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DENVER (AP) — So much has changed for Carter Hart since his last Stanley Cup playoffs run. The one constant is his stellar play in net. In 2020, he was a 21-year-old starting goaltender for the Philadelphia Flyers, going 9-6 in their run to the second round in the Eastern Conference during the Toronto bubble, posting a .926 save percentage and two shutouts. After serving time in hockey exile while mired in the Hockey Canada sexual assault scandal — for which he was acquitted — Hart joined the Vegas Golden Knights last December. He’s sparked them in these playoffs, going 9-4 and helping the Golden Knights steal home ice with a 4-2 win at top-seeded Colorado in the opener of their Western Conference Final on Wednesday night. “We know they’re a good team,” said Hart, who has a .920 save percentage in these playoffs while allowing just 2.35 goals per game. “We know they got a lot of skill on their team and we respect that, but you can’t respect them too much. And I thought we did a good job of defending and limiting their time in space and I thought we blocked a lot of shots tonight and got in a lot of lanes and tied up some sticks.” Hart was stellar in stopping the pucks that reached him, turning away 36 of 38 shots. The only ones he allowed to get through were a between-the-legs aberration by Valeri Nichushkin and a late goal from Gabe Landeskog when the Avs had pulled goaltender Scott Wedgewood on a power play for a two-man advantage. “Carter Hart’s a hell of a goalie,” said Golden Knights coach John Tortorella, who took over in Vegas on March 29 and who also coached Hart in Philadelphia. “He was great in Philly for me, and we’ve got two good ones, you know. (Adin Hill)’s kind of been put off to the side a little bit, that’s a guy that just won a Stanley Cup a couple years ago. “But Carter, I think he’s grown so strong mentally. I don’t think much bothers him. He is just zeroed in. And he’s going to have to be, because we’ve got a lot of work to do here.” The respect is mutual. “Yeah, I think he’s done a great job coming in here,” Hart said. “It’s never easy coming in late in the season like he did and I think he’s done a tremendous job of just rallying the group and earning the guys’ trust and I really enjoy playing for him. I enjoyed playing for him in Philly and I’m happy he’s here.” Beginning in early 2024, Hart was placed on an indefinite leave of absence from hockey after he was charged in connection with an alleged sexual assault involving members of Canada’s 2018 world junior team as part of the Hockey Canada sexual assault scandal; he was acquitted of all charges last year and resumed his career with Vegas. The league reviewed the case and agreed to allow the acquitted defendants to play starting Dec. 1, 2025. Hart was the first of those five Canada junior players to agree to an NHL deal, signing a two-year, $4 million contract before working with Vegas’ American Hockey League affiliate in Henderson, Nevada. After he agreed to sign, Hart read a statement to reporters that, in part, said he wanted “to show the community my true character and who I am and what I’m about.” He’s also showing how much help he can be for Vegas’ hopes of winning another Stanley Cup. He made 10 stops in the scoreless first period as the Golden Knights served notice that they weren’t going to be like the Los Angeles Kings or Minnesota Wild, who went a combined 1-8 against Colorado in prior rounds. “It’s huge,” Hart said. “To come out like we did, I thought we came out really good in the first period and I know this is a hard building to play in and it was huge for us just to get rolling and just start off the right way and then build off that.” ___ AP NHL: https://apnews.com/hub/stanley-cup and https://apnews.com/hub/nhl Brought to you by www.srnnews.com

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — Victor Wembanyama fouled Jalen Williams on a shot attempt in the opening minutes of Game 2 of the Western Conference finals on Wednesday night. Except, no, he really didn’t. Yes, Wembanyama made contact with Williams. Yes, it looked like a foul. Yes, it was called that way — at first. Upon review, it was determined that Thunder center Isaiah Hartenstein actually shoved Wembanyama into his teammate and caused the foul himself. That’s how physical the Thunder were with Wembanyama in Game 2. They grabbed, pushed, nudged, anything and everything they could muster against the 7-foot-4 French star who still finished with 21 points, 17 rebounds, six assists and four blocked shots. But the Thunder won 122-113, tying the series at a game apiece. “It’s all in the scouting,” Wembanyama said. “I have to trust the scouting. We have to trust it and do our work early. It’s straight effort. … Doesn’t mean it’s easy. We have to work through it.” He knew what was coming, and so did the Thunder. Oklahoma City coach Mark Daigneault told Hartenstein on Tuesday that he would have a bigger role in Game 2. “I’m just kind of one of those players that brings physicality to the game,” said Hartenstein, who got only 12 minutes in Game 1 and then assumed a key role in Game 2 — with 10 points and 13 rebounds. “I think that’s just kind of what we needed.” Stopping Wembanyama isn’t going to happen. He’s too good. The Thunder playbook in Game 2 — and going forward — will be about making life as difficult as possible for him, hoping to prevent outbursts like the 41-point, 24-rebound gem that Wembanyama put together in San Antonio’s Game 1 win. “Every good player, they have to feel the defense,” Thunder guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander said. “It’s tough. He’s very different to scout. You’ve got to try to mix things up, you’ve got try different things. And that’s just what we did. Coach tried something in the first game, didn’t like it, tried something else. That’s what it’s about.” Wembanyama’s debut in the conference finals is off to an elite start. He has got 62 points and 41 rebounds through the first two games; the last player with 60 points and 40 rebounds in the first two games of the conference finals was Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in 1974 — with 69 points and 40 rebounds for Milwaukee against Chicago. But the MVP finalist and Defensive Player of the Year wasn’t in the mood to hear stats. He wanted a 2-0 lead, and settling for a 1-1 tie going home for Game 3 wasn’t cause for celebration. The Spurs rallied from 13 down in the fourth to make it interesting, but couldn’t finish the comeback. He was asked what the toughest part of Game 2 was. “I would say it’s spending so much energy on catching back up … then letting it go away,” Wembanyama said. That, to him, was the biggest hit of all. ___ AP NBA: https://apnews.com/nba Brought to you by www.srnnews.com

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — As negotiations with the United States hang in the balance, a hard-line Iranian general linked to notorious attacks at home and abroad over the past decades is believed to have seized a place near the center of power. Brig. Gen. Ahmad Vahidi, who heads Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, has become a major player in formulating Iran’s tough stance in negotiating a possible end to the war with the United States, experts say. He is believed to be part of a small clique in direct contact with Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khameini, who remains in hiding after being reportedly wounded in the Feb. 28 Israeli strikes that killed his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Like everything in Iran since the war began, who ultimately controls decision-making remains uncertain. As people within the upper ranks of Iran’s theocracy vie for power, they can gain or lose favor quickly. Vahidi himself hasn’t been seen publicly since Feb. 8, weeks before the war began. A longtime veteran of the ruling system, Vahidi helped shape Iran’s support of militant groups across the region, is accused of a role in the 1994 bombing of a Jewish center in Argentina, and in 2022 led domestic security forces in a bloody crackdown on protesters. Elevated to Guard commander this year after his predecessor was killed early in the war, he leads the most powerful force in Iran, with its arsenal of ballistic missiles and its fleet of small boats threatening Persian Gulf shipping. “Vahidi and members of his inner circle have likely consolidated control over not only Iran’s military response in the conflict but also Iran’s negotiations policy,” the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War said. Iran’s war strategy has been to keep a stranglehold on the Strait of Hormuz, blocking oil and gas exports and causing a global energy crisis. At the same time, it has struck hard against oil facilities, hotels and infrastructure in Gulf Arab nations. In negotiations, it has held out against U.S. demands that it surrender its stockpile of highly enriched uranium, betting that it can outlast the U.S. in the ongoing standoff and that President Donald Trump will be reluctant to resume outright war that could bring greater damage to America’s Gulf allies. That likely reflects Vahidi’s confrontational style. “He comes from that mindset of unending revolution, unending resistance,” said Kenneth Katzman, a senior fellow at the The Soufan Group, a New York-based think tank. Vahidi believes “the U.S. needs to be challenged at every turn,” said Katzman, a senior Iran expert who advised the U.S. Congress for over 30 years. Vahidi boasted in January that Iran’s defense power has developed to make it a “high risk for any military action by an enemy.” Pakistan hosted talks in April between an Iranian delegation led by parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf and an American one headed by U.S. Vice President JD Vance. But it ended without any deal. Qalibaf and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi returned home to face criticism from inside the theocracy suggesting they were too willing to make concessions. Qalibaf had to insist publicly that the talks had the support of the supreme leader. Since then, Vahidi has become the main point of contact for those negotiating with Iran, said a regional official with direct knowledge of the mediation. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive diplomacy. The extreme seclusion and unknown condition of the supreme leader have fueled speculation about jockeying among leaders for access to Khamenei and influence over him. In early May, President Masoud Pezeshkian, who many see as sidelined from influence by the Guard, went out of his way to say he “got to see our dear leader” and spoke to him for around two hours. But Holly Dagres, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, said it’s likely the new supreme leader “is in lockstep with a more hard-line (Guard) — similar to his father, but in a more emboldened and uncompromising form.” Analyst Kamran Bokhari wrote that figures like Vahidi “are not just managing war — they are actively reshaping succession, consolidating authority around a weakened supreme leader, and effectively ‘capturing’ the state through crisis governance.” Born Ahmad Shahcheraghi in Iran’s southern city of Shiraz in 1958, Vahidi like many young men after the 1979 revolution joined the Revolutionary Guard and fought against the invasion by Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein that sparked a bloody, eight-year war. Vahidi entered the Guard’s nascent intelligence arm and soon was overseeing operations outside Iran. He gained the favor of powerful patrons, including Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, a later president. Rafsanjani said in his autobiography that Vahidi was involved in the 1980s Iran-Contra scandal, in which the Reagan administration sold weapons to Tehran in an effort to free hostages held by Iranian-backed militants in Lebanon. The U.S. later used the money from those sales to fund Contra rebels in Nicaragua. Rafsanjani later intervened to protect Vahidi when then-Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini sought to prosecute members of the Guard who failed to stop an incursion by armed fighters from an Iranian exile group in the late 1980s during the war. Around this time, Vahidi took over the newly formed Quds, or Jerusalem, Force. Over decades, the Quds Force helped create a network of proxy militant groups and allied governments around the Middle East. The Quds Force under Vahidi helped mastermind the 1994 bombing targeting Argentina’s largest Jewish community center, killing 85 people and wounding 300 others, prosecutors say. Iran has denied involvement. American investigators also believe that under Vahidi, Iran organized the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia, killing 19 U.S. service members and wounding hundreds. Tehran has denied being involved in that attack as well. Vahidi left the Quds Force in 1998. In 2010, while he was defense minister, the United States imposed sanctions on him over alleged involvement in Iran’s nuclear program and its pursuit of weapons of mass destruction. More recently, as interior minister, Vahidi oversaw police units involved in a bloody, monthslong crackdown on protests over the 2022 death of Mahsa Amini, who died in police custody after being arrested for not properly wearing the mandated headscarf to the liking of authorities. An Iranian newspaper later published a classified document that showed Vahidi’s Interior Ministry ordered security agencies to monitor and photograph women not wearing the hijab, something he had denied was taking place. At around that time, Vahidi said in public comments that calls to remove the hijab were a “colonial plan” by Iran’s enemies trying to undermine the Islamic Republic. “The hijab has been a big barrier against the progress of effete Western culture,” he said. Vahidi’s role makes reaching an accord with Iran that much more difficult for the U.S. — as does the continued obscurity over Iran’s leadership. Trump wants a single interlocutor in Iran for negotiations, but “the whole system has changed,” said Hamidreza Azizi, an Iran expert at the Middle East Institute. “It is not a one-man show. Vahidi is one alongside others,” Azizi said. “Some we know and some we don’t know.” ___ Associated Press writers Samy Magdy in Cairo, Sarah El Deeb in Beirut, and Amir Vahdat and Nasser Karimi in Tehran, Iran, contributed to this report. Brought to you by www.srnnews.com

Over the past months, Ukrainian drones have crashed into the chimney of a power plant in Estonia, hit empty fuel tanks in Latvia and been shot down by Romanian fighter jets stationed in Lithuania. For the first time in a NATO and European Union capital, Lithuanians were pictured sheltering in underground car parks in Vilnius on Wednesday, as authorities warned of unidentified drone activity in neighboring Belarus. No one has died or been injured recently, but the increasing airspace incursions have prompted some Baltic ministers to chastise Ukraine for the violations, which also led to the collapse of the Latvian government in May. As U.S. President Donald Trump’s war in Iran has driven up the price of oil, a key revenue stream for the Kremlin, Ukraine has ramped up attacks on Baltic Sea ports used for Russian energy exports in an attempt to hit Moscow’s war chest. As Ukraine’s drones have snaked up north, they have skirted the borders of NATO members Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia and Finland. Some of them were not detected before they crash landed in some of the Baltic states. Ukrainian officials apologized and said the drones were aimed at military targets inside Russia but were sent off course by Russian electronic interference. The string of airspace violations has prompted questions about the state of air defenses on NATO’s eastern flank. Here’s a look at the situation: Ukraine has ramped up its attacks against Russia, focusing on arms factories, ports on the Baltic Sea and energy facilities as the war in Iran has boosted the oil price. It has particularly targeted the ports of Ust-Luga and Primorsk, close to the borders of Estonia and Finland. Russia uses the ports to load up ships taking its oil exports through the Baltic Sea. During one attack in May, which set part of the port of Primorsk on fire, more than 60 Ukrainian drones were shot down, Leningrad region governor Alexander Drozdenko said. After stray Ukrainian drones entered Latvian airspace on May 7, the country’s Defense Minister Andris Spruds and Prime Minister Evika Silina resigned. On May 19, a Romanian fighter jet based in Lithuania shot down a Ukrainian drone over southern Estonia. Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur said it was likely aimed at targets in Russia and that he told Ukraine to send its drones “as far from NATO territory as possible.” Since Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Nordic and Baltic nations have increasingly warned about electronic interference from Russia disrupting communications with planes, ships and drones. In the Baltic region, Russia often uses jamming and spoofing to send drones off course. Satellite communications systems — known collectively as the Global Navigation Satellite System, or GNSS — receive precise time signals from satellites around 20,000 kilometers (12,400 miles) away in space. A smartphone, car, marine or aircraft navigation system compares how long it takes to receive signals from several different satellites to calculate an exact location. Jamming occurs when a receiver is overwhelmed by a strong radio signal transmitted in the same frequency range as GNSS and other satellite navigation signals, leaving the receiver unable to fix its location or time. Spoofing involves transmitting fake signals that imitate a real GNSS satellite signal, commonly known as GPS, to mislead a phone, ship, or aircraft into thinking it is in a different place. Lithuanian Foreign Minister Kęstutis Budrys said Tuesday that Russia is “deliberately” redirecting Ukrainian drones into Baltic airspace with electronic interference. In September 2025, about 20 Russian drones flew into Poland, putting the spotlight on holes in NATO’s air defenses, as multimillion-dollar jets were scrambled. Those drones were not detected in advance, Estonia’s defense minister said at the time. Neither was a Ukrainian military drone which crashed with explosives in Lithuania last week, Vilmantas Vitkauskas, chief of Lithuania’s National Crisis Management Centre said on Sunday. While Poland and Romania responded to the drone incursions last year by deploying new anti-drone technology — the first used by the NATO alliance aimed specifically at countering drones — that system is not in place across the entire Baltic region. Defending against drones requires solving a complex set of technological, financial and bureaucratic problems and “there is no one solution against every type of drone,” Colonel Janno Märk of the Estonian Defense Forces said. There are various types of drones that operate at different speeds and altitudes, requiring a layered air defense response, Märk said during military exercises in southeastern Estonia. Budrys, the Lithuanian foreign minister, told AP in an interview Saturday that the Baltic countries are likely going to have to continue to counter incursions from Ukrainian drones as Kyiv now has the capability to reach targets “deep in Russia” as well as ports on the Baltic Sea. The way to counter those drones, he said, is actually with Ukraine’s help as the most effective anti-drone systems have been developed in the country. Writing on X, Budrys accused Moscow of “waging smear campaigns” after Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service, the SVR, claimed on Tuesday without providing evidence, that Ukraine is preparing to begin launching drone attacks against Russia from the territory of the Baltic countries. The SVR claimed Ukrainian military personnel had already deployed to Latvia and warned that the country’s NATO membership wouldn’t protect it from “just retribution.” Ukrainian foreign ministry spokesman, Heorhii Tykhyi, said Tuesday that none of the Baltic states or Finland have ever allowed Ukraine to use their airspace for strikes against Russia. Budrys called the SVR claim a “transparent act of desperation” and an attempt to sow chaos and distract from a “simple reality” — that Ukraine is hitting Russia’s military machine hard. NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte praised on Tuesday the alliance’s reaction to the drone incidents, saying that they had been met with “a calm, decisive and proportionate response.” “This is exactly what we planned and prepared for,” Rutte said, blaming Russia’s war on Ukraine for the incursions. Brought to you by www.srnnews.com

PODGORICA, Montenegro (AP) — Montenegro marks 20 years of independence from a union with Serbia this week, celebrating a two-decade transformation that has already brought the Balkan country into NATO. Now it is eyeing its next milestone: full integration into the European Union. Speaking to The Associated Press amid national festivities, President Jakov Milatovic described NATO membership as a key milestone and said he is confident the country of 623,000 people will fulfill its ambitious agenda of becoming the next member of the 27-member EU in 2028. The motto “28 by 28” has even been inscribed on one of the planes of the national airline. “We can achieve it,” Milatovic said from the presidential office in Podgorica, the capital. “I am optimistic about it.” Concerts and various celebrations are being held in the capital Podgorica this week and other towns in Montenegro, which is known for its stunning Adriatic Sea coastline and towering mountains. Montenegro is considered a front-runner for EU membership among the six countries in the Western Balkans, which are at different stages of the process. Several other countries, including Ukraine, hope to join one day as well. The EU has formed a working group to draft an accession treaty for Montenegro — a signal that membership remains within reach. EU officials are expected to reiterate the message at a meeting in the coastal Montenegrin town of Tivat in early June with the leaders of the Western Balkan candidate nations. The others are Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Serbia and Kosovo. Milatovic noted that support for the EU in Montenegro is very high, at around 80%. But the country must also finish democratic and economic reforms, and how quickly it does so, is “now is entirely up to Montenegro,” he added. There was far less unity when the country 20 years ago chose to leave the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro — itself one of several successor states of Yugoslavia. Split between the supporters of independence and those backing the union with Serbia, Montenegro held a referendum on May 21, 2006, to choose its future path after a decade of wars and NATO bombing in 1999 aimed at stopping the war in Kosovo. The result: 55.5% chose independence. Splitting from the joint state was divisive given that Montenegro has historically close ties with Serbia and because about a third of Montenegrins consider themselves Serbs. Montenegro and Serbia share the same Orthodox Christian religion, speak similar languages and hold centuries-old alliances. The independence drive was led by Montenegro’s longtime leader Milo Djukanovic, who steered the country into NATO and away from another historic Slavic ally — Russia. “Twenty years ago, the citizens of Montenegro took decision-making into their own hands, and that was the basis of our development,” the president said. “The major progress probably happened when the country became a part of NATO in 2017,” he added. “Being a part of NATO for a small country like Montenegro is very important because NATO is indeed a security guarantee for our independence and statehood.” A candidate since 2010, Montenegro still faces many challenges on its EU road, former European integration minister Jovana Marovic said. A key priority involves strengthening state institutions. “What was missing in the last 14 years, we have to provide now just in six months,” she said. “So it’s really demanding, but the process is going on.” For Montenegro’s citizens, the economy and living standards are the key priorities. Along with democratic reforms, Montenegro has adopted the euro as its currency but the economy remains small and heavily dependent on tourism. Zorana Popivoda, 28, hailed restoring Montenegro’s independence. But, she added, “then you go into a store and you see that you can buy absolutely nothing.” President Milatovic, 39 and an economist by training, criticized the previous Montenegrin authorities for not doing more in the early years of independence to boost democratic reforms and to fight against organized crime and corruption. “I think that over the last 20 years, we can objectively say that the country experienced progress,” he said, “but also that Montenegro had a number of missed opportunities.” Brought to you by www.srnnews.com