Simley wrestling coach Will Short can envision a world where his Spartans win a seventh consecutive Class 2A team state title Thursday evening in St. Paul.

He also could see Simley getting bounced in the morning quarterfinals.

The latter is something that, frankly, hasn’t been a legitimate possibility for the Spartans in 15-plus years. But it’s part of the intrigue of this year’s Class 2A tournament. The single day, three-round event figures to be as unpredictable as never before.

Simley (19-6) is the No. 3 seed. Kasson-Mantorville (20-5) is seeded second and Watertown-Mayer (19-1) is the top seed and presumptive favorite. All three could win state. Potentially fifth-seeded Marshall could, as well.

But even more teams are capable of pulling off first-round upsets. Simley, for example, will duel an unseeded Grand Rapids (20-1) team that figures to have decisive matchup advantages in at least five of the matches.

But Simley could win three rounds and hoist the trophy at day’s end. The Spartans enter state with top-six ranked wrestlers in six classes but without a ranked grappler at any other weight.

Short is proud that his team is even in that conversation at this point in the campaign. The Spartans returned just three starters from last year’s title team. They start two or three seniors, depending on their lineup decisions. Certainly, senior Vristol Short is a nice pillar of the lineup at 189 pounds.

But they’ve developed a number of wrestlers, as they always do. Jake Kranz was a JV wrestler a year ago who is now the No. 3 seed in this weekend’s Class 2A, 114-pound individual tournament. Eighth-grader Adrian Mincey has grown into a state title contender at 107 pounds.

“It’s a testament to our kids and our program,” Short said. “I’m so proud of the young kids and their growth and how far they’ve come this year. … The improvement that they’ve made, the toughness that they have gotten over the year wrestling the ridiculously tough schedule that they wrestled.”

That schedule beat up some of the Spartans’ individual records but helped them prepare to at least have a shot at defending their crown on Thursday.

“We’re excited to put ourselves on the line, we really are,” Short said. “We’ve kind of got this nothing-to-lose attitude. … Nobody expected us to be in the conversation to win, and yet, here we are. We’re in the conversation.”

Now, how much of a long shot have they really been all season? The Guillotine — Minnesota’s preeminent wrestling new source — has ranked the Spartans in the top three all season. But they aren’t the favorites to win on Thursday, and that in itself is a change from recent years.

The field is open. Who wins and advances may be determined by how the bracket unfolds, with some teams matching up at certain weights far better against some foes than others.

There figure to be a number of duels that are determined by a swing match here or there.

“It’s going to be a fun tournament,” Short said. “A lot of fun happening in 2A.”

OTHER CLASSES

St. Michael-Albertville (24-0) is the top seed and heavy favorite to defend its title in Class 3A. Shakopee is the No. 2 seed and biggest challenger to the Knights, while Stillwater is seeded third. … In Class A, top-seeded Chatfield is also favored to repeat.

By BILL BARROW, Associated Press

ATLANTA (AP) — The Trump administration’s demand that federal agencies plan to radically downsize is driven by a key figure in the conservative movement who has long planned this move.

In President Donald Trump’s first term, Russell Vought was a largely behind-the-scenes player who eventually became director of the influential but underappreciated Office of Management and Budget. He is back in that job in Trump’s second term after being the principal author of Project 2025, the conservative governing blueprint that Trump insisted during the 2024 campaign was not part of his agenda.

The memo Vought co-signed Wednesday is the clearest assertion of his power and the latest seminal writing for a man who argues the federal bureaucracy is an existential threat to the country itself and that it should dramatically downsize. An OMB spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Here is the context of the Wednesday memo and Vought’s previous work:

To Vought, the federal bureaucracy is itself a constitutional crisis

In Wednesday’s memo, Vought framed the federal government as “costly, inefficient, and deeply in debt” and declared that it is “not producing results for the American public. Instead, tax dollars are being siphoned off to fund unproductive and unnecessary programs.”

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He used similar language in passages of Project 2025 and in a 104-page budget plan proposed by his think tank, the Center for Renewing America, in 2022.

“The overall situation is constitutionally dire, unsustainably expensive, and in urgent need of repair. Nothing less than the survival of self-governance in America is at stake,” he wrote in Project 2025.

That tracks with what Vought said before Trump again nominated him to the role in November.

In a post-election appearance with conservative commentator Tucker Carlson, Vought was even more explicit: “The left has innovated over 100 years to create this administrative state … that is totally unaccountable to the president.”

Vought made clear he would leverage a second chance at OMB

In Project 2025, Vought wrote that OMB “is a President’s air-traffic control system” and that “the Director must view his job as the best, most comprehensive approximation of the President’s mind.”

OMB, he wrote, should be “involved in all aspects of the White House policy process,” becoming “powerful enough to override implementing agencies’ bureaucracies.”

He told Carlson that “OMB is the nerve center of the federal budget” and that “it has the ability to turn off the spending that is going on at the agencies” and control “all of government execution.”

Presidents, he said, “use OMB to tame the bureaucracy, the administrative state.”

Speaking with Carlson, Vought described the approach as “radical constitutionalism.”

In his Project 2025 writing, Vought says the OMB director “should present a fiscal goal to the President early in the budget development process” without specifying a date.

Vought has praised DOGE and pushed back at Trump critics

Asked after the election about the president’s proposal to empower billionaire Trump aide Elon Musk and, at the time, former presidential GOP candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, with sweeping power over the federal government, Vought was on board.

“I think they’re bringing an exhilarating rush … of creativity, outside the box thinking, comfortability with risk and leverage,” he told Carlson.

Ramaswamy left DOGE by Inauguration Day.

As for concerns over constitutional separation of powers, meaning those who believe Trump’s White House seeks to takeover spending decisions that rest with Congress, Vought said, “separation of powers is meant to have strong, opinionated conviction and leadership that go as fast as they can and hard as they can in their direction.”

The memo goes into more detail than previous Vought writing

Vought’s latest memo requires agencies to submit an initial overhaul plan by mid-March. This so-called “Phase I” deadline was introduced by Trump.

So-called “Phase II” plans are due by April 14. Among other details, they must include a “future-state organizational chart” and documentation of “all reductions, including (full-time) positions, term and temporary positions, reemployed annuitants, real estate footprint, and contracts.”

Vought invokes religious imagery and texts with his agenda

The latest OMB memo does not venture into religious texts or assertions. But Vought is an outspoken conservative Christian and invokes his faith as part of his governing philosophy.

The Center for Renewing America’s 2022 budget outline begins by quoting the Old Testament, specifically the eighth chapter of the first book of Samuel, to set up a critique of the federal government’s size and scope:

“He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive orchards and give them to his servants. He will take the tenth of your grain and of your vineyards and give it to the officers and to his servants … He will take the tenth of your flocks, and you shall be his slaves. And in that day, you will cry out because of your king, whom you have chosen for yourselves.”

By JESSICA DAMIANO

If you’ve ever had a dog, you know they don’t exactly tiptoe through the tulips. I’m fortunate that none of mine ever had a penchant for digging holes, but my late pit bull, Maddie, used to run through my perennial beds like a weed whacker, leaving horizontal coneflowers and black-eyed Susans in her destructive path.

Her bathroom breaks would also imprint an ever-expanding array of canine crop circles on the lawn.

Fortunately, my little Havanese, Miguel, doesn’t pose as much of a threat to my plants, but there are other important elements to consider when planning a garden where dogs and plants can safely coexist.

Let’s start with the lawn

The type of grass you select should be suited to your region and your sun exposure. In my sunny Northeastern front yard, that means starting with a Kentucky bluegrass seed blend, which holds up well against foot and paw traffic, and mixing in roughly 10 percent each of urine-resilient perennial ryegrass and shade-tolerant fine fescue.

For further protection, consider incorporating a trample- and urine-resistant groundcover into your grass-seed recipe. I’ve added clover, which also enriches the soil with safe, nourishing levels of nitrogen (free fertilizer!) and reduces or eliminates groundwater pollution from my property.

If you have a beagle-size dog or two, this will go a long way toward retaining your lawn’s integrity. But, to be honest, I don’t know of any grass that will hold up against a German shepherd or bull mastiff kicking it up on a daily basis. Still, starting with the most resilient grass species for your growing conditions will give you the best odds possible.

Barriers to entry

Typical landscaping designs often space plants far apart, leaving areas of mulch-covered soil between plants and shrubs. Dogs love to run obstacle courses on those bare paths, kicking up mulch and, invariably, straying into planting beds.

Instead, opt for a dense garden style that allows only enough space between plants for the expected mature size of each. By their third year, most of the gaps will be filled, eliminating the spaces and, along with them, the invitation to enter.

If you grow delicate plants or edibles, situate them in a raised bed or surround them with short fencing or another barrier to discourage entry.

Avoid toxic plants and chemicals

Next, consider safety. Many common plants are toxic to dogs (and cats), so avoid planting them altogether, even if your pet hasn’t shown an interest in grazing. A one-time curiosity could spell disaster. Check with the ASPCA for a sortable list of plants (including weeds) that are toxic to cats, dogs and horses, and remove any that your pets could access.

Avoid using chemicals. If you must apply them, keep pets out of the garden until the products have dried or dissipated (read package labels carefully and observe warnings and cautionary statements).

Create a zone for digging and playing

If your dog is a digger, fill holes and lay sections of chicken wire over favorite digging spots, then cover them with a few inches of soil. I’ve never met a dog that wasn’t deterred by wire.

Diggers will continue to dig, however, so designate a section of the yard where they can do so with reckless abandon. Bury some toys and bones for them to find, and place balls and other toys in there too. After introducing dogs to the area, watch closely and bring them to the digging zone whenever you catch them in the act elsewhere.

Such a play area or dog run would be a beneficial garden addition even if digging hasn’t posed a problem, as it would reduce or eliminate plant trampling and lawn damage. Enclose it with fencing or another barrier that allows you to keep an eye on the dog — and vice versa.

Similarly, if space allows, designate a pebbled or mulched potty area. Train dogs to use it by moving scooped poop to the spot. Their noses will convey the message, but again, you’ll have to watch closely and move them to the spot when they show signs of intent to relieve themselves elsewhere. It will take some time, but they should catch on.

Finally, be sure to provide access to a clean bowl of water at all times. It will refresh pups as they play outdoors and, as a bonus, dilute their urine to cut down on burn spots in your grass.

Yes, you’ll likely have to lower your aesthetic standards a bit. But getting to relish two of life’s greatest pleasures simultaneously is well worth the compromise.

Jessica Damiano writes weekly gardening columns for the AP and publishes the award-winning Weekly Dirt Newsletter. You can sign up here for weekly gardening tips and advice.

For more AP gardening stories, go to https://apnews.com/hub/gardening.

By SARAH PARVINI

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Nvidia on Wednesday reported a surge in fourth-quarter profit and sales as demand for its specialized Blackwell chips which power artificial intelligence systems continued to grow.

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For the three months that ended Jan. 26, the tech giant based in Santa Clara, California, posted revenue of $39.3 billion, up 12% from the previous quarter and 78% from one year ago. Adjusted for one-time items, it earned 89 cents a share.

“Demand for Blackwell is amazing as reasoning AI adds another scaling law — increasing compute for training makes models smarter and increasing compute for long thinking makes the answer smarter,” Nvidia Founder Jensen Huang said in a statement.

Wednesday’s earnings report topped Wall Street expectations. Analysts had been expecting adjusted earnings of 85 cents a share on revenue of $38.1 billion, according to FactSet.

The fourth-quarter earnings are the company’s first report since Chinese company DeepSeek boasted it had developed a large language model that could compete with ChatGPT and other U.S. rivals, but was more cost-effective in its use of Nvidia chips to train the system on troves of data.

The frenzy over DeepSeek caused $595 billion in Nvidia’s wealth to vanish briefly. But the company in a statement commended DeepSeek’s work as “an excellent AI advancement” that leveraged “widely-available models and compute that is fully export control compliant.”

The poster child of the AI boom, Nvidia has grown into the second-largest company on Wall Street — it is now worth over $3 trillion — and the stock’s movement carries more weight on the S&P 500 and other indexes than every company except Apple.

Nvidia and other companies benefiting from the AI boom have been a major reason the S&P 500 has climbed to record after record recently, with the latest coming last week. Their explosion of profits has helped to propel the market despite worries about stubbornly high inflation and possible pain coming for the U.S. economy from tariffs and other policies of President Donald Trump.