celebrate

In a matter of weeks, Ventura High football coach Tim Garcia will help move his son, quarterback Derek Garcia, into the dorms at Nevada Las Vegas. They’re having one last hurrah, and the memories are going to be priceless.

On Saturday night, Ventura won the Southern Section Division 6 football championship with a 63-28 win over St. Pius X-St. Matthias. It means Ventura’s season keeps going with next week’s state regional playoffs to be announced on Sunday.

Derek passed for 288 yards and one touchdown. Dad was also happy that running back James Watson had 247 yards rushing and four touchdowns.

Earlier this week at the championship luncheon, the Garcias were smiling even though the coach/son role will soon be ending at Ventura. It’s a rite of passage leaving the nest for the son to explore the world.

Derek is thankful he’s had his father at his side for four years of fun and excitement, and what a way to celebrate with a Southern Section championship and maybe even more.

This is a daily look at the positive happenings in high school sports. To submit any news, please email [email protected].

It’s that time again! The holidays are upon us. Although we took a hiatus last year due to logistical and timing issues, we are back in full force with this year’s TWZ holiday tee! And to go with the theme of a very stealthy Christmas, we are also bringing back some of our most beloved designs that we made with our partners at Blipshift for rare re-issues. So if you missed them the first time, here’s your shot!

Our new offering, ‘Waritos,’ pays homage to the nickname tossed at flying-wing designs and the snack that inspired it. “Flying Doritos” or “Doritos of Death” are becoming much more common with rapid developments in stealthy platforms here at home and around the globe. So these soaring wedge-shaped treats are only going to become more of a staple in our skies. For the U.S., the king of the hill in this category is the B-21 Raider. Northrop Grumman’s creation takes what it learned after decades of B-2 Spirit development and operations, and packages it into something even farther reaching, stealthier, more connected and adaptable.

With all this in mind, and due to the fact that we hear readers call it a Dorito all the time, we let the B-21 take center stage in our design.

Still, we must caution that while the B-21 may share a common shape with America’s favorite heavily seasoned tortilla chip, don’t take a bite out of the bomber — radar absorbent coatings are notoriously toxic.

Grab your human upper body-sized bag of “Waritos” at the link below. And remember, like all our designs, they are only available for a very short window of time!

LINK TO BUY “Waritos”

And while your at it, snap up these other low-observable classics we are reissuing:

“On A Silent Night,” one of our biggest selling shirts (and our only tree ornament) ever:

LINK TO BUY “On A Silent Night”

“Stealthier Things” was also a big crowd pleaser and it’s more relevant now than on our first release as the final season of Netflix’s biggest hit just dropped.

LINK TO BUY “Stealthier Things”

Finally, maybe our best inside joke shirt ever, “Tonopah Canyons,” which celebrates the F-117’s semi-clandestine ‘active’ retirement community.

LINK TO BUY “Tonopah Canyons”

The sale of these wearable gems ends Monday (so you can get them by Christmas), then the designs go back into the TWZ apparel vault. Also be sure to check the pull down menu when selecting your shirt as hoodies and other fabric offerings are available.

And to all our readers, commenting community, friends in the industry, and military and colleagues, we wish you all a fantastic holiday and the best for you and your family.

Thank you so much for all the continued support, we literally would not be here without all of you!

Contact the author: [email protected]

PA Media

Reuters

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Gov. Gavin Newsom strode onstage in Houston on Saturday to a cheering crowd of Texas Democrats, saying Proposition 50’s victory in California on election day was a win for the nation and a firm repudiation of President Trump.

Newsom possessed the air of a politician running for president at the boisterous rally, a possibility the California governor says he is considering — and the location he chose was not happenstance.

Newsom accused Trump of pressuring Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to rejigger the state’s congressional districts with the goal of sending more Republicans to Congress, an action that triggered California’s Proposition 50. Newsom successfully pushed for a special election on the ballot measure to counter the efforts in Texas, which the governor said wasan attempt by Trump and the Republicans to “rig” the 2026 midterm election.

Cheers erupted from the friendly, union-hall crowd when Newsom belittled Trump as an “invasive species” and a “historically unpopular president.”

“On every issue, on the economy, on terrorists, on immigration, on healthcare, [he’s a] historically unpopular president, and he knows it, and he knows it,” Newsom said. “Why else did he make that call to your governor? Why else did he feel the need to rig the election before even one vote was cast? That’s just weakness, weakness masquerading as strength. That’s Donald Trump, and he had a very bad night on Tuesday.”

Newsom was the main political force behind Proposition 50, which California voters overwhelmingly approved in Tuesday’s special election. The statewide ballot measure was an attempt to counter Trump’s push to get Republican-led states, most notably Texas, to redraw their electoral maps to keep Democrats from gaining control of the U.S. House of Representatives in the 2026 midterms and upending his agenda. Newsom and California Democrats hope the change will net an additional five Democrats in California’s congressional delegation, canceling out any gains in Texas.

Newsom thanked Texas Democrats for putting up a fight against the redistricting effort in their state, saying it inspired an uprising.

“It’s dawning on people, all across the United States of America, what’s at stake,” Newsom told the crowd. “And you put a stake in the ground. People are showing up. I don’t believe in crowns, thrones. No kings.”

Newsom’s trip to Texas comes as the former San Francisco mayor has been openly flirting with a 2028 run for president. In a recent interview with “CBS News Sunday Morning,” Newsom was asked whether he would give “serious thought” after the 2026 midterms to a White House bid.

“Yeah, I’d be lying otherwise,” Newsom replied. “I’d just be lying. And I’m not — I can’t do that.”

In July, Newsom flew to South Carolina, a state that traditionally hosts the South’s first presidential primary. He said he wanted to help his party win back the U.S. House of Representatives in 2026. But South Carolina is a solidly conservative state and did not appear to have a single competitive race.

During that trip, South Carolina Rep. James Clyburn, the highest-ranking Black member of Congress and renowned Democratic kingmaker, told The Times that Newsom would be “a hell of a candidate.” Newsom received similar praise — and encouragement — when he was introduced at the “Take It Back” rally in Houston.

Newsom now heads to Belém, Brazil, where representatives from 200 nations are gathering to kick off the annual United Nations climate policy summit. For Newsom, it’s a golden opportunity to appear on a world stage and sell himself and California as the antidote to Trump and his attacks on climate change policy.

The Trump administration this year canceled funding for major clean energy projects such as California’s hydrogen hub and moved to revoke the state’s long-held authority to set stricter vehicle emissions standards than the federal government.

For Zuri Crawford, the last several weeks have been an emotional whirlwind — swinging from fears to frustration to now partial relief.

A 20-year-old single mother and Riverside City College student, Crawford depends on the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program to buy groceries for herself and her young son. Earlier this week, she braced herself for the possibility that — because of the federal shutdown — she would not receive the $445 that typically gets loaded onto her state-issued debit card on the sixth day of every month.

“I really feel like I’m going to be burnt out. I feel like it’s going to be hard on me because I am a single mom,” she said on a recent afternoon. “I have to push through, but I am going to be overwhelmed.”

On Thursday, however, Crawford was surprised to learn that the $445 payment had showed up on her card. Soon after, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced that, because of a court victory, “food benefits are now beginning to flow back to California families” — at least temporarily.

Crawford is one of roughly 5.5 million statewide who depend on this food aid — known in California as CalFresh — and one of 42 million people nationwide. In recent weeks, this group has been caught in the crosshairs of a political battle that has shifted from Congress to courtrooms amid a federal shutdown that has now lasted more than five weeks.

As of early Friday, two federal judges had ordered the U.S. Department of Agriculture to use billions of dollars in contingency funding to continue providing SNAP support — the reason Crawford and many others nationwide received their full benefits Thursday. On Friday the Trump administration asked a federal appeals court to block one of those orders. The appeals court let the order stand, and then late Friday the Trump administration succeeded in persuading the Supreme Court to block the judicial rulings and — at least temporarily — withhold food benefits from millions of Americans.

Many recipients in California already have their payments, but the legal drama late Friday may add to their anxieties. Many were already improvising, and may have to do so again.

Zuir Crawford, 20, loads groceries bought using gift cards supplied by Riverside City College.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

In Crawford’s case, she already juggles college coursework, picks up shifts as an UberEats driver and cares for her 1-year-old. When she learned her food aid would be delayed this month, she made a plan: She would drop two classes and then pick up additional work as a caregiver so she and her son could afford to eat. She would use that money to supplement the support she is receiving from her school and community.

Even with food aid, she depends on food pantries to help her obtain items such as canned ravioli, Rice-a-Roni and frozen dinners for the last two weeks of the month.

Single parents could be hit especially hard by the delay in food benefits. Nationwide, single-adults make up nearly two-thirds (62%) of all SNAP households with children, according to the USDA. In California, almost a quarter of single working parents (23.2%) are in poverty, according to the Public Policy Institute of California.

Households headed by single mothers are especially vulnerable amid a worsening gender wage gap and rising costs for education, housing and child care, said Jesseca Boyer, vice president of policy and strategic initiatives for the Institute for Women’s Policy Research. “All of those factors require a single mother to stretch their already limited dollars even further,” she said.

In the Bay Area city of Mountain View, Abigail Villavicencio usually gets between $500 and $700 each month loaded onto her CalFresh cards, she said. It depends on her fluctuating income delivering food for apps such as Uber Eats. A single mom with three children, she first qualified for SNAP in 2021, and at that time was able to stretch the money to cover groceries for an entire month.

“But over the last year, it hasn’t been enough. I spend $500 in 2 weeks. I noticed prices were going up,” she said, and her weekly grocery trip often now costs $200 to $300. “I have two weeks when I have to figure out what to do.”

Villavicencio said she augments her benefits by collecting donated food at her son’s school twice a month.

The last few weeks have been particularly hurtful, she said, when she sees commenters on social media deriding food stamp recipients as “lazy.” She notes that she has to show her bank accounts every six months to qualify for CalFresh. For the past three years, she’s been home with her twin daughters as they went through intensive behavior therapy for autism.

News of the delayed SNAP benefits gutted her carefully calibrated food plan. She dipped into her savings for the last grocery trip and bought enough to make meals she could sell to construction workers to earn a few extra dollars.

Now that her twin daughters are in kindergarten, she’s also been searching for more consistent work — but it’s been challenging, she said, to find one that will allow her to drop off and pick up her children from school.

Holding her dog Bear, Zuir Crawford, 20 fears losing her SNAP benefits because of the federal government shutdown. “I really feel like I’m going to be burnt out. I feel like it’s going to be hard on me because I am a single mom,” she said on a recent afternoon. “I have to push through, but I am going to be overwhelmed.”

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

As for Crawford, she said she experienced “trauma after trauma” growing up, bouncing between homes in Los Angeles and Riverside counties. She has sought stability since becoming a teen mom to her son, whom she affectionately calls Baby Z.

She is in her second semester at Riverside City College, where she is taking prerequisite courses to pursue a nursing career. She makes “little to nothing” driving for Uber Eats, she said, “but it’s enough for me to at least put gas in my tank.”

Without the financial support of her family or a partner, she relies on a patchwork of government programs.

Two months ago, she, her son and her fluffy white dog Bear moved into a one-bedroom apartment that she obtained through a county housing program for the homeless. She uses the nearly $900 a month she receives through CalWorks, a state welfare program, to cover her rent, utilities and phone bill. Along with CalFresh, she gets a monthly allotment of healthy food through the Women, Infants and Children program.

She said she’s also sustained by her Christian faith. She attends regular Bible studies and uses a portion of her food budget to make meals for the homeless.

Inside the college’s Basic Needs Resource Center on Wednesday afternoon, Crawford filled a black basket with peanut butter, jelly, oatmeal, a can of pozole and hygiene products. While students can typically access the pantry every two weeks, they can collect staples once a week during the shutdown, a volunteer explained.

Crawford is in her second semester at Riverside City College, where she is taking prerequisite courses to pursue a nursing career.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

As a community college student and single parent receiving public assistance, she is also eligible for additional support including meal vouchers and grocery gift cards.

With SNAP beneficiaries becoming pawns in the shutdown fight, she said she’s grateful for the public assistance, which she views as a “stepping stone” to a more financially secure life.

“It’s not my fault that I was born into the family I was born into,” she said later that day, as she sliced and spiced chicken and steamed vegetables for a low-cost meal. “I can’t control that. But what I can control is my outcome. And I know that if I keep on working hard, if I keep on persevering through all the hardships, I’m going to be OK.”

Zuir Crawford, 20, carries groceries from a local market and also from a food pantry to her apartment in Riverside.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

Up until Thursday, both Villavicencio and Crawford were preparing for hard times. The Mountain View mom was worried about telling her children about a diminished Thanksgiving this year. Crawford was calculating how to further improvise on using her food budget wisely.

Both women were relieved that, on the sixth day of the month, their benefits had fully reloaded.

“I can breathe now,” Villavicencio said Friday.

“I’m super-shocked,” added Crawford with a laugh. “I feel relieved. I just feel happy.”

This article is part of The Times’ equity reporting initiative, funded by the James Irvine Foundation, exploring the challenges facing low-income workers and the efforts being made to address California’s economic divide.

The celebration had hardly begun, when Shohei Ohtani first voiced the theme of the day.

“I’m already thinking about the third time,” he said in Japanese, standing atop a double-decker bus in downtown Los Angeles with of thousands of blue-clad, flag-waving, championship-celebrating Dodgers fans lining the streets around him for the team’s 2025 World Series parade.

Turns out, he wasn’t alone.

Two days removed from a dramatic Game 7 victory that made the Dodgers baseball’s first repeat champion in 25 years, the team rolled through the streets of downtown and into a sold-out rally at Dodger Stadium on Monday already thinking about what lies ahead in 2026.

With three titles in the last six seasons, their modern-day dynasty might now be cemented.

But their goal of adding to this “golden era of Dodger baseball,” as top executive Andrew Friedman has repeatedly called it, is far from over.

“All I have to say to you,” owner and chairman Mark Walter told the 52,703 fans at the team’s stadium rally, “is we’ll be back next year.”

“I have a crazy idea for you,” Friedman echoed. “How about we do it again?”

When manager Dave Roberts took the mic, he tripled down on that objective: “What’s better than two? Three! Three-peat! Three-peat! Let’s go.”

When shortstop Mookie Betts, the only active player with four World Series rings, followed him, he quadrupled the expectation: “I got four. Now it’s time to fill the hand all the way up, baby. ‘Three-peat’ ain’t never sounded so sweet. Somebody make that a T-shirt.”

For these history-achieving, legacy-sealing Dodgers, Monday was a reminder of the ultimate end goal — the kind of scene that, as they embark on another short winter, will soon fuel their motivations for another confetti-filled parade this time next year.

“For me, winning a championship, the seminal moment of that is the parade,” Friedman said. “The jubilation of doing it, when you get the final out, whatever game you win it in, is special. That night is special. But to be able to take a breath and then experience a parade, in my mind, that is what has always driven me to want to win.”

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“[To] do this for the city, that’s what it’s all about,” first baseman Freddie Freeman added. “There’s nothing that feels as important as winning a championship. And if so happens to be three in a row, that’s what it is. But that’s what’s gonna drive us to keep going.”

Last November, the Dodgers’ first parade in 36 years was a novelty.

Much of the group had been part of the 2020 title team that was denied such a serenade following that pandemic-altered campaign. They had waited four long years to experience a city-wide celebration. The reception they received was sentimental and unique.

Now, as third baseman Max Muncy said with a devious grin from atop a makeshift stage in the Dodger Stadium outfield, “it’s starting to get a little bit comfortable up here. Let’s keep it going.”

“Losing,” star pitcher and World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto added, in English, in a callback to one of his memorable quotes from this past October, “isn’t an option.”

Doing it won’t be easy.

This year, the Dodgers’ win total went down to 93 in an inconsistent regular season. They had to play in the wild-card round for the first time since the playoffs expanded in 2022. And in the World Series, they faced elimination in Games 6 and 7, narrowly winning both to complete their quest to repeat.

“I borderline still can’t believe we won Game 7,” fan favorite Kiké Hernández said in a bus-top interview.

But, he quickly added, “We’re all winners. Winners win.”

Thus, they also get celebrations like Monday’s.

As it was 367 days earlier, the Dodgers winded down a parade route in front of tens of thousands of fans from Temple Street to Grand Avenue to 7th Street to Figueroa. Both on board the double-decker buses and in the frenzied masses below, elation swirled and beverages flowed.

Once the team arrived at Dodger Stadium, it climbed atop a blue circular riser in the middle of the field — the final symbolic steps of their ascent back to the mountaintop of the sport.

Anthony Anderson introduced them to the crowd, while Ice Cube delivered the trophy in a blue 1957 Chevy Bel-Air.

Familiar scenes, they are hoping become an annual tradition.

“Job in 2024, done. Job in 2025, done,” Freeman said. “Job in 2026? Starts now.”

The Dodgers did take time to recognize their newfound place in baseball history, having become just the sixth MLB franchise to win three titles in the span of six years and the first since the New York Yankees of 1998 to 2000 to win in consecutive years.

Where last year’s parade day felt more like an overdue coronation, this one served to crystallize their legacy.

“Everybody’s been asking questions about a dynasty,” Hernández said. “How about three in six years? How about a back-to-back?”

And, on Monday, all the main characters of this storybook accomplishment got their moment in the sun.

There was, as team broadcaster and rally emcee Joe Davis described him, “the Hall of Fame-bound” Roberts, who now only trails Walter Alston in team history with three World Series rings.

“We talked about last year, wanting to run it back,” he said. “And I’ll tell you right now, this group of guys was never gonna be denied to bring this city another championship.”

There was Game 7 hero Miguel Rojas calling up surprise October closer Roki Sasaki, on his birthday, to dance to his “Bailalo Rocky” entrance song; a request Sasaki sheepishly obliged by pumping his fist to the beat.

Yamamoto, coming off his heroic pitching victories in Games 6 and 7, received some of the day’s loudest ovations.

“We did it together,” he said. “I love the Dodgers. I love Los Angeles.”

Muncy, Ohtani and Blake Snell also all addressed the crowd.

“I’m trying to get used to this,” Snell said.

“I’m ready to get another ring next year,” Ohtani reiterated.

One franchise face who won’t be back for that chase: Clayton Kershaw, who rode into the sunset of retirement by getting one last day at Dodger Stadium, fighting back tears as he thanked the crowd at the end of his illustrious (and also Hall of Fame-bound) 18-year career.

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“Last year, I said I was a Dodger for life. And today, that’s true,” Kershaw said. “And today, I get to say that I’m a champion for life. And that’s never going away.”

Kershaw, of course, is one of the few still around from the club’s dark days of the early 2010s, when money was scarce and playoff appearances were uncertain and parades were only things to dream about — not expect.

As he walks away, however, the team has been totally transformed.

Now, the Dodgers have been to 13 straight postseasons. They’ve set payroll records and bolstered their roster with a wave of star signings. They’ve turned the pursuit of championships into a yearly expectation, proud but unsatisfied with what they’ve achieved to this point.

“I think, definitionally, it’s a dynasty,” said Friedman, the architect of this run with the help of Walter’s deep-pocketed Guggenheim ownership group. “But that to me, in a lot of ways, that kind of caps it if you say, ‘OK, this is what it is.’ For me, it’s still evolving and growing. We want to add to it. We want to continue it, and do everything we can to put it at a level where people after us have a hard time reaching.”

On Monday, they raised that bar another notch higher.

“This parade was the most insane thing I’ve ever witnessed, been a part of,” Kershaw said. “It truly is the most incredible day ever to be able to end your career on.”

On Tuesday, the Dodgers’ long road toward holding another one begins.

“I know they’re gonna get one more next year,” Kershaw told the crowd. “And I’m gonna watch, just like all of you.”

Cricket fans have been celebrating across India after the women’s team claimed their first ever World Cup, defeating South Africa in the final in Mumbai.

WELL, arc at you, birthday girl!

Model Iris Law beams with joy under a rainbow as she prepares to celebrate hitting 25.

Iris showed off her toned tum in ­swimwear on a beach while on hols.

The daughter of actors Jude Law and Sadie Frost wrote on social media: “Last day of 24.”

For Iris, who dated footballer Trent Alexander-Arnold, 27, last year, the sky’s the limit in the fashion world.

We recently revealed how Iris had her assistants running across New York to find her favourite treats ahead of the Victoria’s Secret show.

LAYING DOWN LAW

Nepo-baby Iris Law had list of ‘diva demands’ before Victoria’s Secret show

NEW MATCH

Iris Law spotted out for summer stroll with Trent Alexander-Arnold lookalike

The model made her debut as an Angel during the return of the world famous runway show in October.

Iris is said to have sent her team of assistants looking for cookies from a particular bakery and then smoothies from another place in New York, according to Daily Mail.

The Victoria’s Secret catwalk show made a stunning return earlier this month and was full of A-list models including, Alessandra Ambrosio, Jasmine Tookes, Angel Reese,  Barbie Ferreira,  Ashley Graham, Irina Shayk and Emily Ratajkowski.

Iris burst onto the modelling scene when she was in her teens and has been booked by some of the biggest fashion houses in the world.

She has previously posed for Christian Dior, Calvin Klein, and Versace.

She has also started to forge a career in the movies and follow in her famous parents’ footsteps.

Thousands of Moroccans filled the streets of Rabat singing and waving flags after the UN Security Council adopted a resolution describing autonomy for Western Sahara under Moroccan sovereignty as the most feasible solution to the decades-long territorial dispute. The US-drafted text provides international endorsement of Morocco in its dispute with the Algeria-backed Polisario Front.