Editor’s note: This story includes a description of a sexual act.

Steven Lopez, the most decorated taekwondo athlete in history, has been temporarily barred from representing the United States on the international stage.

The 39-year-old has won three Olympic medals — including two golds — and five World Championships. At least five women have accused him and his brother Jean Lopez of sexual misconduct.

The U.S. Center for SafeSport, a nonprofit tasked with investigating abuse across Olympic sports, has suspended him pending further investigation. Lopez was unavailable for comment.

In a statement to NPR, USA Taekwondo says it will “fully enforce this immediate suspension” and that it “fully supports the important work of the U.S. Center for SafeSport and respects its exclusive jurisdiction over sexual misconduct matters.”

Lopez’s brother Jean, a renowned coach, was permanently banned by the organization in April. He is appealing the decision.

The decisions by U.S. SafeSport affect only the brothers’ eligibility to participate in the sport under the U.S. banner. They do not amount to a criminal indictment.

Steven Lopez’s suspension comes just days after four former elite taekwondo athletes filed suit in the U.S. District Court for Colorado alleging that the Lopez brothers had sexually assaulted them. They are not the only people accusing the Lopezes of misconduct. As NPR reported last Friday, Nina Zampetti — who started training with Steven Lopez when she was 8 years old — says that when she was 14, and Lopez 22, he had her perform oral sex on him.

The four plaintiffs in the lawsuit are suing not just the Lopezes but also USA Taekwondo and the U.S. Olympic Committee. They allege that the organizations knew about the Lopezes’ behavior and failed to protect them. Moreover, because some of the alleged assaults happened abroad, they argue the organizations are guilty of sex trafficking.

Women who had leveled allegations against Lopez were gratified by the news. “I’m glad for this,” said Gabby Joslin, who trained with Steven and Jean Lopez and alleges she was assaulted by both men. “Steven needs to be away from potential victims.” Joslin says in the lawsuit that she was first assaulted by Steven Lopez while being coached by him at a tournament in Germany.

Mandy Meloon, who originally made a formal complaint against the Lopezes to the USA Taekwondo in 2006 and is also a plaintiff in the lawsuit, said she was pleased with the suspension but wishes it had come earlier. “Both of the brothers need to be charged with crimes,” Meloon adds.

Ronda Sweet, who served on the board of USA Taekwondo from 2006-2010 and has long argued that the organization needs to take a tougher line on sexual assault, was ebullient about the decision. “This is a historic day,” she says. “But it’s just a start.” She says other coaches need to be investigated as well.

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On Sunday night, the Tampa Bay Lightning defeated the Boston Bruins to head to the NHL’s Eastern Conference Finals.

And nobody licked anybody.

That was not a guarantee. Bruins left wing Brad Marchand licked opposing players twice this postseason.

Marchand is famously antagonistic and annoying, earning the unofficial title of the biggest pest in the NHL, a label his team has embraced. But his new strategy earned some ire off the ice, and the National Hockey League stepped in to order Marchand to knock it off.

In Game 1 of the Bruins’ first-round series, against the Toronto Maple Leafs, Marchand licked Leo Komarov’s neck.

“I thought he wanted to cuddle,” Marchand told reporters after the game, tongue in cheek. “I was just trying to get close to him.”

The Bruins beat the Maple Leafs in that game — Marchand had a goal and an assist — and won the series, as well.

But Marchand’s second licking wasn’t so lucky. During Game 4 of the second-round series, on Friday, Marchand lapped at Lightning forward Ryan Callahan.

The Bruins lost. Marchand was unrepentant.

“Well, he punched me four times in the face, so …” Marchand said afterward.

After that, the NHL decided it’d had enough. A league executive scolded Marchand on Saturday — giving him a tongue-lashing, as The Boston Globeput it.

The Associated Press reports that Bruins coach Bruce Cassidy also gave Marchand marching orders on Sunday:

“Cassidy said before the game that he had spoken with Marchand, delivering a simple, straight-forward message: “We need you on the ice, we need you playing. If part of his M.O. is to annoy people, find a different way to annoy them. Preferably by scoring some goals, that would be the best way.”

“Afterward, Marchand shrugged off a question about his discussion the previous day with NHL senior vice president of hockey operations Colin Campbell.

” ‘It is what it is,’ Marchand said. ‘I think it’s pretty stupid, the whole situation, but if that’s what they want to do, it’s what they want to do.’ “

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Updated at 8:48 p.m. ET

After a day of steady rain on Churchill Downs, it was Justify who managed to cross the finish line first in the mud.

Justify brought Hall of Fame jockey Mike Smith a second Derby victory, on top of his and trainer Bob Baffert’s $1.24 million of the $2 million total prize. Smith previously won aboard Giacomo in 2005. Bafftert, the Triple Crown-winning trainer of American Pharoah, seals his fifth Derby win.

After charging ahead at the final turn, the undefeated chesnut colt held off Good Magic, finishing by two and a half lengths in 2 minutes 4.20 seconds. Audible, a favorite backed by Amazon’s audiobook company of the same name, finished third.

Baffert says Justify’s early speed helped notch first. “When he got away clean, then I thought we had a chance,” he told NBC Sports after the race. “We had to get away. Then Mike took his time.”

“He’s got that ‘it’ factor,” Smith said. “He is so above average, he’s got unbelievable talent and he’s got a mind to go with it. He was loving this stuff.”

Almost 3 inches of rain made for sloppy conditions at the 144th running of the Kentucky Derby. Despite the unpredictable conditions, history predicted the result — it’s the sixth consecutive Derby that a favorite has won.

Entering the race, Justify led the field of 20 with 5-2 odds, followed by Mendelssohn, 6-1, and My Boy Jack at 6-1. Mendelssohn, aiming to claim the first Derby win for a Europe-hailing horse, finished last, while My Boy Jack finished fifth.

Justify, the three-year-old colt that began his career in February, crushed the 136-year-old Apollo Curse dreaded by superstitious fans. According to Sports Illustrated, no horse has won the race without starting as a 2-year-old since 1882 — when Apollo won the Kentucky Derby by defeating 4-5 favorite Runnymede. Justify, with the best odds, and Magnum Moon, closing with 13-1, had been the only candidates in the field eligible to break the 136-year-old curse.

Baffert, who ranks Justify alongside his 2015 predecessor American Pharoah, is now set to enter the Preakness Stakes on May 19, the next leg of the Triple Crown trail.

“Him and American Pharoah and Arrogate, these horses are cut from a different — they are just so great,” Baffert said.

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More than four decades after pingpong diplomacy forged ties between the U.S. and China, thawing a relationship had been frozen in hostility, two long-time opponents have again reached across the net for a historic handshake.

Women’s table tennis teams from South Korea and North Korea announced Thursday that they would not compete against each other, as scheduled, in the quarterfinals of the World Team Table Tennis Championships. They told umpires on the court in Halmstad, Sweden, they would skip the match entirely and instead form a unified team to play in the semifinal round.

“This is a big historical decision for both our countries.” Ryu Seung-min, vice president of the Korea Table Tennis Association, said in a statement released by the International Table Tennis Federation, or ITTF.

“This is an important statement to promote peace between our countries through Table Tennis,” he added.

ITTF President Thomas Weikert said in the statement that the federation’s board of directors did not simply approve the unusual agreement: “The unified team received a standing ovation from the delegates who showed their sign of support to this historic move.”

“It’s a bit of a risk of course as this is not 100 percent according to the rules,” Weikert told Reuters on Thursday, “We all feel happy that we have a small sign in the process of the reunion of Korea.”

Hopeful signs of reunification can be found not just on the pingpong table, but the negotiating table as well.

Late last month North Korean leader Kim Jong Un crossed the border to meet with his South Korean counterpart, Moon Jae-in — the first time a Kim dictator has done so since the 1953 armistice that brought an end to fighting in the Korean War.

Both countries have agreed to stop blaring propaganda at each other across the border through loudspeakers. North Korea has even declared its intention to sync clocks with its southern neighbor, which has operated on a different time zone for decades.

It is also not the first time this year that athletes from the longtime foes have joined up to compete in a unified team: Women’s ice hockey players from North and South took the ice together at the Olympic Games in Pyeongchang.

Still, it has been quite a while since the neighbors have taken up paddles together. The ITTF notes that not since 1991 has a unified Korean team competed in the World Table Tennis Championships, when that team actually won the world title.

Weikert acknowledged that the ITTF had to bend regulations to allow the creation of the new unified Korean team mid- tournament, but he said they had other considerations in mind than just the rulebook.

“It’s more than a sport, it’s more for the peace,” Weikert said. “I think it’s worth it.”

The announcer at the arena in Sweden, when revealing the decision to fans, put the matter more simply.

“It’s not North Korea, it’s not South Korea,” he said as both teams linked arms and beamed for the fans. “It’s just Korea.”

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A “mandatory” trip to a nightclub where they were told to escort wealthy sponsors. A topless photo shoot that male spectators were invited to attend. Those are two of the main allegations made by cheerleaders from Washington’s NFL team about a 2013 trip to Costa Rica to photograph the squad’s swimsuit calendar.

The allegations described in a New York Times story stem from a trip to the Occidental Grand Papagayo, an adults-only resort on Culebra Bay, on Costa Rica’s west coast.

Citing interviews with five cheerleaders who were there, the Times‘ Juliet Macur reports that the women were unhappy with their lack of privacy — and worried that the team wasn’t concerned enough with their safety. Also unsettling: They said the team collected their passports early in the week-long trip.

The team told the Times that it normally collects passports on international trips as a matter of security.

When it was time to take photographs for the risqué calendar — including ones that involved being topless — the cheerleaders said men who backed the team as either sponsors or stadium suite-holders were invited to watch the photo shoots up close.

“At one of my friend’s shoots, we were basically standing around her like a human barricade because she was basically naked, so we could keep the guys from seeing her,” one cheerleader told Macur. “I was getting so angry that the guys on the trip were skeezing around in the background.”

Nine of the cheerleaders were also told they’d been chosen to be “personal escorts” for sponsors during an outing at a nightclub, according to the Times. Several said the order came from the squad’s director.

That trip included urgings that the cheerleaders drink and flirt; one participant said the cheerleaders felt as if their bosses were “pimping us out.”

The cheerleading squad’s director, Stephanie Jojokian, told the Times that she doesn’t agree with the depiction of the trip. She denied ordering anyone to go out with sponsors, and said she provides a supportive environment for her cheerleaders.

“Where is this coming from?” Jojokian is quoted as saying. “I would never put a woman in a situation like that. I actually mentor these women to be strong and to speak up, and it kills me to hear that.”

Neither Jojokian nor the team responded to NPR’s request for comment and clarification about the cheerleaders’ allegations.

In a statement to the Times, the team said:

“The Redskins’ cheerleader program is one of the NFL’s premier teams in participation, professionalism, and community service. Each Redskin cheerleader is contractually protected to ensure a safe and constructive environment. The work our cheerleaders do in our community, visiting our troops abroad, and supporting our team on the field is something the Redskins organization and our fans take great pride in.”

News of the allegations comes after two former NFL cheerleaders – one from the Miami Dolphins and another from the New Orleans Saints – recently filed federal and state complaints over their working conditions. Their complaints cite discrimination and describe a controlling environment that also limits cheerleaders’ ability to profit from their careers.

The attorney for both women, Sara Blackwell, has said they would agree to settle their claims for $1 — and the guarantee of a meeting with NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell to discuss league-wide standards on working conditions for cheerleaders.

Responding to the report about the Washington cheerleaders, Blackwell said via Twitter, “In light of the latest NY Times story, Goodell is completely awful if he refuses to meet with us to create rules that are lawful and fair.”

In an earlier tweet, Blackwell also said it was a “big mistake” if Goodell doesn’t discuss how to protect the NFL’s cheerleaders — and protect the NFL and its teams from a future lawsuit.

When the Times contacted the NFL about its Washington story, a spokesman said the league “has no role in how the clubs which have cheerleaders utilize them.”

“Our office will work with our clubs in sharing best practices and employment-related processes that will support club cheerleading squads within an appropriate and supportive workplace,” the spokesman added.

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