Dominant

Its campus and enrollment are tiny, but Marymount High is a giant in the world of high school volleyball and this year’s squad looks to have the talent to compete for a championship.

The Sailors took first place out of 64 teams at the prestigious Durango Fall Classic in Las Vegas, taking down rival Sierra Canyon, 21-25, 25-15, 25-12, in the final on Sept. 20. Senior hitter and Washington commit Sammy Destler was named the tournament’s most valuable player.

Marymount did not drop a set en route to the Hawaiian Island Labor Day Classic title in Hilo in late August. Last weekend in Phoenix, the Sailors advanced to the championship match of the Platinum Division at the Nike Tournament of Champions Southwest, falling to reigning Southern Section Division 1 champion Mater Dei. The two programs could meet again in the CIF playoffs in November.

For those keeping score, that makes three finals and two titles at three tournaments in three different states over four weeks against the best competition in the nation — just the way head coach Cari Klein likes it.

Marymount High volleyball players, from left to right, Makenna Barnes, Sammy Destler and Elle Vandeweghe clap hands during a match.

(Steve Galluzzo / For The Times)

“Winning Durango was huge … and very fun,” said Klein, who reached the 700-win plateau early this season, her 28th at the all-girls Catholic school with 350 students across the street from UCLA. “These last two years we’ve gotten better the second day. Then playing TOC right after is a tough turnaround. It’s a lot of travel and a lot of volleyball.”

Three Sailors joined Destler on the all-tournament team in Durango: senior setter Olivia Penske (committed to Georgetown), junior hitter Makenna Barnes (an early Northwestern commit who has pounded a team-best 217 kills) and junior middle/opposite hitter and Stanford beach commit Katelyn Oerlemans, who leads the team with 63 blocks.

The roster also features senior middle blocker and Southern Methodist commit Elle Vandeweghe, senior middle blocker Frankie Jones (Brown), senior outside hitter Presley Jones (Amherst), senior libero Declan Eastman (Rice) and senior opposite hitter Grace Jamison (Lafayette).

Marymount lost to Mater Dei in one of the best finals in tournament history (28-26 in the third set) at Durango one year ago.

Girls’ volleyball coach Cari Klein has racked up more than 700 wins during her 28 seasons at Marymount High.

(Steve Galluzzo / For The Times)

“People don’t realize how few students we have or how academically-oriented it is,” Klein said. “Our girls have their books out in between every game. They’re studying on buses, on trains, in hallways … any chance they get to do schoolwork.”

Having played the sport herself (she was a state MVP at Irvine High in 1988 then an All-West Coast Conference hitter at Pepperdine), Klein demands a lot of her players, but she also tries to make the daily routine fun, worth getting up at the crack of dawn. Her motto is a hard practice makes an easy game.

Destler, who started playing for Klein’s Sunshine Volleyball Club when she was 8, takes that message to heart. After Marymount was dealt its first loss at Redondo Union on Sept 2, she stated: “We have practice at 5:45 a.m. tomorrow and I have to like it.”

The Sailors (29-3) are off to their best start since the 2021 team that finished 35-0, winning 92 of 100 sets in the process, and earned Klein PrepVolleyball.com national high school coach of the year honors.

Of the 20 players on varsity, eight are seniors and nine are juniors.

“This team is similar to the 2021 team,” Klein said. “What’s different is that those seniors four years ago were so hungry because they lost their junior year to COVID-19.”

Marymount’s longest drought between section finals appearances in Klein’s tenure is five seasons (2013 to 2017), so the team is about due. She also wants to add another player of the year to those she has already mentored — Haley Jorgensborg (2001); Stesha Selsky (2002 and 2003); Kelly Irvin (2005); Lauren Greskovics-Fuller (2011); and Elia Rubin (2021).

“There are nine or 10 teams in our section that could really give us a match,” said Klein, who has steered the Sailors to 10 Southern Section titles (including a record six in a row from 2001 to 2006), eight regional crowns and seven state championships since taking over the program in 1998. “Huntington Beach, Los Alamitos, Sierra Canyon, Newport Harbor, Santa Margarita, Redondo, Mira Costa, Harvard-Westlake, Mater Dei — all very hard to beat. And if you get to the next level, there are four San Diego schools that are really strong too. CIF is stacked.”

In addition to the postseason success, Marymount has won 24 league titles under Klein. To add to that total, it must beat Sierra Canyon, which defeated the Sailors three times last season. The first of the schools’ two Mission League meetings is Monday night in Chatsworth.

In one regard, a section title in 2025 would be sweeter than the others for Klein because she lost her home in the Palisades fire in January, as did some of her players. She has been living in Playa del Rey with her husband, former Palisades High quarterback Perry Klein.

“We’ve all had to deal with it already, but a lot of girls in the program have been affected and the younger club players as well,” she said. “It’s a pretty emotional year for Marymount.”

PHOENIX — Shohei Ohtani entered uncharted territory in his final pitching start of the regular season, shutting out the Arizona Diamondbacks over a season-high six innings in the Dodgers’ 5-4 walk-off loss Tuesday night.

The question now, with the start of the playoffs looming: When will the two-way star toe the rubber next?

After a season spent mostly in rehab mode as a pitcher, building his workload inning by inning as he slowly worked his way back from a second Tommy John surgery, Ohtani has checked every box in his recovery and looks primed for what will be his first career postseason pitching outing.

On Tuesday, his fastball was elite once again, topping out at 101.2 mph and accounting for five of his eight total strikeouts. The rest of his seven-pitch mix kept the wild-card-seeking Diamondbacks off balance, resulting in just five hits (all singles) and no walks.

Most of all, the right-hander was also efficient, needing only 91 throws to work past the fifth inning for the first time this year.

“Over the last three or four starts, there’s been a ramp-up of intensity and performance,” manager Dave Roberts said of Ohtani, who has given up one run in 19 ⅓ innings over his last four outings to finish the regular season with a 2.87 ERA in 15 starts.

“I think that was his plan.”

Now, it’s up to the team to make a plan for its postseason pitching rotation and figure out exactly where Ohtani fits within it.

Roberts has virtually guaranteed that the reigning National League MVP will be used as a starter in next week’s best-of-three wild card round (which the Dodgers are all but assured of playing in, even if they sew up an NL West division title that has a magic number of three.

And as things currently stand, Ohtani would be lined up to go in Game 1, after the team moved his weekly pitching schedule this month to have him start on Tuesdays. Coincidentally or not, Game 1 of the wild-card round would be next Tuesday.

The reasons for opening that series with Ohtani on the mound are obvious — from his electric stuff, to his penchant for performing in big moments, to ensuring he does pitch in a series that could end in only two games.

However, Roberts insisted team officials “don’t know yet” how their postseason rotation will be ordered. Between the ever-present concerns about managing Ohtani’s two-way workload, and the team’s other wealth of starting options in what has been a resurgent rotation over the last month, there’s debate to be had about how to best maximize their $700-million superstar.

The Dodgers could, for instance, opt to start the wild-card series with Blake Snell and Yoshinobu Yamamoto in Games 1 and 2, and save Ohtani for a potential Game 3. The benefit there: Ohtani could focus solely on his duties as designated hitter the first two games, and wouldn’t be required to play the day immediately after a pitching start (he is hitting only .138 in such games this season, and the Dodgers have made an effort to get him starts immediately before off days in recent months).

Because Ohtani isn’t as built-up as the team’s other starters, delaying his start could also ease the burden early in the series on a shaky bullpen, which coughed up a 4-0 lead Tuesday after rookies Jack Dreyer and Edgardo Henriquez combined to surrender three runs in the seventh, and closer Tanner Scott blew his 10th save in a two-run ninth punctuated by Geraldo Perdomo’s walk-off single.

“I think it just kind of gives us some options,” Roberts said of having Ohtani potentially lined up for a Game 1 start. “But the likelihood of him starting a playoff game in that first series is very high.”

Whenever Ohtani takes the mound again, the Dodgers are hopeful that concerns about his pitching stamina will be somewhat assuaged.

Up until this week, the team had a hard cap of five innings for whenever Ohtani took the mound. For the sake of his health, they were reluctant to waver from it, even when Ohtani had a no-hitter through five his last time out against the Philadelphia Phillies.

Prior to Tuesday’s series-opener at Chase Field, however, Roberts said that “if all goes well,” Ohtani would pitch into the sixth inning and that his leash could be further loosened in October after recent conversations between the player and club.

“I feel really good with the conversation I had with Shohei about how today could potentially play out,” Roberts said pregame. “This is me talking to the training staff, talking to Shohei, feeling like we’ve got a really good base now.”

Once the sixth arrived Tuesday night, Ohtani made Roberts’ decision easy. He had yielded just three hits to that point (one of them, a comebacker that got him in the palm of his glove in the third). The Dodgers had a comfortable early lead, after Teoscar Hernández homered in the second and belted a two-run, two-out triple in the top of the sixth (catcher Ben Rortvedt added a run with his first Dodgers homer in the seventh).

Five batters later, Ohtani’s night was done, the right-hander stranding a pair of sixth-inning singles by getting Gabriel Moreno to line out to center and retire the side.

The next time he takes the mound, it will be his first time pitching in a postseason setting. Whether it comes in Game 1, or later in the best-of-three wild card series, will now be up for the team to decide.

Bullpen reinforcements

The Dodgers have at least one bullpen reinforcement coming in this series, with rookie right-hander Roki Sasaki set to be activated on Wednesday in his long-awaited return from a shoulder injury.

However, the status of trade deadline acquisition Brock Stewart remains in question. Though Stewart completed a recent minor-league rehab stint, and was with the team in Arizona on Tuesday, Roberts said the club is still “making sure he feels good” after missing the last six weeks with a shoulder injury. It is unclear if he will be activated this week, as originally expected.

“[We’re] making sure he’s put in a position to feel good if he is activated,” Roberts said. “That’s no guarantee … We’ll know more tomorrow.”

Before Tuesday’s game, Stewart threw an extended flat-ground session in front of a team trainer and general manager Brandon Gomes. The three talked for several minutes once Stewart’s session was complete.

Dave Roberts started out of the dugout with a walk.

Once Blake Snell caught his gaze, it turned into a trot.

With two out in the seventh inning, and Snell trying to put the finishing touches on his best performance in a Dodgers uniform, Roberts appeared to be coming to the mound after a pair of walks to turn to his shaky bullpen with a three-run lead.

As he usually does when removing a pitcher, his gait was slow — at least, initially.

Once Snell saw him coming, however, Roberts picked up his pace — as he will sometimes do when electing to leave a pitcher in the game.

This time, it was the latter.

After a brief discussion between manager and starting pitcher, Snell stayed in.

Five throws later, the $180-million offseason signee rewarded the decision, striking out Otto Kemp with a 95-mph fastball to put an emphatic ending on his scoreless seven-inning start, one that lifted the Dodgers to a 5-0 win over the Philadelphia Phillies.

Entering Wednesday, all the discussion around the Dodgers had centered on the bullpen. The slumping unit was coming off two of its worst performances of the season. The majority of Roberts’ pregame address with reporters was spent dissecting how to fix it.

“Before the results, has to be confidence,” Roberts said, comparing the relief corps’ struggles to the second-half scuffles that the offense only recently emerged from. “It’s just kind of trying to reset a mentality, a mindset and expect that things happen. … You can’t chase a zero in an inning until you execute the first pitch, and then keep going like that. And I think that right now you can see that they’re kind of trying a little too hard.”

On Wednesday night, however, Snell made their job easy.

Efficient from the start with the kind of aggressive, attacking game plan he had acknowledged was missing in his last three outings, Snell went to work quickly against the Phillies, retiring the side on eight pitches (and two strikeouts) in the first inning, en route to setting down the first eight batters he faced.

Brief trouble arose in the third, when Bryson Stott and Harrison Bader had back-to-back singles.

But then Snell froze Kyle Schwarber with a curveball, one of the seven punchouts he recorded with the pitch. He had a season-high 12 strikeouts on the night.

And after that, the Phillies didn’t put another runner aboard until the seventh, with Snell breezing through the next 12 batters.

In the meantime, the Dodgers built a lead. Freddie Freeman homered to lead off the second. Ben Rortvedt (starting his third straight game behind the plate, even with Dalton Rushing back from a leg injury) added an RBI single later in the inning, following an Andy Pages hit-and-run single that put runners on the corners.

Another run came around in the fourth, after Pages worked a two-out walk, stole second, took third on a wild pickoff throw and scored on an RBI single from Kiké Hernández (who played third base in place of Max Muncy, who still felt “fuzzy” on Tuesday from a hit-by-pitch he took to the head over the weekend).

And from there, the Dodgers watched Snell cruise, with the $182-million offseason acquisition attacking the corners of the strike zone while also inducing misses on 24 of 54 swings.

The night culminated in the seventh, after walks to Nick Castellanos and Max Kepler drew Roberts out of the dugout. In the bullpen, left-hander Alex Vesia was getting warm. For a brief moment, it appeared the game would be in the hands of the relievers.

Snell had other ideas, signaling Roberts to hurry to the mound in the middle of his walk before seemingly pleading his case to stay in.

Whatever he said, Roberts listened.

Snell stayed on the rubber. A crowd of 50,859 roared in approval.

Against his final batter, Kemp, Snell fell behind, missing low with a changeup before pulling a fastball wide. Undeterred, he went back on the attack, getting one foul ball with a heater on the inner half, then another with a curveball that leaked over the plate. The count was 2-and-2. Chavez Ravine rose to its feet.

The next pitch — Snell’s 112th of the night — was another fastball, this time on the upper, outside corner at 95.3 mph. Kemp swung through it. Snell screamed and pumped his fist. In the dugout, Roberts raised an arm in the air, then began clapping as Snell walked off to a raucous ovation.

The next two innings were refreshingly simple. Alex Vesia retired the side in the top of the eighth. The Dodgers made it a five-run lead by scoring twice in the bottom half of the frame, including on Shohei Ohtani’s 51st home run of the season. Embattled closer Tanner Scott spun a stress-free ninth, pitching three consecutive scoreless outings for the first time since early July.

Come October, that’s the kind of blueprint the Dodgers (who maintained a two-game lead in the National League West over the San Diego Padres) will have to try and replicate.

Their bullpen still needs fixing. Their relief issues aren’t solved. But more gems like Snell’s would certainly help.

Billionaire Steve Mandel and his hedge fund Lone Pine Capital have been a great one to follow for individual investors. Although some hedge funds have a poor record of underperforming the broader market, Mandel has substantially outperformed the market over the past three years. So, when he makes a move in his portfolio, investors should pay attention.

One thing Mandel did during Q2 was sell off some of his Microsoft shares. Although it wasn’t a massive move, the hedge fund reduced its position by about 5%. Then, Mandel used some of those funds to invest in another promising AI stock that has increased in value by nearly 800% over the past decade.

That stock? Amazon (AMZN -1.16%).

Image source: Getty Images.

AWS is the best reason to invest in Amazon right now

Amazon may not be the first company that comes to mind when you think about AI. Instead, it probably seems more like an e-commerce investment. While that sentiment is true for the consumer-facing portion, the reality is that a large chunk of Amazon’s profits comes from AI-related revenue streams.

The biggest is from Amazon Web Services (AWS), its cloud computing arm. Cloud computing firms are having a strong year, thanks to the massive demand generated by AI workloads. Because more companies can’t justify spending millions (or even billions) of dollars on a data center dedicated to training AI models, it’s far more reasonable to rent computing power from a firm that already has the capacity. That’s the idea behind cloud computing, and it has translated into strong growth for the business unit.

In Q2, AWS’s sales rose 17% to $30.9 billion. That’s strong growth, but it is a bit slower than its peers, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud, which each grew revenue by more than 30% in Q2. However, AWS is much larger than both of these units, so it shouldn’t surprise investors that AWS is growing at a slower rate. AWS accounted for about 18% of Amazon’s total revenue in Q2, but it made up 53% of its operating profit. That’s because AWS has far superior margins compared to its commerce business units, making AWS a critical part of the Amazon investment thesis.

AWS is experiencing a significant boost from AI, making it a strong stock pick in this space.

But Microsoft is also a solid AI pick, so why is Mandel moving from Microsoft to Amazon?

Amazon’s stock looks more promising over the long term

From a valuation perspective, both companies trade at fairly expensive levels for their growth. However, they’re both priced about the same from a forward price-to-earnings (P/E) standpoint.

AMZN PE Ratio (Forward) data by YCharts

One thing Amazon has going for it that Microsoft doesn’t is the steady upward pressure on Amazon’s margins. Thanks to AWS and its advertising service business units being the fastest growing in Amazon, its margins are steadily improving. Although Amazon’s revenue growth rate appears to be somewhat slow, its operating income growth rate is actually quite rapid.

AMZN Revenue (Quarterly YoY Growth) data by YCharts

This trend still has years to unfold, which is a solid reason to transition from Microsoft to Amazon. I believe this will be a winning trade over the long term, as Amazon’s profits are expected to grow at a significantly faster rate than Microsoft’s, resulting in the stock outperforming its peer over the long term due to their similar valuations.

However, both stocks are still solid AI picks, and you can’t go wrong with either one.

World number one Jannik Sinner dropped only four games in a dominant straight-set win over Vit Kopriva in the first round of the US Open.

The defending champion wrapped up a 6-1 6-1 6-2 victory over Czech player Kopriva, ranked 89th in the world, in an hour and 38 minutes on Arthur Ashe Stadium.

Most notably, the 24-year-old Italian showed little sign of the illness which forced him to retire early from his Cincinnati Open final against Carlos Alcaraz last week.

“I’m very happy that I’m healthy again and that we did our best to be in the best possible shape here,” Sinner said after his win.

Kopriva, making his main-draw debut in New York, failed to pose any serious threat to Sinner, who has now won 22 consecutive matches at hard-court Grand Slams.

Even after he had climbed to the top of the world rankings, there were some doubts about Scheffler’s game.

The statistics proved he was the best from tee to green. They also proved he was among the worst with the putter.

In late 2023, a call was made to English putting guru Phil Kenyon – whose client list is a who’s who of major champions – in a bid to improve with the flatstick.

Attention was particularly paid to Scheffler’s reading of the greens and increasing the stability of his grip.

Switching to a claw grip – where the right hand acts as a pincer lower down the shaft – has transformed Scheffler into one of the most reliable putters in the game.

The tweak helped him become the first player to defend the PGA Tour’s Players Championship, win a second Masters, Olympic gold and five other titles in a stellar 2024 that also had echoed Woods.

Leading the putting statistics after three rounds at Portrush, having holed 97% of his putts inside five feet and 90% of those within 10 feet, put him in command. He holed putts of 14, 15 and 16 feet on Sunday.

“[The grip] was something we tested out last year and felt comfortable from the start,” Scheffler said.

“I use it as we get closer to the hole, lag putting. Outside of 15 to 20 feet, I’m still putting conventional.

“It was something we felt could help us improve, and so far it has.”

While improved putting has taken Scheffler to Woods-esque heights, will it help him move closer to replicating his iconic predecessor’s achievements over the longer term? That remains to be seen over the coming years.

Less than one hour after he teed off on Sunday afternoon Scottie Scheffler had effectively won his first Open Championship title.

The world number one was only walking off the fourth green but the game was already up. A starting four-shot advantage over the field had grown to seven at a sun-kissed Royal Portrush in Northern Ireland.

A third birdie of the round, on the fifth, further underlined his dominance and the only question left remaining was if he would surpass Tiger Woods’ modern record of an eight-shot win, achieved in 2000 at St Andrews.

In the end, he fell short of that but a 68 saw him win on 17 under par, four shots clear of fellow American Harris English, who closed with a 66.

Last week’s surprise Scottish Open winner Chris Gotterup was one further back after a 67, while England’s Matt Fitzpatrick, who hovered around the top of the leaderboard all week, birdied two of the last three to join Wyndham Clark (65) in joint fourth on 11 under.

Rory McIlroy looked emotional as he was welcomed on to the final green like the champion by thousands of adoring fans.

He tapped in for a par that saw him finish alongside Scotland’s Robert MacIntyre and last year’s winner Xander Schauffele on 10 under.

The new champion golfer of the year though is Scheffler and given his recent dominance the comparisons with Woods are only going to grow stronger.

This stat adds to that feeling. A total of 1,197 days elapsed between Woods first major victory and his fourth (the 1997 Masters and 2000 Open). A total of 1,197 days have elapsed between Scheffler’s first major victory and his fourth (the 2022 Masters and 2025 Open).

It is a second major title of the year for Scheffler, after winning May’s US PGA Championship, and a fourth in total, adding to his two Masters. He now only needs the US Open to become the seventh player to complete the career Grand Slam.

Victory on the Antrim coast is the American’s second title outside of his home country, after also claiming gold at last year’s Olympics in Paris, France.

It is not bad for a man who spoke at the start of the week about how professional golf was “not a fulfilling life” and questioned “the point” of pursuing victories with such zeal.

More to follow.

England cruised past the United States in a match in Washington that had almost two hours of delays because of lightning strikes in the area.

Kick-off in the US capital was held up by an hour, with play in the one-off Test starting at 18:05 local time (23:05 BST) on Saturday.

England led 14-0 in the 29th minute when more reports of bad weather forced Scottish referee Sam Grove-White to take the players off the field for a further 40 minutes.

On both occasions, supporters inside the 20,000-capacity Audi Field in Washington were told to “exit the seating bowl” and “seek shelter in the concourse” on a message on the stadium’s video screen.

Despite the weather delays, England still managed to shine, scoring six tries to end their tour of Argentina and the United States with a perfect three-win record.

Steve Borthwick’s side started the match well, taking the lead through Curtis Langdon after a maul in the 11th minute, while Luke Northmore crossed under the posts seven minutes later. Both tries came with the USA down to 14 players with Chris Hilsenbeck in the sin-bin.

Alex Dombrandt and debutant Joe Carpenter then had tries chalked off after TMO reviews, before Cadan Murley deservedly added England’s third score by crossing on the left wing on the stroke of half-time.

Straight after the restart, Jack van Poortvliet went over while replacement Harry Randall produced a brilliant dummy to score in the 62nd minute.

Gabriel Oghre finished England’s sixth try, but the Red Roses were unable to completely shut the US out, as Shilo Klein crashed over in the corner right at the end.

Alongside Sale full-back Carpenter, Bath centre Max Ojomoh, Gloucester second row Arthur Clark and Gloucester fly-half Charlie Atkinson all made their England debuts.

Immanuel Feyi-Waboso also returned after his two-match ban as Borthwick made 12 changes to the England side who beat the Pumas in San Juan in their second Test.

Earlier at Audi Field, the USA’s women survived a late charge to beat Fiji 31-24.

While the loss to Fiji was damaging to Scotland, a loss to Samoa would have been unthinkable. However, Ashman’s early score eased any jitters.

The Australia-bound hooker latched on to a driving maul to put Scotland in the lead after seven minutes, but in those early stages they’d had to stand up to some surging Samoa attack.

But after they landed the first blow, the backline kicked into gear. Stafford McDowall kicked through for Hutchinson to collect with the Northampton man darting over for Scotland’s only central score of the first half.

The next one was much wider, as the impressive Jamie Dobie looped a long miss pass out to the scampering Reed to dot down in the corner.

Five minutes later, they had their fourth. Dobie, Fergus Burke and Rowe all timed passes to perfection, with Steyn cantering in untouched.

They started the second-half in equally clinical fashion. Pounding at the Samoan barricades, the battering ram of Gilchrist eventually broke through to timber over for only his second international score.

Any hope of shutting out the hosts was soon snuffed out as replacement George Horne threw a blind pass on his own five-metre while being bundled into touch. Samoan lock Nee-Nee was on hand to intercept, gleeful at such an opportunity being handed to him.

Scotland responded immediately. From a scrum they went left, then right, then left again. Andy Onyeama-Christie carried hard, as did Matt Fagerson, but it was Burke’s pop-up offload from the deck which gave Rowe the chance to leap into the corner and touch down.

Toulon centre Paia’aua was able to get one back for Samoa, spinning out of the hands of two Scotland tacklers, but Turner got the seventh from the back of a driving maul.

The scoreline could have been far more comfortable, but Burke forgot his kicking boots and could only land one of his four conversion attempts. It was a greasy surface, in fairness to the Scotland newbee.