The winds of change started swirling early Tuesday for UFC 196.

First, UFC lightweight champion Rafael Dos Anjos was forced out his fight with featherweight champion Conor McGregor due to a broken foot.

The final decision on a replacement was eventually announced late Tuesday with Nate Diaz stepping in, allowing the UFC to keep McGregor on the card, March 5. Interesting to note that this fight will be at 170 pounds, marking the first time McGregor has fought at welterweight.

UFC President Dana White made the announcement live on ESPN SportsCenter.

Diaz and McGregor brings together two of the company’s best trash talkers.

Diaz had a profanity-laced tirade directed at McGregor after Diaz defeated Michael Johnson in December.

“We figured this would be the most exciting fight, this is the fight that Conor really wanted,” White said. “A lot of people wanted to fight Conor McGregor, but Diaz really wanted it

“We called Jose Aldo, Jose Aldo turned the fight down. We called Frankie Edgar, Frankie Edgar turned the fight down. Those are two guys everybody was talking about. BJ Penn, Anthony Pettis, a lot of guys wanted this fight. We ended up with Nate Diaz because we felt it is a fight the fans wanted to see.”

The co-main event stays the same with UFC bantamweight champion Holly Holm facing challenger Miesha Tate.

As for Dos Anjos, he’s looking at a 6-8 month recovery period.

PHOTO CONTRIBUTED BY MICHAEL ROZMAN/WARNER BROS

Kathryn Youngman, right, talks with Ellen DeGeneres during a taping of “The Ellen DeGeneresShow” that aired Monday.

#YoungmanOnEllen.

Check.

For the past several weeks, students of Pendleton High School Spanish teacher Kathryn Youngman waged a Twitter campaign to get their teacher on “The Ellen DeGeneres Show.” Youngman, fighting cancer for the third time, has long admired the comedienne for her positivity. The hashtag trended with tweets originating around the world.

A producer finally invited Youngman to fly to Los Angeles and observe an “Ellen” taping, and last Thursday, Youngman and two family members settled into their seats among the audience to watch the show. The episode would feature “X-Files” actor David Duchovny and air the following Monday.

During the show, DeGeneres approached Youngman in the audience for a conversation about attitude. The comedienne invited Youngman to stand and talk about facing challenges.

“It’s totally about attitude and I also think it’s totally about being kind to one another,” Youngman said. “I get my inspiration from you and your show. Be kind to one another. Kindness and spreading it to other people is a great message. It helps you get through these times.”

“These times” referred to Youngman’s breast cancer, which requires chemo treatments every two weeks. At the show, DeGeneres fixed her blue eyes on Youngman’s hazel-brown ones.

“You know, I love talking to interesting people and we have a lot of famous people that come on the show,” DeGeneres said, “but it’s stories like yours that actually I … think about when I go home at night.”

She gave Youngman a long hug.

DeGeneres’ staff heaped red carpet treatment on Youngman, flying her to LA on Wednesday, sending a chauffeur to collect her entourage (her niece, Katie Montchalin, and daughter, Becky Youngman) and drive them to a hotel near Universal Studios. The next afternoon, the driver whisked them to the Warner Brothers Studios where “The Ellen Show” is produced. They were shown to a private green room and fed lunch. Youngman’s mother, Marie Groshong, and sister, Rebecca Barlow, joined them there.

Later from her seat in the audience, Youngman laughed at Duchovny and DeGeneres’ banter. During commercial breaks, staff members kept the audience in a high-energy frenzy with dance contests and pulsing music. Though she had worried about having enough stamina for the trip, Youngman just relaxed and enjoyed the adventure.

“She was so high and energetic. Her adrenaline was flowing,” Groshong said. “She had accomplished one of her dreams and she was in the clouds.”

“It was amazing,” Youngman said. “It surpassed my expectations.”

After the show, the producers treated the five women to dinner at an expensive Italian restaurant.

Youngman said she found DeGeneres to be quite genuine.

“She means what she says and she truly cares about other people,” the teacher said. “The people who work for her promote her values.”

That’s important to Youngman. She is using her third battle with cancer as a platform to promote her own values and the importance of being kind.

The day the show aired, Youngman had returned to reality with a crash. She spent the morning in chemotherapy. It was a lot of downtime to think about her surreal adventure in LA and all the folks who had made it happen. The businesses that held fundraisers for her medical fund. The students and their plethora of tweets.

After watching the show again at home, she expressed her gratitude.

“I’m so thankful to all the people who supported and encouraged me — the high school students and the community and the campaign that allowed me to go down there and spread the message of kindness.”

FILE – A campaign sign for Republican congressional candidate Dave Brat is posted in front of his home in Glen Allen, Virginia, June 12, 2014. Brat defeated House Majority Leader Eric Cantor in that year’s Republican primary.

WASHINGTON—

When the calendar turns to March in this year of the irate voter, the first wave of congressional Republicans will find out whether they have their very own Dave Brat waiting for them.

Brat was an underfunded, obscure college professor who shocked the political world in 2014 by ousting House Majority Leader Eric Cantor in what was supposed to be a no-contest Republican primary in Virginia. He now holds the Richmond-area seat and is one of the chamber’s more conservative and recalcitrant members.

Next month, GOP House members in a crescent curving from Texas to Illinois face the first congressional primaries in this incumbent-bashing, anti-establishment season of billionaire Donald Trump and Ted Cruz, the leading Republican presidential contenders.

Nearly all House members are expected to survive. But a few face contests being watched for possible upsets by conservative challengers. Among them: Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady of Texas, and Reps. Martha Roby and Bradley Byrne of Alabama and John Shimkus of Illinois.

“It’s an open question whether we’ll see any serious candidates on the fringe right,” said Rob Engstrom, national political director of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which has started TV advertising backing Roby and Byrne and could engage in other House races. He said that March 1, when Alabama, Arkansas and Texas have the initial House primaries, is “a very important day to measure and determine what the score is.”

Mississippi House primaries are March 8, followed by Ohio and Illinois a week later. March 15 House contests in North Carolina have been delayed until June because of a dispute over redrawing district boundaries.

As usual, most incumbents have overwhelming financial and name-recognition advantages. In Texas, Brady’s campaign raised $1.6 million last year, compared with $64,000 for the best financed of his three challengers, pool company owner and former state Rep. Steve Toth.

That edge has long made most officeholders impossible to topple. In 2014, just five sitting House members were defeated in party primaries. But 2016 poses a new test, with voters’ ill feelings toward Washington, fanned by Trump and Cruz, fueling conservatives’ hopes of defeating Republicans deemed too willing to cut deals.

“The frustration and anger that’s out there would indicate that this is the year you get beat from the right,” said Republican Rep. Mark Meadows, like Brat a member of the rebellious House Freedom Caucus that last year helped push Republican House Speaker John Boehner, to resign from Congress. “If you don’t get beat this year, you will be golden for a long time.”

The surly mood has prompted the conservative Club for Growth to run hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of TV ads attacking Shimkus and Rep. Renee Ellmers in a now-delayed North Carolina race. Club commercials also back conservative Warren Davidson’s bid for Boehner’s vacant seat in western Ohio, which if successful would be a symbolic coup.

Other groups including FreedomWorks, Citizens United Political Victory Fund and the Senate Conservatives Fund are also helping conservative contenders.

Brady is among 13 Texas GOP House incumbents facing primary opponents, challenges that are mostly considered long-shots. He’s represented his district north of Houston for two decades and last fall became chairman of the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee, a combination that makes him a household name locally and a national magnet for political contributions.

He also boasts endorsements from National Right to Life, the National Rifle Association and a sky-high 95 percent lifetime rating from the American Conservative Union. A primary defeat of a sitting Ways and Means chairman would be unprecedented, says Eric Ostermeier, research associate at the University of Minnesota’s Center for the Study of Politics and Governance.

“A lot of things get said during election season,” Brady recently emailed supporters, “but the facts about my dedication to conservative, limited government principles are clear.”

Toth says Brady isn’t conservative enough. He says anger toward establishment Republicans is “off the charts” and predicts he’ll be helped by the Texas’ March 1 presidential primary, the same day as the state’s congressional primaries.

“Seventy percent of the people who come to the polls here in Texas are going to be voting for either Trump or Cruz,” said Toth. “And they’re not going to pull the lever for Kevin Brady.”

Wally Wilkerson Jr., longtime Republican Party chairman in Montgomery County, the district’s largest, cites a “very unusual” political climate with lots of unhappy voters.

“The congressman is taking it seriously,” Wilkerson says of his re-election race. “If I was advising him, that’s what I’d tell him.”

In rural southern Illinois, the $1.3 million Shimkus reported raising last year was nearly 10 times what challenger Kyle McCarter reported collecting. But playing on anti-incumbent fever, a Club for Growth ad targeting the 10-term veteran lawmaker says, “A guy who’s been in Washington 20 years ain’t going to fix it.”

In a recent interview, Shimkus countered by citing his supporters.

“If you’re endorsed by the National Right to Life, by the NRA and the Farm Bureau, it’s hard for anybody to say you’re not representing the district,” he said.

Arsenal’s hopes of qualifying for the quarter-finals of the Champions League were left hanging by a thread on Tuesday evening.

Lionel Messi scored twice in the final 20 minutes to ensure a 2-0 loss in the last 16’s first-leg and a body blow to Arsene Wenger’s side.

Messi finally got the better of Petr Cech after waiting years to net past him and he did so in style as just like London buses two goals came in one match.

+9

+9

+9

Cech was shown being floored by the brilliance of the Ballon d’Or winner as supporters on social media wasted no time in rubbing salt into Arsenal’s wounds as they look set to fall at the last 16 hurdle in Europe again.

A blistering counter-attack for Messi, Luis Suarez and Neymar was always on the cards but it didn’t stop it sending shockwaves through Twitter when the first goal hit the back of the net.

Barcelona extended their unbeaten run to 33 games after Lionel Messi sealed win for them against Arsenal. (Source: AP)

Barcelona’s Lionel Messi broke free from Arsenal’s shackles to score two late goals and put the Champions League holders on the brink of the quarter-finals with a clinical 2-0 victory at the Emirates Stadium on Tuesday.

The irrepressible Argentine, along with strike partners Luis Suarez and Neymar, had been subdued for most of the last 16, first-leg tie but came alive late on, clinically finishing off a lightning counter-attack and then dispatching a penalty.

“They are 95 percent through to the quarter-finals certainly,” Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger, whose side had defended solidly for 71 minutes until crumbling, told reporters.

“It’s a shame we didn’t get any satisfaction because we put everything into it.”

Luis Enrique’s Barca side extended their unbeaten run to 33 matches and, barring something extraordinary in the return at the Nou Camp next month, will take their place in the last eight for the ninth season in a row.

“I liked everything we did tonight,” the Spaniard told reporters.

Messi has proved a thorn in Arsenal’s side on each of the last two occasions the teams have met in the Champions League.

In 2010 he scored four times in the last 16 second leg to send Barca through and a year later he struck twice in a 3-1 win in Spain after Arsenal had edged the first leg.

Messi, Suarez and Neymar had scored 91 goals in all competitions this season heading into Tuesday’s game but none of the feared trident managed an effort on target in the first half as Arsenal’s fans cranked up the decibel levels.

Arsenal were patient and should have gone ahead midway through the first half when Hector Bellerin’s scuffed shot fell for Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain but he scooped his effort straight into the arms of keeper Marc-Andre ter Stegen.

The Catalans began to move through the gears though and either side of halftime wasted two glorious chances.

Suarez, who has 41 goals in all competitions this term, headed Dani Alves’s dinked cross wide with the goal gaping before

Neymar was denied by goalkeeper Petr Cech after being played in by Andres Iniesta.

Starved of the ball for long periods, Arsenal still posed a threat and Ter Stegen did well to keep out Olivier Giroud’s close-range header from a Mesut Ozil cross.

Arsenal grew in belief but it cost them dear as they committed players forward and got stung on the break.

With 19 minutes left they lost the ball near Barca’s goal and Suarez and Neymar combined in devastating fashion, the Brazilian unselfishly picking out Messi who steadied himself before beating Cech for the first time in his career.

Suarez then hit the post when he should have scored before Messi scored again, this time with a calmly struck penalty after substitute Mathieu Flamini had tripped him.

Mainers will be served up a double scoop of caucuses the weekend of March 5 and 6 with Republicans caucusing in regional gatherings on Saturday and Democrats meeting Sunday in municipalities across the state.

Officials from both parties hope for and expect large turnouts as their members gather to determine which of their respective party’s presidential candidates will win their support. The events can also provide a setting for like-minded people to gather and network politically and socially.

“We’re anticipating a really big turnout,” said Bronwen Tudor, of Georgetown, chairwoman of the Sagadahoc County Democrats. Tudor said Democratic caucuses in some municipalities are being held in new locations because the former sites may be too small to accommodate this year’s anticipated turnout, largely driven by the ongoing, hotly contested presidential nomination race.

“It’s interesting, and a great way for Democrats to find one another,” she said. “It’s a social opportunity, as well as political.”

Maine Republicans will cast votes for presidential candidates by secret ballot at their caucuses, a new format that is part of other changes meant to provide a simpler, more direct and binding method for party members to make their choice.

“We’ve never done this before. It’s a brand new process,” said Rick Bennett, Maine GOP chairman. “It’s easy, it’s accessible, and an opportunity we haven’t had before. And we’re hoping people will appreciate that and take advantage of it.”

So what can attendees expect at each party’s Maine

REPUBLICAN PARTY

This year Republicans will vote for their preferred presidential candidate by secret ballot. While officials hope they’ll also stick around to network with their fellow party members and conduct other caucus business such as listening to candidate presentations and filling local and county party positions, they don’t have to do so to cast their votes for the presidential nominee.

Each regional convention will start with an hour in which unenrolled people or those not registered to vote can enroll and register to vote.

After that first hour, polls open for the following three hours during which the secret ballot voting will take place.

“People can come, and we hope they’ll stay and participate in the other activities and share camaraderie with fellow Republicans,” Bennett said. “But if they’re busy and want to get in and go and make their voice heard, you can cast your ballot and depart immediately.”

Another change for this round of Republican caucuses is the presidential votes taken at the caucuses will be binding on delegates, proportional to the March 5 caucus vote results. In the past, Bennett said, a presidential candidate who wanted to win Maine’s delegates had to follow a long and indirect route and turn out supporters to local caucuses and the state convention.

Kim Pettengill, of Farmingdale, chief caucus warden for the Maine Republican Party, expects a high turnout for their caucuses this year in part because of the interest in the new, more direct voting.

Pettengill, who attended her first caucus in 1974 and has gone every two years ever since, is looking forward to this year’s round.

“I enjoy them. You get to see people you don’t always see,” she said. “And (this year) it’s different, a more substantive vote. I think a lot of people who’ve never been to a caucus before are interested in it.”

Each of the 22 regional caucus sites will have an hour reserved for presidential speeches. Those speeches, Bennett said, can be by surrogates speaking on behalf of candidates, including local supporters and national campaign representatives, or if any choose to make an appearance, presidential candidates themselves.

Caucus locations and other information is available on the Maine Republican Party’swebsite at www.mainegop.com.

DEMOCRATIC PARTY

Maine Democrats have two different ways to weigh in with their preference for the presidential nominee this year. They can join one of the Democratic caucuses to be held March 6 at municipalities across Maine, or they can vote absentee.

Absentee ballots, available at the party’s website at www.mainedems.org, must be received by the Maine Democratic Party by 5 p.m. on March 2, according to Jeremy Kennedy, executive director of the Maine party. Caucus locations and times are also listed at that site.

Maine Democrats won’t vote by secret ballot at their caucuses. Instead, they vote in more of a town meeting-style format.

After the caucus proceedings get underway, attendees will physically divide up into separate groups based upon their presidential preference, and the number of each people in each group will be counted. The allocated number of delegates for that caucus will then be divided up proportionally based on how many supporters each candidate for the presidential nominee receives.

“Caucuses are very different from a primary,” Kennedy said. “At the caucus, you make a public declaration of presidential support. It’s kind of like a town meeting, where you are there with the other people of your town, discussing issues and doing the other business of the caucus. The main event is the presidential portion.”

Candidates or their representatives or supporters from the community may speak at the caucuses.

Other party business conducted at caucuses include the election of local and county committee members and discussion of other party issues. Attendees at some caucuses will be able to meet candidates for state and other offices, as well.

Tudor, a former Vassalboro resident who has been attending caucuses in Maine since 1974, said she anticipates turnout will be high this year, given the strong feelings people supporting the potential presidential nominees seem to have.

She said some caucuses have been moved to new sites to accommodate the expected larger turnout. In Richmond, for example, Democrats will caucus at Marcia Buker Elementary School out of concern the previous site at the town office might be too small.

Residents who are not registered to vote or registered as unenrolled voters may register to vote at caucus locations in the hour before the scheduled caucus start time.

Keith Edwards — 621-5647

kedwards@centralmaine.com

Twitter: @kedwardskj