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It's the latest shortage sweeping the nation, meaning this is not the year for your favorite NFL team to need a starting quarterback. Options are limited in free agency and the upcoming2026 NFL Draft, leaving plenty of teams without a seat at the table when the dust settles.

A classic case of supply and demand, expect values and contract numbers to explode this offseason withDaniel JonesandMalik Willisheadlining the group of free agents with just weeks to go before the opening bell.

Other names, likeKirk Cousins, will join this group down the line and some might be removed before free agency even starts. As it stands, only four quarterbacks were able to sneak into thetop 100 list of NFL free agents this year, according to USA TODAY Sports' Nate Davis.

The music is about to start and we'll eventually see where everyone lands when it stops. Here's a look at the free agent quarterback rankings in 2026.

2. New York Jets – Arvell Reese, LB/DE, Ohio State

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 3. Arizona Cardinals – Francis Mauigoa, OT, Miami (Fla.)

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 4. Tennessee Titans – Rueben Bain Jr., DE, Miami (Fla.)

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 5. New York Giants – Carnell Tate, WR, Ohio State

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 6. Cleveland Browns – Spencer Fano, OT, Utah

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 7. Washington Commanders – David Bailey, DE/OLB, Texas Tech

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 8. New Orleans Saints – Jeremiyah Love, RB, Notre Dame

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 9. Kansas City Chiefs – Makai Lemon, WR, USC

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 10. Cincinnati Bengals – Caleb Downs, S, Ohio State

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 11. Miami Dolphins – Jermod McCoy, CB, Tennessee

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 12. Dallas Cowboys – Mansoor Delane, CB, LSU

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 13. Los Angeles Rams (from Atlanta Falcons) – Brandon Cisse, CB, South Carolina

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 14. Baltimore Ravens – Olaivavega Ioane, G, Penn State

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 15. Tampa Bay Buccaneers – Sonny Styles, LB, Ohio State

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 16. New York Jets (from Indianapolis Colts) – Jordyn Tyson, WR, Arizona State

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 17. Detroit Lions – Keldric Faulk, DE, Auburn

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 18. Minnesota Vikings – Colton Hood, CB, Tennessee

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 19. Carolina Panthers – Kadyn Proctor, OT, Alabama

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 21. Pittsburgh Steelers – KC Concepcion, WR, Texas A&M

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 22. Los Angeles Chargers – Caleb Banks, DT, Florida

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 23. Philadelphia Eagles – Monroe Freeling, OT, Georgia

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 24. Cleveland Browns (from Jacksonville Jaguars) – Denzel Boston, WR, Washington

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 27. San Francisco 49ers – Kenyon Sadiq, TE, Oregon

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 29. Los Angeles Rams – Germie Bernard, WR, Alabama

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 30. Denver Broncos – CJ Allen, LB, Georgia

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 31. New England Patriots – Cashius Howell, OLB, Texas A&M

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" /> 32. Seattle Seahawks – Avieon Terrell, CB, Clemson

" style="max-width:100%; height:auto; border-radius:6px; margin:10px 0;" loading="lazy" />

NFL mock draft: First-round projection with order set after Super Bowl

NFL free agency: Ranking best available QBs

1. Daniel Jones (2025 team: Indianapolis Colts)

Jones revived his career with theColtsin 2025, which was later cut short aftersuffering a torn Achilles in Week 14against theJacksonville Jaguars. The quarterback did enough to warrant a new lease on NFL life, which seems likely to result in a return to the Colts.

If he hits the open market, he is clearly the best available with a better track record and potential for long-term success than the other available options in free agency. Someone will want to see if Jones is the nextSam Darnold, who proved his doubters wrong by leading theSeattle Seahawksto a victory inSuper Bowl 60.

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2. Malik Willis (2025 team: Green Bay Packers)

Teams will always be willing to take a flier on potential. It's an easy sell, especially in a year where proven commodities simply don't exist. Willis filled in nicely forJordan Lovewhen needed over the last two seasons, completing 78.7% of his passes while throwing six touchdowns and zero interceptions. He also displayed plenty of rushing upside, posting 261 rushing yards and three touchdowns as a runner.

While his experience as a starter is limited, someone will invest and hope to find the next breakout star. The tools are certainly there.

3.Aaron Rodgers(2025 team: Pittsburgh Steelers)

Rodgers took fans on a wild ride during the 2025 offseason before eventually settling on a one-year deal with the Steelers. Retirement rumors swirled last year and they will inevitably swirl again this year. If the 42-year-old elects to keep playing, sticking around in Pittsburgh to reunite with his formerPackershead coach, Mike McCarthy, makes plenty of sense.

If ring-chasing is the goal for the four-time NFL MVP, perhaps theMinnesota Vikingscome calling. As always, anything can happen with Rodgers.

4.Russell Wilson(2025 team: New York Giants)

TheGiantsbenched Wilson after just three games as a starter, paving the way forJaxson Dartto take over. It was a case of the noise getting too loud for the Giants to ignore, especially after Wilson led the team to a 0-3 record and completed a career-worst 58% of passes.

Given the lack of options this offseason, perhaps there is a chance for him to compete for a starting job next season. Otherwise, he seems best fit for a backup gig.

When does NFL free agency start in 2026?

NFL free agency in 2026starts on March 9 at Noon ETwhen the legal tampering period opens. Players can officially begin signing contracts when the new league year begins at 4 p.m. ET on March 11.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY:Ranking best available NFL free agent QBs in 2026

Spain La Liga Soccer

Mbappé was not included in the squad for the game at the Santiago Bernabeu Stadium because of a left knee injury he has been nursing for some time.

Rodrygo and Jude Bellingham also won't be available because of injuries.

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Madrid's forwards will include Vinícius Júnior, Franco Mastantuono, Brahim Díaz and Gonzalo García.

Madrid won the first leg 1-0 last week in Benfica and only needs a draw to advance to the round of 16.

AP soccer:https://apnews.com/hub/soccer

But entering their only regular-season meeting on Thursday night in West Lafayette, Ind., this clash between No. 13 Michigan State (22-5, 12-4 Big Ten) and No. 8 Purdue (22-5, 12-4) has no banner-hanging implications.

With Michigan owning a commanding lead in the conference title race, the Spartans and Boilermakers are left to play for postseason seeds and bragging rights instead of league titles.

Considering Purdue and Michigan State have won the last three Big Ten crowns -- and their coaches have combined for 16 league titles -- this is not an insignificant concession.

"Not being able to win the Big Ten championship is tough," said Purdue head coach Matt Painter, whose team comes off a 93-64 rout of Indiana on Friday. "That's tough. But we're the ones that lost the games. So we've got to try to get better, try to improve. I thought (Indiana) was a great bounceback for our guys, but it's hard to take. It's really hard to take when you have lofty goals and one of them is out the window."

Purdue comes in having won five of its last six games. The only problem for the Boilermakers is that the defeat was a 91-80 home loss to Michigan, which essentially ended their hopes for a league title.

Purdue will forge on and focus on Michigan State in what will be a battle of two of the best point guards in the country.

In fact, Michigan State junior Jeremy Fears and Purdue senior Braden Smith are 1-2 in the country in assists. Fears averages 9.2 assists while Smith, who ranks fifth all-time with 994 assists, averages 8.7 per contest.

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The Spartans are coming off back-to-back home wins over UCLA and Ohio State, but they have lost their last two road games and don't have a signature road win yet.

After Purdue, Michigan State will have another tough road game at Indiana.

"We have to get better," Michigan State head coach Tom Izzo said. "We talked a lot with the group about what the next couple of days are going to be like and what the next couple of weeks are going to be like. Our schedule ends about as tough as anybody's."

Michigan State will try to achieve that in a place that's been a house of horrors lately.

The Spartans have lost their last five games at Mackey Arena -- six if you count an NCAA Tournament loss to UCLA during the COVID-plagued 2020-21 season.

The last time Michigan State won at Mackey Arena was in 2014.

"Mackey Arena is one of the toughest we play in during the conference or nonconference," Izzo said. "I think this is a really experienced Purdue team. They've got three guys in Smith, (Fletcher) Loyer and (Trey) Kaufman-Renn where it seems like they've been there forever."

--Field Level Media

OTTAWA, Feb 25 (Reuters) -OpenAI's admission it banned the ChatGPT account of mass shooter Jesse Van Rootselaar months before the 18-year-old killed eight people and herself is drawing more scrutiny to her past online activity and raising questions about whether opportunities were missed to prevent one ‌of Canada's worst-ever mass killings.

OpenAI's decision not to report Van Rootselaar to police prompted Canada's Artificial Intelligence Minister Evan Solomon to summon company officials to Ottawa this week ‌to explain their safety protocols.

The shooting in the small British Columbia town of Tumbler Ridge is the latest tragedy in which critics have argued interactions with chat bots may have forewarned of or even encouraged violence.

Crime experts noted ​that while greater scrutiny of AI platforms and social media is necessary, police or other authorities may have missed chances to avert the tragedy. Police had previously removed guns from Van Rootselaar's home, though they were later returned. Police also said they were aware of her history of mental health issues.

Van Rootselaar began the attack by killing her mother and sibling at home, before shooting dead an educator and five students, while two others were hospitalized with serious injuries.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police said the investigation is still active and some questions are subject to relevant legislation or court processes.

"This was clearly ‌a household where there were many problems," said Patrick Watson, a ⁠criminology professor at the University of Toronto unconnected to the case. "But we also need far more scrutiny of the companies who are creating these new platforms, which are essentially becoming a new public sphere with very little accountability."

In a since-deleted Reddit post, Van Rootselaar said she had been diagnosed ⁠with numerous mental health issues, including attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, depression, obsessive compulsive disorder and was on the autism spectrum.

"I went crazy and burnt my house down my second time trying shrooms but still have a desire to try alternatives," Van Rootselaar wrote.

Van Rootselaar also previously created a game using the Roblox Studio app, involving shooting other characters at a mall.

Roblox told Reuters that Van Rootselaar's account and its content ​were ​removed from the Roblox Studio app the day after the Tumbler Ridge massacre, and that the game had ​only seven visits.

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Open AI said in a statement it had banned Van ‌Rootselaar's ChatGPT account last June after identifying "misuses of our models in furtherance of violent activities" and considered whether to refer her to law enforcement.

The company ultimately decided "the account activity did not meet the higher threshold required for referral," mainly because OpenAI was not able to identify credible or imminent planning. The company said intervening in these situations can be distressing for young people and their families and may also raise privacy concerns.

MISSED OPPORTUNITY

Tracy Vaillancourt, a professor at the University of Ottawa who specializes in youth mental health and violence prevention, said OpenAI's failure to refer Van Rootselaar to police was "a missed opportunity," but acknowledged there were challenges in protecting users' privacy.

"People using ChatGPT may worry that it's going to spy on them, but AI is so powerful ‌there should be a way to improve how technology and we as a society, are able to ​reduce credible threats," Vaillancourt said.

Cynthia Khoo, a technology and human rights lawyer, warned "it would be a mistake to start ​down a path where AI companies might become deputized as a private surveillance wing ​of law enforcement," saying that invasions of privacy would disproportionately hit already marginalized groups.

Van Rootselaar was born male but identified as a female and began ‌transitioning six years ago, police said. A 2023 report from the U.S. ​government showed that more than 95% of mass ​shooters are male and that transgender people account for about 2%.

British Columbia Premier David Eby said the Tumbler Ridge shooting could have been avoided if OpenAI had warned authorities about Van Rootselaar's violent online activity and called for more transparency from the tech giant.

"It looks like OpenAI had the opportunity to prevent this tragedy, to prevent this ​horrific loss of life, to prevent there from being dead children ‌in British Columbia," he said Monday.

OpenAI said in its statement the shooting was "a devastating tragedy" and that it was doing all it could to support the ongoing ​investigation.

"We reached out to law enforcement immediately after the identity of the shooter was made public and we are engaged with the (police) to support their ongoing work," ​the company said.

(Reporting by Maria Cheng, Ryan Patrick Jones; Editing by Caroline Stauffer and Lincoln Feast.)

He will succeed Laurence des ​Cars, who resigned on Tuesday, government spokesperson Maud Bregeon said. Des Cars has faced intense criticism since burglars made off in October with jewels worth an estimated $102 million that are still missing, exposing glaring security gaps at ‌the museum.

"Leribault's priority will be ⁠to strengthen the safety and security of the building, the collections, and people, to restore a climate of ⁠trust, and to carry forward, together with all the teams, the necessary transformations for the museum," the Culture Ministry said in a statement about President ​Emmanuel Macron's ​pick for the job.

Leribault, 62, is ​an 18th‑century art historian who ‌previously led Paris' Musée d'Orsay and the Orangerie before taking over at Versailles in 2024. He will leave the Versailles job to take up the Louvre role.

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He was deputy director of the Louvre's department of graphic arts from 2006 to 2012, the ministry said.

As well as the heist, ‌strikes over pay and work conditions have ​repeatedly shut the Louvre since mid‑December, while ​water leaks and a ticket‑fraud ​probe that prosecutors say siphoned more than 10 million ‌euros over a decade have also ​cast a shadow ​over one of Paris' top tourist attractions.

A state auditors' report last year urged management at the Louvre, home to Leonardo da Vinci's ​Mona Lisa, to ‌redirect spending from acquisitions to overdue security and infrastructure upgrades.

(Reporting by ​Gianluca Lo Nostro and Elissa Darwish; Editing by Benoit Van ​Overstraeten, Gabriel Stargardter and Alison Williams)

Now, Indiana is close to offering a third option: the Classical Learning Test, a classics-based examination first embraced by religious colleges that is quickly gaining traction in Republican states.

Senate Bill 88instructs high schools to prepare students to take the CLT in addition to the ACT and SAT and requires state educational institutions to accept the CLT as they would any other college admissions exam. It would also require schools to teach waiting until marriage to have kids as part of its good citizenship instruction, one of three steps in a 2000s anti-poverty theory called the "Success Sequence"

The House passed the bill Feb. 24 in a 65-29 vote, but the Senate still needs to vote to give it final approval.

While proponents of the CLT describe it as merely an alternative to current standardized testing, its emphasis on early Christian thought, as well as its fast-track in red states, has provoked skepticism from teachers' unions and some academics. The exam has also been boosted by Indiana's own U.S. Sen. Jim Banks, a Republican who authored a bill in the U.S. Senate topromote the CLT late last year.

Created by a former English teacher with a mission to "reconnect knowledge and virtue by providing meaningful assessments and connections to seekers of truth, goodness, and beauty," the CLT contains passages from religious thinkers like St. Thomas Aquinas, Martin Luther, John Calvin and Pope John Paul II. But it also pulls from the Communist Manifesto author Karl Marx and Charles Darwin, who contributed to the theory of evolution.

Those are some of "the most important texts that have driven society and culture," founder Jeremy Tate toldThe Guardianin 2023, believing them to be key to reversing a trend of moral decline in public education. The for-profit company's expansive Board of Academic Advisors include right-wing figures like Kevin Roberts of the Heritage Foundation and PragerU CEO Marissa Streit, though Tate claims that the test is not partisan.

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At least nine Indiana colleges currently accept the CLT, including Anderson University, Grace College and Depauw, according to the bill's author, Sen. Gary Byrne, R-Byrneville. If Byrne's bill passes, Indiana would join a handful of states, including Florida, who are embracing the test.

But critics of the CLT said it could disadvantage students who are less acquainted with western classics.

"It has baked-in prejudices that would make students who come from less diverse backgrounds appear to have done better than students from more diverse backgrounds," Joel Hand, a lobbyist for the American Federation of Teachers for Indiana, said during Senate committee testimony in January.

The bill was lauded by several representatives of classical schools, who said their students would be best assessed by the CLT.

"A one-size-fits-all testing mandate, it really risks narrowing curriculum and unintentionally undermining the very excellence that it seeks to ensure," said Rachel Oren, head of the Classical Academy in Indianapolis.

Contact breaking politics reporter Marissa Meador at mmeador@gannett.com or find her on X at @marissa_meador.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star:Indiana House boosts conservative-linked college admissions test