffs. That risks “setting off a spiraling trade war’’ of tit-for-tat tariffs and counter-tariffs, said Eswar Prasad, professor of trade policy at Cornell University.

FILE – President Claudia Sheinbaum speaks to the crowd during an event marking her first 100 days in office, at the Zócalo, Mexico City’s main square, in Mexico City, Sunday, Jan. 12, 2025. (AP Photo/Fernando Llano, File)

Economists gathered Monday at a conference of the National Association for Business Economics were generally wary of the import taxes and their impact on the economy. Michael Strain, an economist at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, estimated that the proposed duties could drag down economic growth by as much as a half-percentage point.

One big difference between Trump’s first term is that he’s likely to get less pushback from his own aides. “This is true religion inside the White House right now, unlike the first term, when many of the president’s advisers were deeply skeptical of this policy,” Strain said.

Diane Swonk, chief economist at the giant accounting firm KPMG, said the impact of tariffs this time would likely be much bigger than in 2018-2019. Among other things, the president is planning to impose what he calls “reciprocal tariffs” — and raise U.S. import taxes to match higher tariffs charged by other countries.

“The breadth and scope are different,” Swonk said. “The goals are different. It’s not just one country, we’re talking about multiple countries at the same time. And the rest of the world is ready to retaliate.”

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One of those goals that Trump has cited more often than last time is using tariffs to raise revenue for the government, Swonk noted. Trump and some of his officials have talked about substituting tariff revenue for income taxes. If so, that would mean keeping the tariffs in place even if countries like Canada and Mexico agreed to Trump’s demands on other issues, such as immigration restrictions.

Perhaps the biggest difference is the economic backdrop Trump must contend with this time.

Six years ago, inflation was low — maybe even too low, the Federal Reserve fretted. Trump’s first-term tariffs didn’t make a dent.

Inflation isn’t so benign anymore. Prices surged in the unexpected boom that followed the end of COVID-19 lockdowns. Inflation has come down from the four-decade high it hit in mid-2022, but it’s still stuck above the Fed’s 2% target and hasn’t shown much improvement since summer.

Trump’s tariffs could rekindle the inflationary trend and convince the Fed to cancel or postpone the two interest rate cuts it had anticipated this year. That would risk keeping “interest rates at their current elevated level for a longer period in 2025. That will push up mortgage and loan borrowing rates … and reduce real growth,’’ said Boston College economist Brian Bethune.

Outside a Harris Teeter supermarket near downtown Raleigh, North Carolina, Jacobs Ogadi had in his shopping bag an avocado, which almost certainly came from Mexico.

The 62-year-old mechanic said it “doesn’t take a rocket scientist’’ to know that Trump’s tariffs run counter to his promises to rein in inflation. “If it goes up 25%, it’s not the government, it’s not the Mexican people paying for it,’’ he said. “Who pays for it? Us.’’

AP writers Anne D’Innocenzio in New York and Gary Robertson in Raleigh, North Carolina, contributed to this story.

ARVADA, Colo. — If you love history and beautiful old buildings, vibrant restaurants, cozy independent coffee shops and bars, delightfully quaint storefront shops and a strong sense of community, you’ll find all that and more in Olde Town Arvada.

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Listed on the National Register of Historic Places, Olde Town is one of my favorite places to linger. Parking is never a problem because RTD’s Gold rail line stops there with a multilevel parking garage just across the tracks. If you park there, you’ll walk past a flour mill built in 1926 — one of 26 historic buildings in Olde Town — which you can tour by appointment.

Walk a few steps farther and you’ll come to the intersection of Grandview Avenue and Olde Wadsworth Boulevard, where Jefferson County’s first electric traffic signal was installed in 1941. That’s near the town’s iconic water tower, which went into operation in 1910 when Arvada was a farming community with a population of 840.

Strolling east along Grandview — so named because it overlooks the wide Clear Creek valley and affords mountain views — you’ll find all sorts of fun places to explore. Carly’s Boutique is located in a building that was the home of Arvada’s first mayor in the early 1900s. Upstairs is a healing arts center.

There’s a paint-your-own pottery studio called Into the Fire. By day, the Bluegrass Lounge is one of Olde Town’s three coffee shops (all of which do their own roasting), but it doubles as a bourbon lounge. That building is 130 years old.

There’s a music store with an amazing assortment of guitars and other stringed instruments, called the Olde Town Pickin’ Parlor. The Silver Vines Winery has gypsy jam nights on Mondays. There is a gourmet spice shop, Penzeys, that is worth a walk through just to savor its sublime aromas.

Back at the traffic light, you’ll find two excellent restaurants. One is Smokin Fins, a seafood restaurant where a friend of mine swears she had the best fish tacos ever. Across the street is the Homegrown Tap and Dough, which serves wood-fired pizza that makes it my favorite pizza place in the metro area.

Heading north on Olde Wadsworth, you’ll find more restaurants and bars, along with a venerable Army Navy Surplus store. It sells all sorts of outdoor gear, of course, but you can also pick up a gold-panning kit there if you want to try your hand in Clear Creek. The history of the Arvada area began in 1850, when Lewis Ralston discovered gold a few miles to the east in Clear Creek. The town was established 20 years later.

As you walk, listen for the church bells of St. Anne’s, a beautiful church built in 1922. Check out the Electric Cherry thrift store, especially if you like vintage record albums. Stop at Rhinelander Bakery, its display cases filled with a mind-boggling array of fresh sweets. Insider tip: It’s all good, but the fruit streusels are amazing. That building dates back to 1910.

Perhaps Olde Town’s best-known restaurant is the School House Kitchen and Libations, located in an 1882 building that was Arvada’s first schoolhouse and later became its first movie house. The bar top has more than 4,000 yellow pencils arranged in squares underneath a clear epoxy surface. Joe Hengstler, executive director of Olde Town’s business improvement district, calls it one of the town’s flagship businesses.

Andy Busold, general manager of the School House, says it’s all about community.

“There’s not much not to love about Olde Town Arvada,” Busold said. “I stumbled across this neighborhood 10 years ago and it’s amazing. We’re just one business; there are so many businesses and so many different options. We’re not competing against everyone else. The ultimate goal is to work together and give people reasons to want to come to Olde Town.”

I love to stop in Olde Town and park in the RTD structure before hopping on the train downtown for games at Coors Field and Ball Arena. It’s a great way to beat the traffic, not to mention the cost and hassle of parking down there, while getting to enjoy Olde Town’s unique vibe.

Go visit, and stroll the streets that date back to horse-and-buggy days with historical markers that tell Olde Town’s fascinating story.