college

UCLA is proceeding as though it landed a massive gift this week, with 2025 Sun Belt Player of the Year Trent Hendrick joining the Bruins for practices Monday and Tuesday.

Hendrick is among 16 players who sought a Louisiana temporary restraining order allowing them to return to college after entering the NFL draft pool, arguing they would not have left had they know NCAA rules would change granting them an extra year of eligibility.

The temporary restraining order was granted last week, but the Big Ten voted on Tuesday to pass a new rule that prohibited football players who have signed a professional contract, were on a professional roster at any point or declared for the NFL draft as an underclassman without withdrawing, from maintaining eligibility for athletic competition.

Hendrick, however, did not sign a contract, never earned a spot on a roster and didn’t declare for the draft as an underclassman.

Linebacker Trent Hendrick participates in a drill during the Cleveland Browns’ rookie minicamp on May 8. Hendrick is now poised to play for UCLA.

(Sue Ogrocki / Associated Press)

“We support the Big Ten’s adoption of the new professional football players rule and understand the importance of having clear and consistent eligibility standards across the conference,” UCLA athletic director Martin Jarmond said in a statement on Tuesday. “We have been in communication with the Big Ten throughout this process, and our student-athletes are eligible under the guidelines adopted today. We are excited to turn our full attention to the upcoming season and our opener [versus] California on Sept. 5.”

It is unclear whether anyone will contest the Louisiana temporary restraining order.

For now, Hendrick is quickly getting up to speed in a system he learned while competing under head coach Bob Chesney and defensive coordinator Colin Hitschler last season at James Madison.

Chesney was excited on Monday to welcome Hendrick to Westwood. Hitschler told reporters Tuesday he, too, was pleased to see Hendrick on the UCLA roster.

James Madison’s Trent Hendrick tackles Washington State’s Maxwell Woods during a game on Nov. 22.

(Brien Aho / Getty Images)

“We had a lot of fun together last year and I think he did a great job where he was,” Hitschler said. “I’m glad he got the opportunity for himself to hopefully continue to play college football here. What a special opportunity for him and let’s make the most of it.”

Both coaches said they faced competition to land Hendrick after last week’s restraining order was granted.

“He’s a really good player,” Hitschler said. “He made a lot of plays for us last year and he loves the game. … Awesome kid, loves the game, loves the work, loves the grind, you know, and he’s talented.”

Can a player who joined a roster less than two weeks before the season opener be ready to play immediately? Hitschler thinks so.

“Trent’s a kid that stays ready,” Hitschler said. “He was begging for an opportunity to get a tryout in the league. Just another opportunity to maybe get it. So he was working out, he was in great shape. He’s a kid that lives, eats and sleeps football and God blessed him with an opportunity here, let’s see what he can make of it.”

The Big Ten is holding schools accountable for compliance with its rule and told the Associated Press restrictions in other sports such as basketball could follow.

A head football coach who plays a former pro will be suspended 50% of the season and his school will be fined, the Big Ten confirmed to the AP on Tuesday.

The topic is a hot one around college athletics. Wake Forest athletic director John Currie, chairman of the Atlantic Coast Conference athletic directors group for the upcoming season, said his colleagues planned to discuss the issue Wednesday.

“I don’t think anybody in our league likes the idea of taking away opportunities from existing college students and graduating high school players, which is exactly what is happening when a school signs a player out of an NFL camp to their team,” Currie wrote in a text message to the AP.

Duke coach Manny Diaz said the Power Four conferences need to present a unified front. The Big 12 and Southeastern Conference have not announced steps, though the SEC ripped the potential for pros back in college in a statement late Monday.

“I think you’ll see more leagues start to govern themselves since we’re having such a hard time finding it at a national level,” Diaz said. “I think everyone understands it’s absolutely absurd. We can enjoy the fact that the players can benefit financially from playing in college now. At the same time, recognize the ultimate truth that we’re not a professional sports franchise. We are a collegiate, scholastic school activity, and we’ve got to rein that in.”

Agent Drew Rosenhaus told the AP on Monday that former Mississippi tight end Dae’Quan Wright had been waived by the Cleveland Browns and, if he clears waivers, will join Lane Kiffin’s roster at Louisiana State. Wright played two seasons for Kiffin at Ole Miss.

Wright was among a group of players who sued in a Louisiana court, saying the new NCAA rule granting five years of eligibility to most athletes should apply to him and others who were not “grandfathered” into the rule, which did not include the high school Class of 2022.

“Over 100 athletes in multiple sports were cleared and said you could go play. That’s a court order,” Kiffin said Tuesday on “The Pat McAfee Show” on ESPN. “If you think back on all the different court orders of great players that were granted — whether that’s Diego Pavia or, now, Trinidad [Chambliss] that were allowed to play a sixth year, we followed all court orders. I think you get into a really interesting situation as a conference if you’re now saying, ‘Well, we’re not going to follow this court order.’ These kids that a court says can go anywhere, we’re going to say, ‘No you can’t.’”

The situation has drawn sharp criticism among coaches in college and the NFL. Rams coach Sean McVay said reversing the college football-to-NFL pipeline was mind-boggling.

“I don’t know enough about it, other than the fact guys that can be in NFL camps, if it doesn’t go down for them, they can go back to college,” McVay said. “I mean, I feel like I took a freaking gummy. I don’t even understand it. It’s true. I mean, looking at this stuff, I’m like, surely that’s not real. But I just try to stay in my lane. But I would say it’s very unique and it’s very different.”

Correspondent Jordan Puente and the Associated Press contributed to this report.

NEW YORK — Ohio State and Oregon were 1-2 in The Associated Press Top 25 released Monday, giving the Big Ten Conference the top two teams in the preseason rankings for the first time in 65 years and just the second time ever.

The Buckeyes received 40 first-place votes and Oregon received 14 in voting by 69 media members who cover college football.

Ohio State will go into a season No. 1 for the ninth time, and first since 2015. The Buckeyes are now tied with Alabama for second-most preseason No. 1 rankings behind Oklahoma’s 10.

Oregon has its highest preseason ranking in program history after having opened No. 3 four times.

Georgia, Notre Dame and Texas round out the top five. Defending national champion Indiana starts at No. 6 and is followed by Miami, Texas A&M, Mississippi and Oklahoma.

Notre Dame received six first-place votes, Indiana got eight and Miami one.

This is the first year a conference has held down the top two spots in the preseason poll since Oklahoma and Nebraska of the Big Eight were 1-2 in 1987.

The last time the Big Ten had the Nos. 1 and 2 teams in the preseason was 1961, when Iowa and Ohio State topped the poll. The Hawkeyes lost four of their last five games after a 4-0 start and finished that season unranked. The Buckeyes went 8-0-1 and ended the season No. 2 behind unbeaten Alabama.

The Big Ten has won three straight College Football Playoff championships (Michigan, Ohio State, Indiana) and will be going for an unprecedented fourth straight national title. This is the fourth consecutive year the Big Ten has had two of the top three teams in the preseason rankings.

The Southeastern Conference leads all conferences with nine teams in the preseason Top 25, marking the third straight year it has had at least that many. Five of the top 10 teams are from the SEC for the first time since 2013.

Four Big 12 teams are ranked, with conference champion Texas Tech the highest at No. 12. The Atlantic Coast Conference has three ranked teams, with the Hurricanes joined by No. 19 SMU and No. 24 Louisville. There are no Group of Six schools in the Top 25.

Top-ranked Buckeyes

The offense is loaded. Heisman Trophy finalist Julian Sayin was the most accurate passer in the nation by a wide margin last season, Jeremiah Smith leads the nation in receiving yards and receiving touchdowns over the last two years and Bo Jackson is coming off a 1,000-yard rushing season as a freshman.

There is little concern about the defense even though eight starters must be replaced for a second straight year. At least six transfers are projected to start or play major roles.

Ohio State will get tested early and often. The Buckeyes visit Texas on Sept. 12 and five of their nine conference games are against preseason ranked teams, including at Indiana and against Oregon at home.

The Buckeyes have ended a season No. 1 in the AP poll six times (1942, 1954, 1968, 2002, 2014, 2024).

Bulldogs best of the SEC

The beat goes on for Kirby Smart’s Georgia Bulldogs. They’re in the preseason top five for the ninth straight year. The two-time defending SEC champion Bulldogs are favored to play in a sixth straight conference title game and appear in the CFP for the sixth time in 10 years.

Texas, the preseason No. 1 last year, opens in the top five for the third straight year. No. 8 Texas A&M is in the preseason top 10 for the first time since it was No. 6 in 2022, the year that marked the beginning of the end for coach Jimbo Fisher.

Pete Golding’s first full season as Mississippi head coach starts with the No. 9 Rebels in the preseason top 10 for the second time in three years and third time since 1970. No. 10 Oklahoma is in the preseason top 10 for the first time since 2022, when it was in the Big 12.

What about the Hoosiers?

Indiana is the seventh returning national champion in 40 years, and second in three years, to be ranked outside the top five in the preseason (Michigan went into the 2024 season ranked No. 9 after winning the national title).

The Hoosiers became the first team in the modern era to go 16-0, and they return lots of talent and signed a top-10 transfer class. The move from Heisman Trophy winner and No. 1 NFL draft pick Fernando Mendoza to TCU transfer Josh Hoover at quarterback apparently put doubts in the minds of voters.

Poll nuggets

—USC, which landed the nation’s top recruiting class during the offseason, is ranked No. 15 in the preason poll.

— Ohio State will try to become the 12th team to start and finish No. 1 since the AP preseason poll debuted in 1950. The last team to do it was Alabama in 2017.

— Notre Dame has its highest preseason ranking since it was No. 2 in 2006. The Fighting Irish, who have a Heisman candidate in quarterback CJ Carr, bring a 10-game winning streak into the season and are still smarting from being left out of the playoff.

— Lane Kiffin’s first LSU team is No. 11 after finishing 7-6 and unranked under Brian Kelly and Frank Wilson.

— Ten of the 12 CFP teams last season are ranked. The two that aren’t are James Madison and Tulane from the Group of Six.

— No. 23 Houston has its first preseason ranking in four years and third since 1991.

Full AP preseason top 25 poll

1. Ohio State
2. Oregon
3. Georgia
4. Notre Dame
5. Texas
6. Indiana
7. Miami
8. Texas A&M
9. Mississippi
10. Oklahoma
11. LSU
12. Texas Tech
13. Alabama
14. BYU
15. USC
16. Michigan
17. Washington
18. Penn State
19. SMU
20. Tennessee
21. Utah
22. Iowa
23. Houston
24. Louisville
25. Missouri

Olson writes for the Associated Press.

As an aspiring young quarterback at Muleshoe High in the early 2000s, Lincoln Riley attended a football camp at Texas Christian University, run by a coach known even then as a mastermind of defense, a man whose ideas and 4-2-5 scheme would one day be disseminated across college football.

Gary Patterson had just been elevated from defensive coordinator to head coach at TCU, a job he would occupy for the next two decades. Around the same time, his staff saw something in Riley. They talked briefly about giving him a shot at safety on Patterson’s vaunted TCU defense.

“Needless to say,” Riley told The Oklahoman in 2018, “it didn’t turn out.”

But a quarter-century after first crossing paths at that camp, it’s now the young quarterback giving the old ball coach a chance to prove himself.

When USC announced it was hiring Patterson as Riley’s defensive coordinator in January, ears perked up across college football. On one hand, Patterson, 66, is a freshly minted College Football Hall of Famer and one of the great defensive minds of the modern era. On the other hand, he hasn’t led a college football team since 2021, when he was forced out at TCU, and a lot has changed in the sport since. Not to mention it’s been more than 25 years since Patterson last served as a coordinator.

Those were fair concerns, considering all that’s riding on Riley getting it right with Patterson, his third defensive coordinator in five seasons. But after seven months with him on the job, you won’t find anyone at USC — players, coaches or administrators alike — with an ounce of distress over Patterson’s stamina.

“I think I would have had more reservations had I not known him,” Riley said. “But that fire still burns very, very hot.”

That much was obvious in the spring when Patterson jumped into the middle of a tackling circuit to teach proper technique, and ended up running through the whole drill. He even delivered a blow at the end.

“He knocked the guy back,” said safeties coach Paul Gonzales, who coached with Patterson for a decade at TCU. “For a 60-year old guy, he still got some pop.”

USC defensive coordinator Gary Patterson watches practice in March.

(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

Riley is betting big on that translating to the Trojans’ defense this fall. Over his four seasons as USC’s coach, there’s no mistaking what’s held Riley back from reaching the same heights at USC as he had at Oklahoma. The Trojans finished 124th, 104th, 87th and 65th in yards allowed per play during those years.

At TCU, Patterson’s defenses finished No. 1 in yards allowed five times during a 10-year stretch. Yet in the second half of his tenure at TCU, there was a noticeable decline, as his defenses finished in the top 25 of that same category just twice.

It was during that time that Riley’s offense went toe-to-toe with Patterson’s defense on numerous occasions. Riley, who was in his first head coaching job at Oklahoma, got the better of Patterson in each of their four meetings, piling up at least 498 total yards each time out.

“There was never anyone who was more of a pain to gameplan for or try to move the ball against than this guy,” Riley said.

During his five years away from coaching, Patterson said he actually spent more time studying the game than he had at TCU, where he was often consumed with other responsibilities. After consulting briefly at Texas and Baylor, Patterson took a job with an Amazon college football show, he says, primarily for the subscription service that came with it. Every Sunday morning, he’d watch whatever college game he wanted, just to stay fresh.

When he did return to coaching, Patterson didn’t just want to install the same scheme he used at TCU. So he closely studied Ohio State and Indiana’s defenses, which gave up a combined 32 touchdowns last season — seven fewer than USC’s defense (39). He took cues on how both clamped down better than anyone else in the red zone, where they each allowed opponents to convert touchdowns just 37% of the time.

“All I did was do football,” Patterson said. “I mean, it’s like getting married. I mean, it’s like I got nothing else. I wasn’t doing anything else.”

Those habits haven’t changed at USC. When other assistants took time for vacation this summer, Patterson stayed in the facility. He wanted to hone in on how to install his defense for a second time this fall. So he came in every day before 7 a.m., in a mostly empty office — just to beat the traffic.

“You want to change things, it’s a full-time job,” Patterson said. “It’s not one of those things that you do 70 or 80% of your time.”

It also gave him time to get to know his new players, each of whom have been summarily stunned by their veteran coach’s vitality.

“I don’t know how old he is, but he‘s out there like he’s 30,” linebacker Desman Stephens said. “He‘s still being active with us. He’s showing us drills. Like, if he want it done right, he gonna show you the exact way how to do it.”

So far, at USC, Patterson has had his hands on just about every detail of the defense. Which is precisely what Riley envisioned after watching him coach at TCU — and why he wasn’t worried about the game passing Patterson by.

“He was such a hands-on head coach,” Riley said. “He wasn’t a head coach just kind of doing a practice schedule, doing the speech, getting out early. He didn’t just straight CEO this thing, right? He was still calling defense, still game planning. He was very involved in every aspect of that program through all those years.”

USC defensive coordinator Gary Patterson fist bumps linebacker Desman Stephens during practice on Aug. 5.

(Eric Thayer / Los Angeles Times)

He won’t have to do that at USC. And Patterson seems perfectly fine with that.

But while others still wonder if he can make a successful return to college football, with a scheme that hasn’t been tested since 2021, Patterson is pretty confident his decades of experience count for something, too.

“It’s an advantage for me compared to somebody that’s 30 years old and doesn’t have kids, never been married, doesn’t know what it’s like to grow somebody up and raise a family and do things,” Patterson said.

“This is, I think, my 45th season. … “There’s not a lot of guys in this profession of the age where you can go back to all the things that I’ve learned through all the years.”

A slew of online discourse unfolded last week after Turning Point USA spokesman Andrew Kolvet shared that a college-aged member of the conservative nonprofit told him, “A burrito shouldn’t cost $20.”

“Yeah, a lot of this is a hangover from COVID and Biden-era inflation, but the lived experience is the same: It just feels like basic things cost too much,” Kolvet wrote in the viral X post, which has racked up more than 3 million views.

The online controversy highlights a deep frustration for young adults in Los Angeles. While politicians appear to be debating inflation for their own ends, students are struggling with the reality of not being able to afford food.

A $20 burrito sounds “unjustifiable” to Klarissa Palacios, who graduated from USC in May with bachelor’s and master’s degrees in law, history and culture. While in school, Palacios interned at various city hall offices and said her hourly salary eventually reached $25 — a key consideration for college students, she said, because many young people determine a meal’s affordability based on how many work hours can pay it off.

With minimum wage in L.A. at $18.42 per hour as of July, college students earning this rate would need to work for more than an hour in order to pay for just one burrito, Palacios pointed out.

“I’m Mexican, so I grew up with free burritos at home, anytime I wanted. $20 is pretty steep,” she said. “I’m expected to eat three times a day. If I’m spending $20 per meal and I work eight hours, then that means I’m only really getting paid five hours.”

Noticing a need for affordable meals, Palacios and fellow USC student Josiah Herfurth spent this past semester hosting $10-per-person lunches at their college apartments, dubbing the offering Cafe 10:31. The idea budded from a survey they sent to fellow members of their campus ministry, which found that the leading reason students weren’t attending post-church lunches at restaurants ranging from In-N-Out to sit-down ramen spots was because they wanted to save money, not for a lack of transportation or time.

So Palacios and Herfurth began paying out of pocket for bulk Costco runs that fed as many as 40 people per event. On the menu? Tacos, chili, hot dogs and conversation.

“It started with being just a USC college student thing, and ended up being just a general young adults thing,” Herfurth said, referring to how word quickly spread to UCLA and Cal State Long Beach students, as well as the young adult community at their church.

Herfurth is used to meal prepping in bulk, and said it’s a common practice among college students hoping to cut costs. He and his roommates would use up to six stove burners at a time to prepare meals together, he said.

“It was always more fun for me when I could share something with someone else, and it also made things cheaper,” Herfurth said. “That was the key to me.”

As the online conversation around food affordability evolved, Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas) chimed in on X.

“Just hearing about this dumb $20 burrito debate so just thought I’d make the losers on social media angry before going to bed,” Crenshaw wrote. “Stop whining, get a job, eat ramen like the rest of us did in college, on a budget with four roommates.”

But Megan Monroe, who graduated from UCLA in June, said it’s unrealistic to eat packaged ramen like the iconic Cup Noodles brand for every meal.

“Just because someone else did it, doesn’t mean that was the right thing to do,” Monroe said. “Nutrition has come such a long way. … I think it’s for the best that we’re steering toward a better, nutritional diet.”

Still, Monroe is a stickler for keeping her diet affordable.

Even though UCLA’s dining halls are recognized as the best in the country, Monroe opted out of the campus meal plan her junior year. Her required freshman and sophomore year plans came out to about $9 per visit, but when she moved to an off-campus, university-owned housing complex, she had the choice to opt into a plan that would cost about $15 per visit. She deemed it too expensive.

“I was like, I can cook for less than that,” Monroe said.

Since her dining hall days, Monroe now makes one Trader Joe’s trip per week, which usually comes out to about $45. She typically has milk and cereal for breakfast and is known among friends to eat a homemade take on a classic deli combination “360 days of the year”: a cold sandwich, a piece of fruit and a bag of chips.

Monroe does dine out once per week, including for burritos — she favors the $11 burrito at Brother’s Cousins Tacos in Sawtelle.

In a burrito city like L.A., prices can range dramatically, such as Burritos La Palma’s $5 homestyle burritos, where the menu recommends ordering two or three per person for a satisfying meal. When former taco stand El Ruso opened its flagship in Studio City last month, burritos wrapped in 18-inch Sonoran flour tortillas and stuffed with rib-eye or chile Colorado were priced at $20 each. It’s not uncommon to find breakfast burritos that exceed $20, like the $24 wrap with beef machaca and shrimp offered on Daisy Margarita Bar’s weekend brunch menu.

For students at other universities, campus dining varies in affordability.

When Joshua Min started at Cal State Long Beach in 2025, a $315-million renovation project had just shut down its University Student Union through 2028.

In light of the closure shuttering certain food options on campus, the university gathered an array of local food trucks — with most meals within the $15 to $20 range, Min said. Not wanting to spend additional funds, he opted into a meal plan offered for commuter students like himself, with 50 meals for the 16-week semester that came to about $10 per meal.

Min said he had minimal complaints of the food itself; he often filled up his plate with chicken, rice, fruit and vegetables. But he found himself rationing the meal swipes, starting the semester conservatively and ending with extras, which he used by inviting his friends to come with him.

After that semester, Min opted to pack turkey or tuna salad sandwiches for school, using bulk ingredients that his family buys from Costco.

Min said he ultimately was disappointed at Cal State Long Beach’s selection of food trucks, as a student who prioritizes cutting his cost of living.

“It seemed like they just cobbled up these ideas at the last minute,” he said. “I respect the effort, but I think a lot of students were left unheard and hungry.”

Pierce College won’t have a football season in 2026.

The community college in Woodland Hills announced it has placed the football program “on hiatus” for 2026.

Players were informed Monday and were told they should look for another program if they wanted to play immediately.

Orange Coast College also has paused its season and won’t play in 2026.

In its official statement, a spokesperson indicated “health and safety concerns” as the reason for the hiatus. The school was monitoring the roster during the summer and delayed a final decision “as long as possible” hoping the roster would expand.

Here’s the statement:

“Los Angeles Pierce College has made the difficult decision to place its football program on hiatus for the 2026 season.

“This decision was made after a careful evaluation of the program and with the health and safety of our student-athletes as our highest priority. While we are disappointed that we will not field a football team this season, our immediate focus is supporting our student-athletes and helping those who wish to continue competing identify opportunities with other collegiate programs. We are working closely with the Southern California Football Association and other area colleges to provide opportunities for student-athletes to compete. Our priority is minimizing disruption to students’ academic progress and while supporting their athletic goals.”

Football teams have always been important contributors for enrollment at the junior college level.

As if the college sports world weren’t crazy enough with roster limitations and rising numbers in the transfer portal, a new trend that isn’t really new but is accelerating involves coaches telling players they will have little chance to play as motivation for the player to leave and open up a roster spot.

That’s how a coach escapes bad publicity for chasing off a player. But maybe the coach is being honest in their evaluation? It’s all part of the strange happenings taking place.

Check out social media to see the growing number of high school and junior college players suddenly searching for new schools this summer by saying, “My recruitment is back open” or announcing an “involuntary decommitment.”

Just this week, Ole Miss is facing criticism after a longtime high school baseball commit from Iowa who has been battling cancer for three years, Brett Harris, said he had his baseball scholarship pulled.

College baseball, in particular, is being disrupted. Members from the high school class of 2027 are being forced to reopen their recruitment as schools take into consideration a new NCAA rule giving players five years of eligibility across five years.

Braden Ruiz, a Mater Dei High graduate who played shortstop at Cypress College, signed with Oregon last January. Last month he asked for his release from Oregon.

“It was the vibe I was getting,” Ruiz said. “They said I could still go up there and give it a shot. The conversations were they didn’t seem interested as before. I decided to decommit. The coach who recruited me ended up leaving Oregon a week later.”

Ruiz played with a hamstring injury at Cypress College last season.

“It’s all about performance,” he said. “If you’re not performing, it makes the coaches think differently.”

Ruiz has come to understand how college sports has become a business.

“They pretty much can do whatever they want,” he said. “They can pull your offer or in the conversations tell you you’re not wanted anymore. But it’s part of their job. They need to win to keep their job.”

Mater Dei coach Richard Mercado said he’s advising parents and players “if a school is giving out NIL money, it’s a business. You’re not going there to be friends with the coach. It’s a business relationship. They have to win immediately and with limited roster spots. They can’t be wrong.”

Players being pushed away to open a scholarship spot is not new. It’s happened in all sports. College baseball coaches have been engaged in a balancing act for years. Remember the days when Division I schools were limited to 11.7 scholarships. Players were being given partial scholarships and coaches had to project who might leave or stay after the amateur draft. Now college programs can offer full scholarships (think SEC), but rosters dropped to a maximum 34 players last season, forcing coaches to revise and regroup.

Add the impact of no more transfer restrictions and it’s understandable there’s uncertainty. The word loyalty is going to cease to exist in many programs.

So what’s the advice to players and parents?

Betting on yourself still works. If someone doesn’t want you, find someone who does.

“Everybody’s journey is different,” Ruiz said. “You can commit early or late. I would say people who commit now will make it on campus. Their past season was probably good. People performing better more recently have a better chance of playing.”

Do research to find programs that stick with old-fashioned rules and commitments and maybe mention academics.

On Thursday, Ruiz signed with New Mexico State. He’s one of the fortunate ones finding a school with a roster opening this summer before Saturday’s amateur draft begins. He’ll have three years of eligibility left. He’s finally healthy and can’t wait for the day he gets to play against Oregon.

If he becomes a standout, who knows, maybe the Ducks will want him again in this new world of college athletics.

“The portal is crazy,” Ruiz has concluded.

The US Supreme Court has ruled that states can ban transgender women from competing in female school and college sports.

The court considered cases from students in two different states who had challenged bans on participation. The two states, Idaho and West Virginia, enacted laws that required public school and college sports teams to compete in accordance with their sex recorded at birth.

One of the two challenges said the ban violates equal rights protections in the US Constitution. The other said it contradicts civil rights laws.

More than two dozen states have enacted bans since Idaho did so in 2020.

Under those state bans, a transgender woman – a biological male who identifies as a woman – is not permitted to compete in female sports at schools and colleges.

All nine justices on the court decided the state bans do not violate a civil rights law called Title IX which prohibits sex-based discrimination in schools.

But the judges were split along ideological lines on whether the bans contravene the constitution’s 14th Amendment guarantee of equal protection under the law.

The six conservative justices said it did not violate the constitution but the three liberal justices disagreed.

“The Constitution and Title IX do not require an overhaul of women’s and girls’ sports throughout America,” wrote Justice Brett Kavanaugh who authored the ruling.

In her partial dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor said the majority opinion had applied “a diminished view of equal protection” to sports.

The challenge launched in Idaho came from a transgender woman, Lindsay Hecox, a long distance runner, who lodged it shortly after the law was enacted. She was later granted an injunction by both a district court and an appeals court.

State lawmaker Barbara Ehardt, who introduced the law, said at the time of its passing that it would ensure “boys and men will not be able to take the place of girls and women in sports because it’s not fair”.

But in the appeals ruling, a panel of three judges found that the Idaho law violated constitutional rights. They said the state had failed to provide evidence that its ban protects “sex equality and opportunity for women athletes”.

President Donald Trump made the issue of transgender athletes in women’s sports a regular focus of his 2024 election campaign. Last year, he signed an executive order that aimed to ban transgender women from competing on female sports teams in schools and colleges.

Following that decision, the NCAA, the governing body for US college sports, banned transgender women from competing in women’s sports.

Supporters of the bans argued that transgender women had a biological advantage over athletes who were recorded female at birth.

When the International Olympic Committee (IOC) announced in March it was going to limit the women’s category of Olympic sports to biological females, it said its working group reviewed the latest scientific evidence over the previous 18 months and had concluded there was a “clear consensus”, external that “male sex provides a performance advantage in all sports and events that rely on strength, power and resistance” .

Those who opposed the bans argue that they unfairly discriminated against transgender students and dispute whether there is a scientific consensus that transgender women and girls have an inherent advantage.

SEATTLE — Cristian Roldan and Haji Wright grew up less than three years and 30 miles apart, Roldan in Pico Rivera and Wright in Culver City. The odds that they would go on to become teammates on not one, but two, U.S. World Cup teams seem astronomical.

Yet despite starting at the same time and place and arriving together at the same destination, the two players followed completely different paths to get there.

Wright joined the Galaxy’s academy at 14 and signed with Schalke of the top tier German Bundesliga days after his 18th birthday. Roldan was still playing for El Rancho, when he was 17, making him the only member of the U.S. World Cup team to play four years at a public high school.

“I might be the last one,” Roldan said. “I hope not.”

Crescenta Valley’s Salar Hajimirsadeghi and El Rancho’s Cristian Roldan meet in unison for a header.

(Tim Berger / Glendale News Press)

High school soccer was once the foundation of the sport in the U.S. Eighteen players on the 2002 World Cup team, the only American team to reach the tournament quarterfinals, played for their high school teams. By 2022, the only man on the roster who played four years for a public school was Roldan.

“I don’t wish my story, or how I ended up here, was any different,” Roldan said. “What I will say was it made it more difficult to be here, play[ing] four years in high school. But it makes my story special.”

His story becomes even more special with this World Cup, which opened for the U.S. in Inglewood, a 45-minute drive from his boyhood home, and will continue when the Americans face Australia on Friday in Seattle, where Roldan played two years at the University of Washington and 12 seasons as an all-star midfielder with the Sounders, winning two MLS titles.

“When we talk about people’s paths, Cristian’s is not the standard right now,” said older brother Cesar, an athletic trainer with the Galaxy. “Cristian did it mostly to be around his friends. He wanted to play with his buddies.

“That is not a standard way to make it into MLS. And forget about making [it] all the way to the national team.”

“Yeah, it’s different,” Cristian said with a smile. “Being able to play in your backyard, have friends and family there. It’s a celebration.”

And it may never be repeated.

Roldan, 31, is the third-oldest player on the U.S. team, so the MLS academy system was just getting started when he enrolled at El Rancho in 2010. But as the academy system and the Elite Club National League became larger and more powerful, they began to throw their weight around.

Academy and elite club teams essentially robbed prep soccer of its best players by forcing them to choose between their high school teams and elite club programs, demanding a year-round commitment and banning participation in other sports. When top players began opting for the academies, others had no choice but to follow if they wanted to be seen and scouted.

That also robbed U.S. soccer of one of the few advantages it has over European and South American countries, most of whom have nothing to rival the high school and college sports infrastructure where kids can play and develop for free.

Cristian Roldan sprints during a training session Tuesday in Irvine ahead of the United States’ World Cup match against Australia on Friday.

(Andre Penner / Associated Press)

“That’s not available in Germany or England, or whatever,” said Brian Schmetzer, Roldan’s coach with the Sounders. “I like the fact that the United States is a big enough country where we can give kids opportunities to continue playing.”

Especially since the academy and elite club pathways aren’t open to everybody. Moving from a free neighborhood high school team to an academy can be expensive, erecting a “pay-to-play” barrier that often restricts those programs to wealthier families. Travel to games and practices can also be an issue. Since many high school-age players can’t drive, a parent has to accept the responsibility of toting them back and forth to team activities.

That leaves little time for work, which can pose an additional financial burden.

“My parents would have done whatever for us. So they would have made things happen,” Cesar Roldan said of Cristian. “But he really didn’t have any of those options. There was just not the opportunity.”

Paul Caliguiri, who played in two World Cups before retiring as the second-most-capped player in U.S. Soccer history, said the slow strangulation of high school soccer will ensure some talented players will be overlooked.

“There are a lot more qualified players that choose the path of high school soccer rather than the full-time academies,” he said. “The issue is that many of those players that don’t go to full-time academies when the opportunity presents is likely due to transportation.

“We need to have more full-time training offered to players without increasing the ‘pay to play’ cost.”

Dominic Picon, who coached all three Roldan brothers at El Rancho, agrees.

“We’re losing a ton of kids who never get seen,” he said. “There’s a lot of kids that just get lost in the shuffle simply because we have a very limited scope of how we find players. If you look at our three main sports — baseball, basketball and football — virtually all of them play high school sports. They all come through that pipeline.”

Roldan, the son of a Guatemalan immigrant father and a Salvadoran-born mother, said he never really considered any of those issues when he decided to play with the neighborhood kids in high school, just as his older brother Cesar had done.

“I looked up to my brother and I wanted to share a similar path as he did,” he said. “And I wanted to win a trophy for the city of Pico Rivera, which only has one high school.”

U.S. midfielder Cristian Roldan defends the ball from Senegal forward Habib Diarra during an international friendly match on May 31.

(Scott Kinser / Associated Press)

He made good on that last pledge in his senior season. Playing with younger brother Alex, who was a junior, Roldan scored 54 goals and had 31 assists — what Picon calls “video-game numbers” — to lead El Rancho to 29 wins and a CIF Southern Section title. Individually, he was named the Gatorade national player of the year.

Alex would go on to play alongside Cristian with the Sounders and captain the Salvadoran national team. Picon said he knew the brothers were good. But he didn’t know how good.

“When you’re coaching them, they’re in high school,” he said. “You never look at them and say, ‘You know, these guys are going to be in the World Cup someday.’”

In fact, there was some doubt both would even play in college. Alex was headed to a junior college in Arizona before receiving a last-minute offer from Seattle University. And Cristian, despite his award-winning senior season, had very few firm offers from top schools, in part because he insisted on playing high school soccer and in part because he was small at 5-foot-7.

“What hurt him is playing at a public school,” Picon said. “His rise was improbable because of where he came from, but also when he did play in front of [college] coaches, I think his size was something that dissuaded coaches.”

Contrast that with Wright, whose exposure at the academy level helped him get stamped as one of the country’s top youth players, opening up professional opportunities before he was old enough to vote.

In the end, it wasn’t Roldan’s talent that got him a scholarship as much as it was the boldness of his mother Ana. When Washington coach Jamie Clark inadvertently sat down next to her at the Surf Cup showcase in San Diego, she urged him to have a look at her son.

He did, then called Picon the next week.

“He’s a legit player,” Picon remembers telling Clark. “He’s better than 99% of the academy players out there. It’s just because of where he plays, the city that he’s from.”

Cristian Roldan speaks to reporters during a team training session in Seattle on Thursday.

(Soobum Im / Getty Images)

Picon was right. In his first season at Washington, Roldan was the Pac-12 freshman of the year and after his sophomore season he turned pro. MLS stardom and two World Cup selections were on the horizon. And there was luck in that, the coach says.

But that good fortune started at home with parents who put their faith in public schools, then saw that faith rewarded.

“It’s the quintessential American story, right?” Picon offered. “You have immigrant parents. They come here and they put a lot of trust in the public school system. At the elementary level, the teachers were tasked with making sure they have a grasp of English. They did that.

“At middle school, they were tasked with getting them prepared for high school and they did that. All three were accepted into a four-year [college], their kids.

“Where Cristian and his brothers lucked out is having the parents that they did. They were the type of parents that any coach, high school or club, would want to have.”

Getting to the World Cup, then, isn’t always determined by the path you take. Sometimes the most important factors are how and where you started.

June 16 (UPI) — Britain’s Prince George will attend Eton College, the same school as his father, starting in September, Kensington Palace announced Tuesday.

Eton is an elite private school in Berkshire with students from ages 13 to 18. In Britain, “college” refers to pre-university education. George, the oldest child of the prince and princess of Wales, will turn 13 in July. William, prince of Wales and heir to the British throne after his father, King Charles III, also attended Eton.

Prince George attended Lambrook School in Berkshire with his siblings, Princess Charlotte, 11, and Prince Louis, 8, BBC News reported. That school accepts students up to age 13.

Prince Harry, Prince William‘s brother, also attended Eton, as did many other prominent politicians, including 20 of the country’s 58 prime ministers, CNN reported. Celebrities including Tom Hiddleston and Eddie Redmayne are also alumni.

The school, founded in 1440 by King Henry VI, is considered prestigious — and expensive, with yearly fees nearly $85,000 in U.S. dollars. It’s a full boarding school, meaning Prince George will live and study there.

Melanie Sanderson, managing editor of “The Good Schools Guide,” said Eton has “spectacular facilities and spacious grounds” and that “despite its ancient buildings, it is a modern school with a progressive outlook,” BBC News reported.

“Most 13-year-old boys arriving there in September cannot possibly know what adult life holds for them,” she said. “Prince George, however, faces a very particular future and his parents, with an unrivaled choice of schools available to them, have decided that an Eton education represents the best preparation for life as a modern working royal.”

KATIE Price has admitted son Harvey is happiest at home and tells her he “hates” living anywhere else.

The former glamour model revealed that while Harvey previously moved into his own flat, he is now back living with her and dreads the prospect of being away from his mum again.

Speaking on The Katie Price Show podcast, Katie opened up about how much Harvey struggles when he’s not at home.

She said: “I think people are noticing I’ve got Harvey here more than I normally do. Normally he’s in Cheltenham.”

Harvey, 24, who has Prader-Willi Syndrome, attended a specialist further education college for young people with complex disabilities.

He enrolled at the residential college in Cheltenham in 2021 before his funding was cut in 2024.

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Harvey then moved into supported independent living, with Southampton serving as a temporary base.

Katie explained: “We’re still waiting for his next placement. They’re saying next month and that’s up the road from me.

“But where he is in Southampton, he just doesn’t like being there.

“When he’s there, he texts me, ‘I hate it here, Mum. I just need you. I want your cuddles, hold my hand.’

“And it pulls on your heart. So I’ve got him here and it’s hard because I’m working and his carer at the same time.”

Harvey and Katie’s daily challenges have previously been documented in the BBC documentary Harvey and Me.

Meanwhile, Katie recently returned from Dubai, where she tried to find out more about husband Lee Andrews’ detention in Al Awir prison.

Lee, 43, claims he was arrested and detained on suspicion of espionage, but it is understood he is actually being held over a private civil matter.

USC loses in heartbreaking fashion

From Alan Cole: USC’s 2026 baseball season will be defined by two words — progress and pain.

Just two outs away from reaching the College World Series for the first time since 2001, USC suffered a devastating 4-3 loss in game three of the Chapel Hill Super Regional, as North Carolina rallied for two runs in the bottom of the ninth and snatched the trip to Omaha away from the Trojans on Owen Hull’s walk-off RBI double into the left-center gap.

“I’m proud of our boys,” USC coach Andy Stankiewicz said. “I’m disappointed in the results, but I’m never disappointed in our guys. They did something pretty special this year.”

Andrew Johnson did everything possible and then some to get USC (48-18) across the finish line. After already throwing 3 ⅔ innings of shutout baseball to close Game 1, Johnson went a season-high 7 ⅔ innings with two earned runs surrendered to get the Trojans to the doorstep of victory. He glided through North Carolina’s lineup for most of the day, at one point retiring 15 out of 17 batters.

He ended the super regional with 133 pitches thrown in a little over 48 hours, on top of the 145 pitches he threw across two appearances in the College Station Regional for a total of 278 tosses in 22 ⅓ innings with five earned runs given up in a heroic postseason stretch.

“The goal from the beginning of the season is Omaha,” Johnson said. “We’re definitely not just happy that we made it to supers and moved past the regional, but for it was a great season and we can be proud of what we accomplished.”

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Big win for Nelly Korda

From Sam Farmer: Nelly Korda watched someone else lift the trophy at last year’s U.S. Women’s Open.

This time, it was Korda — the 2025 runner-up — who did the heavy lifting.

The world’s No. 1 women’s golfer won for the fourth time in 2026 on Sunday and checked off the biggest item on her to-do list.

“To be hoisting this trophy, to hold it high and at such an iconic venue, is just a dream come true,” said Korda, the first American to win back-to-back majors since Juli Inkster in 1999.

Korda claimed her first U.S. Open title, pulling ahead on the back nine at Riviera Country Club, which was playing host to the major championship for the first time.

It was anything but a wire-to-wire win for Korda, who struggled on the tee and limped through the opening round at two over par. But she shot a pair of 67s on Friday and Saturday, then closed out the victory Sunday with a 69 on a postcard afternoon.

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U.S. Women’s Open leaderboard

Angels rout the Dodgers

From Liana Handler: The Angels flipped the script on the Dodgers, preventing a Freeway Series season sweep with a 13-5 win Sunday afternoon at Dodger Stadium.

Emmet Sheehan’s start only lasted 1 ⅓ innings, as he struggled to keep his pitch count low. He threw 35 of his 49 pitches in the second inning alone. Many of those went to Nick Madrigal, who battled Sheehan in a 14-pitch at-bat in which Madrigal won two ABS challenges.

“I thought the stuff was good coming in,” said manager Dave Roberts about Sheehan. “After the first inning, I just didn’t feel comfortable getting him past the 40-pitch mark in one inning. I’m not going to put this guy in harm’s way.”

The Angels third baseman drew a walk, marking the beginning of the end for Sheehan, who already allowed a single. The 26-year-old pitcher loaded the bases with another walk. Angels catcher Sebastián Rivero drove in two runs with a center-field single.

“Frustrating,” Sheehan called his outing. “Couldn’t put guys away, not efficient.”

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Swanson: Dodgers show courage by permanently honoring LGBTQ+ pioneers Glenn Burke and Billy Bean

Dodgers-Angels box score

MLB standings

Caitlin Clark complains too much

From Bill Plaschke: As a diehard WNBA fan and season ticket-holder, it is with great reluctance that I have come to the following painful conclusion.

I’m sick of Caitlin Clark.

As the purchaser of an Iowa jersey and consumer of all things Indiana Fever — covered their games, witnessed them as a fan, caught them on television — it is with great angst that I make the following brutal admission.

I wish Caitlin Clark would just stop whining and play.

The logo-shooting, circus-passing, shape-shifting revelation who was once arguably the most famous basketball player in the world has become rude, entitled and, frankly, not all that fun.

In her third season in the WNBA, the once-shining superstar is acting like a spoiled brat. The league’s most popular player has become its biggest lout. Her stats are decent, but her attitude stinks.

I once openly cheered as Clark raced down the court, dribbled behind her back, skated past a helpless defender, and drained a three-pointer.

Now I cringe as she bricks the trey and immediately complains to the officials, spreading her arms, shaking her head, screaming in their face.

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Christian Pulisic carries U.S. World Cup hopes

From Kevin Baxter: Christian Pulisic looked exhausted as he stepped from a yellow cab on the edge of Manhattan’s financial district for a promotional event arranged by his shoe sponsor.

A day earlier, he had been booed off the field after going scoreless in his final 17 games with AC Milan. And as Pulisic’s private jet made its way from Italy to New York, the club’s coach, sporting director and two other top executives were sacked.

A day later Pulisic walked across a stage overlooking the East River to cheers during a sparsely attended rally in which the U.S. roster for this summer’s World Cup was announced.

The 24 hours between those two events — some of which were spent signing autographs for hundreds of school children as a dog in a red-and-white No. 10 Pulisic jersey looked on — would be the only respite from a hugely disappointing club season and the heavy expectations of the second World Cup played on U.S. soil.

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Iran’s soccer team arrives in Mexico for training ahead of World Cup matches in L.A.

World Cup poses an unprecedented security challenge at a fraught moment

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World Cup roundtable: Who will win, who will surprise and how far will U.S. advance?

Sparks get much-needed win

From Marisa Ingemi: The quarter mark of a season isn’t necessarily a make-or-break point, but for the Sparks, it was starting to feel like it was close to it.

An 89-72 win over the expansion Portland Fire on Sunday to close a 1-2 homestand felt more necessary than the Sparks might have wanted to admit. But after struggling on the road before losing consecutive games at home against Las Vegas and Dallas amid a three-game losing streak, the Sparks needed something to go right.

Especially defensively, where the Sparks had seemingly been getting worse. They had their best defensive game of the season Sunday, holding Portland to 36% shooting — the second-lowest mark against them this season.

Continue reading here

More fouls, less flow: Sparks struggling to adjust to WNBA crackdown on physical play

Sparks box score

WNBA standings

This day in sports history

1935 — Omaha, ridden by Willis Saunders, becomes the third horse to win the Triple Crown by capturing the Belmont Stakes with a 1½-length victory over Firethron.

1958 — Mickey Wright beats Fay Crocker by six strokes to win the LPGA Championship.

1980 — Sally Little wins the LPGA Championship by three strokes over Jane Blalock.

1982 — 36th NBA Championship: Lakers beat Philadelphia 76ers, 4 games to 2.

1985 — Creme Fraiche, ridden by Eddie Maple, becomes the first gelding to win the Belmont Stakes, beating Stephan’s Odyssey by a half-length.

1986 — Larry Bird scores 29 points to lead the Boston Celtics to a 114-97 victory over the Houston Rockets and their 16th NBA title.

1990 — The “Indomitable Lions” of Cameroon pull off one of the greatest upsets in soccer history, 1-0 over defending champion Argentina in the first game of the World Cup.

1991 — Warren Schutte, a UNLV sophomore from South Africa, shoots a 5-under 67 to become the first foreign-born player to win the NCAA Division I golf championship.

2000 — Mike Modano deflects Brett Hull’s shot at 6:21 of the third overtime, ending the longest scoreless overtime game in Stanley Cup finals history and helping the Dallas Stars beat the New Jersey Devils 1-0 in Game 5.

2002 — British-Canadian Lennox Lewis retains boxing’s WBC Heavyweight title with eighth-round knockout of American Mike Tyson.

2005 — Freshman Samantha Findlay hits a three-run homer in the 10th inning to lead Michigan to a 4-1 win over UCLA for its first NCAA softball title. Michigan is the first team from east of the Mississippi River to win the national championship.

2008 — Rafael Nadal wins his fourth consecutive French Open title in a rout, again spoiling Roger Federer’s bid to complete a career Grand Slam. Dominating the world’s No. 1 player with astounding ease, Nadal wins in three sets, 6-1, 6-3, 6-0.

2008 — Yani Tseng of Taiwan becomes the first rookie in 10 years to win a major, beating Maria Hjorth on the fourth hole of a playoff with a 5-foot birdie on the 18th hole to win the LPGA Championship.

2012 — I’ll Have Another’s bid for the first Triple Crown in 34 years ends shockingly in the barn and not on the racetrack when the colt is scratched the day before the Belmont Stakes and retires from racing with a swollen tendon.

2013 — Serena Williams wins her 16th Grand Slam title and her first French Open championship since 2002, beating Maria Sharapova 6-4, 6-4.

2014 — Rafael Nadal wins the French Open title for the ninth time, and the fifth time in a row, by beating Novak Djokovic 3-6, 7-5, 6-2, 6-4. Nadal improves his record at Roland Garros to 66-1.

2015 — The NCAA approves multiple rule changes to men’s basketball for the 2015-16 season, including a 30-second shot clock and fewer timeouts for each team. The shot clock was last reduced, from 45 to 35 seconds, in 1993-94.

2018 — Golden State romps to its second straight NBA championship, beating Cleveland 108-85 to finish a four-game sweep. Stephen Curry scores 37 points and Kevin Durant, who is named MVP for the second straight finals, has 20 for the Warriors. It’s the first sweep in the NBA Finals since 2007.

2019 — Ashleigh Barty, Australia, wins the French Open by defeating Marketa Vondrousoca. The win is Barty’s first Grand Slam singles title.

Compiled by the Associated Press

This day in baseball history

1914 — New York’s Iron Joe McGinnity posted his 14th straight win beating Pittsburgh 2-0. With the win moved the Giants into first place over Chicago.

1933 — Philadelphia’s Jimmie Foxx homered in his first three at bats all off Lefty Gomez as the A’s beat the New York Yankees 14-10. Foxx had homered his last time up the previous day to tie a major league record of hitting four consecutive home runs. Bobby Lowe did it in 1894.

1940 — Harry Craft of Cincinnati connected for a home run, a triple, a double and two singles in seven at-bats to lead a 27-hit attack as the Reds pounded the Dodgers 23-2 at Brooklyn.

1950 — The Boston Red Sox beat the St. Louis Browns 29-4 at Fenway Park and set major league records for runs scored; most long hits, 17 (nine doubles, one triple and seven homers); most total bases, 60; most extra bases on long hits, 32; most runs over two games, 49; most hits in two games, 51, including 28 this game. Bobby Doerr had three homers and 8 RBIs, Walt Dropo hit two homers and drove in seven runs and Ted Williams added two homers and five RBIs.

1968 — Howie Bedell’s sacrifice fly in the fifth inning ended Don Drysdale’s record streak of 58 2/3 consecutive scoreless innings. The Dodgers beat the Philadelphia Phillies 5-3.

1969 — The New York Yankees’ No. 7 was retired on Mickey Mantle Day. A crowd of 60,096 came to Yankee Stadium to honor Mantle and watched the Yankees sweep the Chicago White Sox 3-1 and 11-2.

1975 — Detroit’s Tom Veryzer doubled with two out in the ninth to end Oakland’s Ken Holtzman’s no-hitter. Outfielder Bill North misjudged Veryzer’s hit but was not charged with an error. Holtzman retired the last hitter for a 4-0 victory.

1986 — In the longest 9-inning game by time in AL history Baltimore’s Lee Lacy went 4-for-6 with three home runs and six RBIs as the Orioles beat the New York Yankees 18-9. The game took 4:16 to complete.

1996 — Warren Morris hit a two-run homer with two out in the bottom of the ninth inning to give Louisiana State a 9-8 victory over Miami in the championship game of the College World Series.

2001 — Damion Easley became the ninth Detroit player to hit for the cycle as the Tigers beat Milwaukee 9-4.

2010 — Stephen Strasburg exceeded expectations in his much-hyped major league debut, striking out 14 in seven innings to lead the Washington Nationals to a 5-2 win over the Pittsburgh Pirates. Last year’s No. 1 overall draft pick gave up four hits, two earned runs and didn’t walk a batter, piling up the most strikeouts in a debut since J.R. Richard fanned 15 for Houston in 1971.

2012 — Kevin Millwood and five Seattle relievers combined on a no-hitter, the third in franchise history, and the Mariners beat the Dodgers 1-0. Millwood was cruising through six innings, giving up just one walk. But while warming up for the seventh he felt a twinge in his groin and was pulled from the game. Five relievers combined to finish the no-hitter, capped by Tom Wilhelmsen retiring Andre Ethier on a routine grounder to end it.

2013 — In the longest major league game in more than three years, Adeiny Hechavarria hit an RBI single in the 20th inning and the Miami Marlins outlasted the New York Mets 2-1.

2020 — MLB owners present their counter-proposal to get the season started. They propose playing 76 games, with a postseason involving 16 teams, drop the proposed sliding scale for reducing salaries — although they still seek further cuts — and also propose dropping all forms of compensation for signing free agents. The ball is now back in the MLBPA’s court.

2021 — Pirates rookie 3B Ke’Bryan Hayes, swinging a red hot bat after coming back from a two-month stay on the injured list, makes a very embarrassing mistake when he has a home run taken away for missing first base. His apparent solo shot off Walker Buehler is nullified when the Dodgers successfully appeal that he did not touch the bag while rounding the bases.

Compiled by the Associated Press

Until next time…

That concludes today’s newsletter. If you have any feedback, ideas for improvement or things you’d like to see, email me at houston.mitchell@latimes.com. To get this newsletter in your inbox, click here.

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — USC’s 2026 baseball season will be defined by two words — progress and pain.

Just two outs away from reaching the College World Series for the first time since 2001, USC suffered a devastating 4-3 loss in game three of the Chapel Hill Super Regional, as North Carolina rallied for two runs in the bottom of the ninth and snatched the trip to Omaha away from the Trojans on Owen Hull’s walk-off RBI double into the left-center gap.

“I’m proud of our boys,” USC coach Andy Stankiewicz said. “I’m disappointed in the results, but I’m never disappointed in our guys. They did something pretty special this year.”

Andrew Johnson did everything possible and then some to get USC (48-18) across the finish line. After already throwing 3 ⅔ innings of shutout baseball to close Game 1, Johnson went a season-high 7 ⅔ innings with two earned runs surrendered to get the Trojans to the doorstep of victory. He glided through North Carolina’s lineup for most of the day, at one point retiring 15 out of 17 batters.

North Carolina’s Cooper Nicholson celebrates during his team’s ninth-inning rally to beat USC in their super regional finale Sunday in Chapel Hill, N.C.

(Laura Wolff/For The Times)

He ended the super regional with 133 pitches thrown in a little over 48 hours, on top of the 145 pitches he threw across two appearances in the College Station Regional for a total of 278 tosses in 22 ⅓ innings with five earned runs given up in a heroic postseason stretch.

“The goal from the beginning of the season is Omaha,” Johnson said. “We’re definitely not just happy that we made it to supers and moved past the regional, but for it was a great season and we can be proud of what we accomplished.”

A first inning run off a Caden Glauber balk, plus Kevin Takeuchi and Andrew Lamb’s solo home runs accounted for all the offense on a day when the Tar Heels (50-12-1) had their own star pitcher going. Atlantic Coast Conference freshman of the year Caden Glauber held the Trojans at bay for most of the game, striking out a career high 11 batters in 7 ⅓ innings.

USC coach Andy Stankiewicz talks to his players after their season-ending loss to North Carolina.

(Laura Wolff / For The Times)

Glauber’s work was enough to hold his team in the game, but USC still had a 3-2 lead heading to the fateful bottom of the ninth. After closer Adam Troy retired the first batter, a long, loud foul ball seemed to spark North Carolina.

Third baseman Cooper Nicholson crushed a ball more than far enough for a home run, but just foul into the left field corner. But the near-miss seemed to rattle Troy, who walked Nicholson after getting ahead 0-2 in the count and fell behind 3-0 to nine-hole hitter Carter French.

Stankiewicz made a pitching change mid at-bat, going to Chase Herrell. French lined a 3-2 single through the right side, leadoff hitter Jake Schaffner tied the score on a sacrifice fly and Gavin Gallaher drew a walk, bringing Hull to the plate with the series’ winning run at second.

USC appeared to survive at least with extra innings when a Hull foul ball looked ticketed for the third out, but it dropped with three fielders in the area to give him an extra life. Hull pounded his fourth double of the game, prompting mass hysteria from the 3,913 Tar Heel fans and ultimate heartbreak in the other dugout.

Stankiewicz has built his program in stages, finally making the NCAA tournament last year and then going a step further this year.

But he also knows these opportunities are never guaranteed, and it will take a lot of work to return to the super regional stage.

“It’s a step,” he said. “Things take a moment. Sometimes we want things to happen overnight as humans I guess, but sometimes it takes a moment. We’ve been at this thing for awhile now, and we feel like we’re certainly building it and folks are taking notice. Now we just can’t go backwards. This thing’s got to continue moving forward.”

A positive season, but a nightmare ending sure to haunt the Trojans until they finally return to Omaha.

Jennifer Cohen has heard her peers this spring lament the precarious state of college football, with the College Football Playoff format in flux, the College Sports Commission under fire and the current model of college athletics hanging by a proverbial thread. As athletic director at USC, Cohen understands the reasons for their doom and gloom.

There’s little clarity about where things stand in college athletics right now, let alone where they’re going. Plus, it has never cost more to run an athletic department — or a football program, with the price tag of rosters exceeding $40 million this season — in part because of name, image and likeness rights.

“There’s no doubt that this last year’s been frustrating, and that’s because we tried to fly a plane and build a plane at the same time,” Cohen told The Times last week. “So it’s certainly not going swimmingly, right?”

Before discussing all that’s wrong with the current college sports landscape, Cohen wants to remind everyone that it hasn’t all been bad.

“It’s important to talk about what are the positives that came from what’s happened,” Cohen said.” And from my perspective, student athletes have benefited now more than ever, you know?”

At USC, Cohen has managed to steer the athletic department through the chaos. As costs have risen exponentially with the advent of revenue sharing, Cohen says department revenue at USC is up almost 60% over a three-year span, sponsorship values have doubled and USC donors have poured money into the Trojan Athletic Fund, which is up 707% since she started.

Jennifer Cohen, left, and university president Carol Folt, right, flash the “V for Victory” hand sign during a news conference in 2023 introducing Cohen as USC’s new athletic director.

(Ringo Chiu / For The Times)

And later this summer, USC will open a $200-million football facility — a rarity in an age when such spending has more often taken a backseat.

None of that is to say USC is immune to the coming financial crunch in college sports.

“We also have to manage expenses, and we’re trying to do that and still support what we think is part of our DNA, which is [keeping all] 23 programs,” Cohen said. “As you look at the financial benefits that football brings to this place, the more you’re gonna take those revenues from football and put it back into football and to football student athletes versus other programs, you’re gonna feel the pinch. And so we’ve tried to mitigate that with new strategies on revenue generation.”

But what about when football rosters costs balloon to $50 million … or $60 million? What about $100 million?

“Hopefully not,” Cohen said. “We’ve gotta match roster spends with revenues and, and, and, and how we run a business.”

“I don’t think there’s one simple answer to this, and I do think that we are at a point where we’ve got to figure out as an industry, how do we do this in a smart way and not just let our competitiveness get the best of us? But that’s hard when football winning is the only way that you pay your bills.”

The Times sat down with Cohen last week to discuss the state of affairs in college football and USC’s athletic department. The following conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

With college football in such an uncertain place, do you feel like there needs to be some form of outside intervention? Or some major governance change that would help solve these problems?

“I think at some point in time we’re gonna have to find something. I mean, obviously we’re a year in. So I think first we all need to look in the mirror — myself included, as a leader — and say, ‘What did we do in this new system that worked? And what have we done in this new system that doesn’t work? And the question becomes, ‘Can you get everybody across the Power Four [conferences] to do that exercise and be honest enough to find some sort of solutions together? Or do you need to start looking at other solutions? I, for one, fully believe in federal support. I understand why it’s needed. I’m somebody that spent a lot of time on that earlier in my career, and, you know, the patchwork situation of laws is not fair from a competitive standpoint. It’s also very confusing to student athletes and to their families and to our coaches. But I am absolutely not holding my breath for that.

Eric Musselman and athletic director Jennifer Cohen hold a jersey with Musselman’s name during his introductory news conference as the Trojans’ basketball coach in 2024.

(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

“The most important place where I’m spending my energy is figuring out how we are going to win in whatever environment that we’re dealt. Because I don’t have as much control in my current role to solve for all of those national issues. I am 24/7 thinking about how USC is going to compete in whatever environment we’re in. And I feel really confident that we will. But as somebody that loves college sports, I also think that we are gonna have to find a different alternative than how we’re operating right now to have a sustainable and durable model.”

USC seems to be in a really strong place with NIL, stronger certainly than when you were hired. How would you say that USC has gotten to that point?

“ When we got here, my mantra was if you’re not ahead, you’re gonna get behind. And so there were a lot of areas that we focused on to just try to improve and get ahead, and NIL was one of them. There’s a natural ability here to be really competitive in NIL — especially in the third-party space with brands. You know, we were just looking at some data the other day just in this new CSC-NIL Go model. Our brand deals are valued 2 1/2 times more than the national average, and I think that really speaks to both USC, the city of L.A., and obviously the quality of the student athletes that we have. And I think it’s just been a strategy of embracing the new era, recognizing that it’s really cool to be able to have student athletes benefit in that new era, and it’s important, and that you have to be competitive in that space.

“And so I think it was just a matter of having intentionality in a plan and getting all of our stakeholders aligned around that plan, and it was an urgent matter to keep trying to get ahead in that space. Because if we weren’t, other people were. That’s how we’ve been tackling it, and so we’re really proud of how robust the program is now. But we’re gonna have to keep getting better at it. We’re gonna have to keep evolving.”

The Big Ten has come out in favor of expanding the College Football Playoff to 24 teams. What are your thoughts on that?

“We’re unified as a league around 24, there’s no doubt about that. And obviously that’s gaining traction in some of the other conferences as well. And so where we’re unified, USC’s gonna support that. I think that there’s merits in the 24 model. I also think there’s plenty of fair questions around that. It has to make sense for everybody. So that’s kind of where we stand on it.

USC athletic direct Jennifer Cohen wears a headset with microphone as she’s interviewed before a football game in 2023.

(Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

“I think personally speaking, I would have absolutely no problem staying at 12. I think we’ve experienced a lot of change in college sports and in college football. I think we need to understand how that change is impacting not just us, but our fans and others. And so if we end up at 12, I’m confident that we’re gonna find our way in that 12 every single year. And again, uh, that’s where my focus is. I mean, I am nonstop thinking about how USC athletics can compete in whatever model that we’re in, and I feel really good about the plans that we are developing and will continue to develop because we’re gonna have to keep changing to, to make sure that we’re competitive.

Being that it’s now Year 5, is it fair to say that the expectation is that Lincoln [Riley] needs to take USC to the Playoff this year?

“The expectation has always been the same. That’s the thing, that’s the reason why I came here, is that the standard is high. We do expect to make the playoff. We do expect to have a championship run. We do expect to be competing for championships every single year. I think that’s what’s awesome about USC, is that that’s what we all expect of it. And I know that I’m not the only one that expects that. I know our fans expect that. I know that he expects that. And so I really like this team. I really like the kids that we brought in. I love the returners. I love the leadership of this team.

“We’ve got some really outstanding older young men in this program that get it, that have been through a lot and really care about this place and this program. The young guys are awesome. They’re really challenging the older guys. So I feel really good about the talent level of this team, and I feel really good about what Lincoln’s done. I think with this staff, I think we have a highly competitive staff. I think we have a really experienced staff. And then you can’t dismiss what Chad’s accomplished. You know? I think that that’s been the benefit of bringing in not just Chad, but an entire front office staff, taking the pressure off of Lincoln, taking the pressure off of the other coaches so that they can be at their best. I mean, he’s been really energized about that and really focused on taking the strengths that he has. So yeah, the expectation, I mean, we haven’t been shy about that. We expect to win, and I, I feel confident that we’re going to.”

UCLA loses to Alabama

Megan Grant hit her 41st home run of the season to tie a UCLA career record Thursday night, but top-seeded Alabama rallied behind a five-run surge to beat the eighth-seeded Bruins 6-3 on opening day at the Women’s College World Series.

UCLA starter Taylor Tinsley took a 3-1 lead into the fifth inning but walked leadoff batter Jena Young then surrendered a 249-foot home run to Alexis Pupillo two batters later to tie the score.

In the sixth, Alabama’s Kristen White beat out a grounder to third and Young dropped a bloop single to left, setting the stage for Brooke Wells, who drove a pitch from Tinsley 239 feet to center field to give the Crimson Tide the lead.

The Bruins (52-9) will have to beat the winner of the game between Arkansas and Nebraska on Friday night to avoid elimination.

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Angels rout the Tigers

Grayson Rodriguez pitched five strong innings as the Angels beat the Detroit Tigers 7-1 on Thursday for their fifth victory in six games.

The Angels won back-to-back series for the first time this season, sweeping Texas at home before winning two of three in Detroit.

Detroit has gone 4-18 since May 4, losing seven straight series.

Rodriguez (2-1) allowed one run on two hits and two walks in five innings. He struck out five.

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Angels box score

MLB standings

MLB team owners propose a salary cap

From Bill Shaikin: They had balloons, baseball caps and a splashy video. They even had Dusty Baker, because any day with Dusty Baker is a good day.

And, as a campaign called “The Sacramento Pitch” unveiled its plan to lure a Major League Baseball expansion team to the state capital, the mayor made his pitch a blunt one.

“This region has earned its place in the majors,” Sacramento Mayor Kevin McCarty said Thursday. “And, frankly, MLB could use Sacramento.”

We’ll see. But, as McCarty and other dignitaries rallied in Sacramento, a more important gathering was happening in New York, at which MLB owners formally proposed the salary cap players have vowed to resist.

Whether owners can get a cap — either by persuasion through the fall and winter, or more likely by canceling games next spring so players go unpaid — remains to be seen. For Sacramento and the other American and Canadian cities pursuing two expansion teams, the outcome of collective bargaining could determine the fee MLB would charge for each one.

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Mason Edwards leads USC to College Baseball World Series

From Joaquin Ruiz: Mason Edwards has first-round hype ahead of July’s 2026 MLB draft for a reason.

USC’s ace takes the mound like a boxer enters the ring, eager to land blow after blow. And as the Trojans (43-15) open the NCAA tournament in College Station, Texas, at 6 p.m. PDT Friday (ESPNU), the southpaw packs a serious punch. He carries a nation-leading 160 strikeouts and the second-best 1.43 ERA.

“They’re getting a competitor,” Edwards said of what people can expect when he pitches. “There have been a lot of situations where I’ve had to battle and fight adversity. So, I think you’ll see a good fight when I toe the rubber. I’m not going to shy away from any type of competition.”

If anything, the competition probably shies away from Edwards.

Named the Big Ten 2026 Pitcher of the Year after stacking a record 113 strikeouts in conference play, Edwards is integral to what has been USC’s best team since the early 2000s.

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Can UCLA win the College Baseball World Series?

From Joaquin Ruiz: No. 1 UCLA’s quest for the second baseall national title in school history starts Friday.

The Bruins (51-6, 28-2 Big Ten) enter the NCAA tournament as the top overall seed and host against Saint Mary’s (34-25, 15-12 West Coast) to begin the Los Angeles Regional at Jackie Robinson Stadium.

After winning its first Big Ten tournament championship in program history on Sunday, UCLA is focused on continuing its dominance and embracing the target on its back as a College World Series favorite.

“We’ll see what happens, but I think just staying with us and not trying to do too much and just stay present,” UCLA junior outfielder Payton Brennan said. “That’s the main thing — and staying with each other.”

Their record and conference dominance aside, the Bruins sit atop several statistical categories and are intimidating across the diamond.

But UCLA coach John Savage said UCLA isn’t looking past its regional foes — Saint Mary’s, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo and Virginia Tech.

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This day in sports history

1946 — Two-year-old fillies Chakoora and Uleta become the first thoroughbreds to complete a transcontinental flight. They’re flown from New York to Inglewood by the American Air Express Corp., a 2,446-mile trip that lasts 20 hours due to bad weather.

1968 — European Cup Final, Wembley Stadium, London: Bobby Charlton scores twice as Manchester United beats Benfica, 4-1; first English club to win the trophy.

1971 — Al Unser wins his second straight Indianapolis 500 with a record mark of 157.735 mph and finishes 22 seconds ahead of Peter Revson. The pace car, ridden by Eldon Palmer, crashes into the portable bleachers and injures 20 people.

1977 — A.J. Foyt becomes the first driver to win four Indianapolis 500s and Janet Guthrie becomes the first woman in the race. Guthrie is forced to drop out after 27 laps with mechanical problems.

1977 — Australian Sue Prell first female golfer to hit consecutive holes-in one; 13th and 14th holes at Chatswood Golf Club, Sydney.

1980 — Larry Bird beats out Magic Johnson for NBA rookie of year.

1983 — After three second-place finishes, Tom Sneva wins the Indianapolis 500 by 11 seconds over three-time champion Al Unser.

1985 — 29th European Cup: Juventus beats Liverpool 1-0 at Brussels.

1988 — Rick Mears overcomes an early one-lap deficit, then overpowers the rest of the field on the way to his third Indianapolis 500 victory. Mears gives team-owner Roger Penske an unprecedented seventh victory and fourth in five years.

1990 — Stefan Edberg and Boris Becker, the top two seeds, are bounced in the first round of the French Open by two European teenagers, the first time the top two men’s seeds are eliminated in the first round of a Grand Slam tournament. Edberg is swept easily in straight sets by 19-year-old Sergi Bruguera of Spain, and Becker loses to 18-year-old Yugoslav Goran Ivanisevic.

1991 — 35th European Cup: Red Star Belgrade beats Marseille (0-0, 5-3 on penalties) at Bari.

1993 — Wayne Gretzky’s overtime goal gives the Kings a 5-4 win over the Toronto Maple Leafs in the Western Conference finals. The Kings become the first NHL team to play the full 21 games in the first three rounds.

1998 — Eighteen-year-old Marat Safin, ranked 116th in the world and playing in his first Grand Slam tournament, beats defending champion Gustavo Kuerten, 3-6, 7-6 (7-5), 3-6, 6-1, 6-4 in the second round of the French Open.

2005 — Dan Wheldon wins the Indianapolis 500 when Danica Patrick’s electrifying run falls short. Patrick is the first woman to lead at Indy, getting out front three separate times for a total of 19 laps. But Wheldon passes her with seven of the 200 laps to go and easily holds on.

2006 — Rafael Nadal passes Guillermo Vilas as the King of the clay courts and begins his pursuit of a second successive French Open trophy. Nadal earns his 54th consecutive win on clay, breaking the Open era record he shared with Vilas by beating Robin Soderling in straight sets in the first round at Roland Garros.

2011 — JR Hildebrand, one turn from winning the Indianapolis 500, skids high into the wall on the final turn and Dan Wheldon drives past to claim an improbable second Indy 500 win in his first race of the year.

2011 — Roger Federer sets another record by reaching the French Open quarterfinals, and Novak Djokovic closes in on a pair of his own. Federer extends his quarterfinal streak at major tournaments to 28 with a 6-3, 6-2, 7-5 victory over Stanislas Wawrinka. Djokovic maintains his perfect season to 41-0 and stretches his overall winning streak to 43 matches by beating Richard Gasquet of France 6-4, 6-4, 6-2.

2012 — Serena Williams loses in the first round of a major tournament for the first time, falling to Virginie Razzano of France 4-6, 7-6 (5), 6-3 at the French Open. Williams enters the day with a 46-0 record in first-round matches at Grand Slam tournaments.

2016 — Alexander Rossi wins the 100th running of the Indianapolis 500.

2017 — Tiger Woods is arrested and charged with driving under the influence in Jupiter, Fla.

2021 — UEFA Champions League Final, Porto: Kai Havertz scores just before halftime to give Chelsea a 1-0 win over Manchester City in an all-English final; Blues’ second CL title.

Compiled by the Associated Press

This day in baseball history

1916 — Christy Mathewson defeated the Boston Braves 3-0 for the New York Giants’ 17th consecutive road win.

1922 — The U.S. Supreme Court ruled organized baseball was primarily a sport and not a business, and therefore not subject to antitrust laws and interstate commerce regulations. The suit had been brought by the Federal League’s Baltimore franchise.

1928 — Bill Terry hit for the cycle to lead the New York Giants to a 12-5 win over Brooklyn at Ebbets Field. Terry became the first player in major league history to include a grand slam as part of the cycle.

1942 — New York’s Lefty Gomez, self-described as the worst-hitting pitcher in baseball, banged out four hits while pitching a 16-1 four-hitter against Washington.

1956 — Dale Long went hitless for the Pirates, ending his major league record streak of home runs in eight consecutive games. The Brooklyn Dodgers beat Pittsburgh, 10-1.

1965 — Philadelphia’s Richie Allen hit a 529-foot home run over the roof of Connie Mack Stadium off Chicago’s Larry Jackson in the Phillies’ 4-2 victory.

1976 — Houston’s Joe Niekro was the winning pitcher and hit a home run off his brother, Phil Niekro. The Astros beat the Atlanta Braves 4-1. It was the only home run hit by Joe in his 22-year major league career.

1990 — Oakland’s Rickey Henderson broke Ty Cobb’s 62-year-old American League stolen base record, but the Toronto Blue Jays still beat the Athletics 2-1. Henderson’s 893rd steal came in the sixth inning.

2000 — Oakland second baseman Randy Velarde turned the 10th unassisted triple play in regular-season history during a 4-1 loss to the New York Yankees. With runners on first and second in motion, Shane Spencer hit a line drive to Velarde who caught the ball, tagged out Jorge Posada (running from first) and stepped on second to beat Tino Martinez.

2002 — Roger Clemens recorded the 100th double-digit strikeout game of his career, fanning 11 in seven innings against Chicago. Nolan Ryan (215) and Randy Johnson (175) were the others to have 100 double-digit strikeout games.

2002 — In an article in Sports Illustrated former NL MVP Ken Caminiti stated that about 50% of current major league players used some form of steroids.

2003 — Colorado, behind Todd Helton’s three home runs and Ron Belliard’s five hits beat the visiting Dodgers 12-5. Helton added a single and drove in six runs.

2010 — Philadelphia’s Roy Halladay threw the 20th perfect game in major league history, beating the Florida Marlins 1-0. It was the first time in the modern era that there were a pair of perfect games in the same season. Halladay faced three Marlins pinch-hitters in the ninth. Mike Lamb led off with a long fly ball, Wes Helms struck out, and Ronny Paulino to hit a grounder to third for the 27th out. Halladay struck out 11 and went to either 3-1 or 3-2 counts seven times, twice in the game’s first three batters.

2013 — Chris Davis went 4 for 4 with two home runs, and the Baltimore Orioles overcame three homers by Ryan Zimmerman to beat the Washington Nationals 9-6.

2013 — Dioner Navarro had the first three-homer game of his career, connecting from both sides of the plate at Wrigley Field to lead the Chicago Cubs to a 9-3 win over the Chicago White Sox. Navarro drove in a career-high six runs and scored four times.

2014 — Diamondbacks pitcher Josh Collmenter faces the minimum 27 batters in spite of giving up three hits in a complete game shutout defeat of the Cincinnati Reds. The three Reds baserunners were erased on double plays.

2015 — Lewis-Clark State wins their 17th NAIA baseball title.

2021 — The Twins’ Josh Donaldson scored the two-millionth run in major league history.

2025 — Chris Sale becomes the fastest pitcher to reach 2,500 strikeouts, doing so in 2,026 innings, fewer than the 39 men who have preceded him to the mark.

Compiled by the Associated Press

Until next time…

That concludes today’s newsletter. If you have any feedback, ideas for improvement or things you’d like to see, email me at houston.mitchell@latimes.com. To get this newsletter in your inbox, click here.