Kia ora, Talofa, Ma’lelei, Bula and Welcome to Season 09 Episode 04 of Breakfast Bites, by TEIVOVOdigital.com – a wrap of Pasifika people’s sports news, on a sunny and bright Friday morning 05 April 2024.
                                                                  
Coming to you with tons of hanisi from the 180th meridian in the middle of the Blue Continent. 
 
In rugby: At the Cathay/HSBC Hong Kong 7s today: Fiji Men play Australia at 9.30pm, then Canada at 12.33am and France at 5.43pm on Saturday in their last pool game.
 
Team Fijiana plays Australia at 4.25pm today, followed by South Africa at 7.12pm, and they play Ireland at 3.02pm on Saturday.
 
Also in Hong Kong today at 3.16pm Samoa vs Spain, then they play Ireland at 6.49pm and their final pool game vs South Africa at 2.16pm tomorrow.
 
Meanwhile, the Melbourne Rebels may be saved by an 11th hour private equity cash injection that will see the bankrupt Super Rugby side relocate to Melbourne’s western suburbs where a 15,000-seat stadium is being built in Tarneit, and there share facilities with A-League side Western United.

A private equity-backed consortium led by former Qantas chairman and former CEO of Rio Tinto, Leigh Clifford says they’re close to raising A$30Million to invest in the struggling Rebels.

In SportsBiz: The Las Vegas Grand Prix has been hailed as the biggest sporting event in the history of Las Vegas.
 
The Clark County Commission’s debrief into Formula 1’s high-profile return to the city, reported the race was both the “largest sporting event with the largest global audience” in Las Vegas history and the most lucrative event ever held.

The total economic impact of the grand prix for Clark County weighed in at a staggering US$1.5Billion.

The bulk of that came directly from visitor spending, which totaled US$884Million.

Formula 1 fans were found to spend 3.6 times more than the ordinary Las Vegas tourist, staying 4.1 nights on average and shelling out more than US$4100 per trip — and that’s without the cost of the F1 ticket prices.

In rugby league: In a scintillating 11-try thriller at AAMI Park last night, the Melbourne Storm came from behind, scoring three times in the second half, including twice in the final five minutes, to snatch a heart-stopping 34-32 win over the Broncos.
 
While on the sidelines, the Dragons could potentially make a play for Nelson Asofa-Solomona after it was revealed the Melbourne Storm star has fallen out of favour at the club, after Lord Nelson returned for preseason training out of shape.
 
This explains why the big man is yet to feature for the Storm this season.

It comes after the Dragons reached an agreement with their disgruntled star Zac Lomax, which would see the final two years of his contract mutually terminated, freeing up A$800,000 a season.
Finally in March Madness: Remember the name – Caitlin Clarke!
 
The ESPN telecast of Iowa’s 94-87 win over LSU averaged a staggering 12.3 million viewers on Monday night.

That made it the most-watched women’s college basketball game on record, far surpassing the previous mark: 9.9 million viewers. 

It was also the most-watched college hoops game ever, men’s or women’s, on ESPN platforms.
Caitlin Clark is drawing both hard-core sports fans and casual TV viewers eager to find out what the fuss is all about.

And it’s particularly impressive given the slow death of cable TV, especially ESPN’s distribution.
With Clark being the biggest story in sports, TV ratings experts predict the Iowa-UConn game to post another record, even with a 9:30 pm ET tip time. 

If Caitlin Clark advances again, a dream title game matchup between Iowa and unbeaten South Carolina would pull more than 16 million viewers, perhaps even outdrawing the men’s championship.

If Clark and Iowa are knocked out in the Final Four the experts predict the women’s championship-game viewership would plummet by 10 million viewers.

For context: UConn’s win over San Diego State in the men’s title game last year averaged 14.7 million viewers on CBS.

And that’s a wrap!
 
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Mahalo and Ka kite; for TEIVOVOdigital.com, I’m Culden Kamea tanking you all too mass for all your love and support.
 
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