The Zion Phelps story is going to be told over and over at Loyola High to show students what can happen when someone discovers potential and decides to take a chance to bring it out.
In his first year running track after bragging during the football season that he was the fastest student at Loyola, Phelps proved on Thursday he’s also the fastest 100-meter runner in the Mission League by winning in a school-record time of 10.49 seconds at the Mission League finals at Sherman Oaks Notre Dame.
“I’m beyond grateful,” he said after embracing Loyola coach Sharaud Moore.
A junior defensive back, Phelps let Moore bring out his track talent, and now he has options in track and football.
Loyola’s Ejam Johannes offers the “shoosh” sign after anchoring the winning 4×100 relay team. He also won the Mission League 400 and 200 titles.
(Craig Weston)
Another Loyola athlete stepping forward in preparation for next weekend’s Southern Section Division 1 prelims was Ejam Yohannes. He ran anchor leg for the 4×100-meter relay team that beat Notre Dame for the first time in three years with a time of 40.75. At the finish, he put a finger over his lips and gave a “shoosh” sign. He also won the 400 meters in 47.05 and the 200 meters in 20.85, the fourth-best wind legal time in the state this year.
Notre Dame’s JJ Harel qualified in three events — going 6 feet, 10 inches in the high jump, 22-5¼ in the long jump and also qualifying in the triple jump.
The strangest moment of the day came in the Mission League 100 girls’ final. Nalia Keyes of Chaminade and Maya Rios of Bishop Alemany tied for first place, each finishing with a time of 12.46.
“It’s weird,” Rios said of her first ever race tie.
In the Marmonte League final, Demare Dezeurn of Westlake ran the 100 meters in 10.39 seconds to outduel Jaden Griffin of Newbury Park (10.50) and Kingston Celifie of Calabasas (10.56). Dezeurn played football for Palisades in the fall after transferring from Bishop Alemany last season.
Baseball
Sylmar 10, Kennedy 0: Rickee Luevano hit a grand slam for Sylmar.
Westlake 10, Newbury Park 3: Dylan Lee homered and Holden Backus had two hits and three RBIs.
Bishop Amat 3, La Serna 2: Ray Castro threw six innings and also had an RBI single.
Temecula Valley 3, Vista Murrieta 1: Grayson Martin gave up one hit and struck out seven in six innings.
Oaks Christian 17, Calabasas 8: Ryan Sheffer hit two home runs and finished with four RBIs.
Softball
Garden Grove Pacifica 4, Cypress 1: Jenna Valladares had an RBI triple and Shay Kletke threw a complete game.
Sherman Oaks Notre Dame 16, Louisville 0: Jackie Morales had three hits and six RBIs.
Harvard-Westlake 14, Chaminade 11: It was a wild Mission League game that ended on a walk-off grand slam by Kale’a Tindal in the bottom of the ninth inning. Chaminade scored five runs in the seventh to tie the score 9-9. Both teams scored runs in the eighth to make it 10-10. Chaminade took an 11-10 lead in the top of the ninth on an RBI single by Siena Greenlinger. Tindal finished with four hits and four RBIs. Dylan Fischer had a home run, two doubles, a single and four RBIs.
Murrieta Mesa 8, Great Oak 0: Tatum Wolff threw six innings, striking out 10 and walking none. She also hit a home run.
The Federal Communications Commission is considering an early review of the Walt Disney Co.’s broadcast TV licenses amid criticism of ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel’s provocative jokes ahead of the White House Correspondents’ Assn. dinner.
The order could come as soon as Tuesday, according to Semafor, which first reported that the review is expected. The licenses for ABC’s stations — which include KABC in Los Angeles — were not scheduled for renewal until 2028.
Disney has not commented on the possibility of a review.
The move was likely in the works before the latest kerfuffle over Kimmel, who is under fire for a comedic bit that satirized the annual Washington gala that Trump attended for the first time. FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, who has targeted the political content on the ABC daytime talk show “The View,” told The Times on Saturday that an action related to ABC programming was coming this week.
Carr has suggested “The View” should not be exempt from the FCC’s equal time rule that requires broadcasters to bring on a politician’s rival to provide balanced coverage and multiple viewpoints.
Carr, who was at the Saturday dinner, made the remark just hours before the event was shut down after a Torrance man breached security at the Washington Hilton while armed with a shotgun, handgun and several knives. The suspect, Cole Tomas Allen, was arrested and faces three criminal charges, including attempting to assassinate President Trump.
Right-wing commentators have gone into heavy rotation with the claim that a routine by Kimmel inspired Allen to act.
During the bit that aired Thursday, a tuxedo-clad Kimmel called First Lady Melania Trump “beautiful,” saying she had “the glow of an expectant widow.” The comic explained Monday that the gag was a reference to the age difference between Trump and his wife.
“It was a very light roast joke about the fact that he’s almost 80 and she’s younger than I am,” Kimmel said. “It was not, by any stretch of the definition, a call to assassination. And they know that.”
Since becoming FCC chairman last year, Carr has repeatedly threatened to use the levers of power he has to punish TV and radio stations that irritate Trump. His behavior has alarmed free speech advocates, including the FCC’s lone Democratic appointee Anna Gomez, who noted that early station renewal reviews are exceedingly rare and largely futile.
“This is unprecedented, unlawful, and going nowhere,” Gomez said in a statement. “It is a political stunt and it won’t stick. Companies should challenge it head-on. The 1st Amendment is on their side.”
Other White House administrations have threatened to pull TV station licenses in response to negative news coverage. At the height of the Watergate scandal in the 1970s, Richard Nixon’s allies unsuccessfully attempted to challenge the TV licenses for three stations owned at the time by the Washington Post.
RKO General, a unit of the General Tire and Rubber Co., was the last company to lose broadcast TV station licenses in 1987, including Los Angeles outlet KHJ. The case was related to corporate malfeasance and not broadcast content on the stations.
The process to revoke the RKO licenses took seven years from the moment the FCC voted in favor of the move.
Dodgers closer Edwin Díaz said Monday that he’s known about the five loose bodies in his elbow — which were removed in an operation Wednesday — since he was drafted in 2012.
Last week in Colorado was the first time it affected him. He gave up three runs without recording an out on April 19. And the next day, he told the team his arm felt “weird.”
On Monday, he described the feeling as “tired and tight.”
Before his arm started giving him problems, Díaz was unavailable for four straight games because of fatigue in his knee. His legs felt “good” in Colorado, Díaz said.
Results from an MRI scan suggested that the loose bodies in his elbow were to blame for the discomfort in his arm. Díaz said he was confident the operation would resolve the problem.
“The tightness and the soreness was where the loose body was,” Díaz said. “So that’s why we ended up getting the surgery because it was in the same spot I’ve always had them.”
He’s hoping to return after the All-Star break. So, the Dodgers will have to come up with an alternate ninth-inning plan for the next two-and-a-half months.
“That sucks to miss the first half with the team,” Díaz said. “I’m new with this team. But that’s something I can’t control. Everyone here is supporting me. All of my teammates they’re supporting me, they’re happy that I’m doing way better than before. They just can’t wait to see me on the mound in the second half.
“They say, take your time, we need you in October. But I want to come back as soon as possible and help this team to win games.”
Díaz is still waiting to have his stitches removed, but he expects to start playing catch in a couple weeks.
“My arm is feeling way better than it did on Sunday,” he said. “That’s a good sign. Right now, just a couple days after surgery, I can move my arm really good. My range of motion is coming back to normal. So that’s something I like. And just get stronger and be ready for the second half.”
Kings coach D.J. Smith gave his team the day off Friday, but he sent his players home with a message: if they don’t show up for work Sunday, they’ll have the rest of the spring and summer off, too.
Players don’t like to call any game a “must-win” because of the pressure it brings, but there’s no other way to look at Sunday’s game for the Kings. After losing the first three games of their best-of-seven playoff series with the Colorado Avalanche, the Kings are one loss away from being eliminating in the first round for a fifth consecutive season.
“Must-win game,” agreed defenseman Drew Doughty, who hasn’t played on a winning team in a playoff series since the Kings last won the Stanley Cup in 2014. “Everyone’s going to give everything and we’ve got to win that one. And then hopefully go back to Denver.”
The most recent loss came Thursday when the Avs scored two fluky goals on pucks that bounced in off the skates of Kings players and put another one into an empty net in a 4-2 victory that pushed the Kings to the brink of elimination once again.
“You don’t like the result,” Smith said. “And it’s tough to swallow.”
For Colorado, the best team in the NHL during the regular season, it hasn’t been the most stylish of postseasons. But after a pair of hard-fought 2-1 wins at home, the Avs have a chance to sweep a playoff series for the first time since 2022, when they won their last Stanley Cup.
“All the games have been tight. We’re right there,” forward Quinton Byfield said. “Each guy, including myself, we just have to give a little bit more.
“We’re doing the right things, we just have to dig in a little bit more.”
It’s hard to say how. The Kings’ power play has been good, scoring a goal in each of the three games, and their penalty kill even better, shutting out the top-scoring team in the NHL on nine tries with a man advantage.
The Kings have been physical and fast and goaltender Anton Forsberg has been brilliant in his first career playoff series, making 90 saves in the three games. Yet none of that has paid off with a win.
“Sometimes you play real well for stretches and you don’t get the results. And then you’ll win a game you don’t deserve to win,” Smith said. “Maybe we didn’t stay with it long enough.”
“Those games are over with,” a frustrated Byfield added. “You can’t look back at those games. It’s just on to the next one, that’s our focus.”
Doughty said the Kings need to wear down the Avalanche, something they clearly couldn’t do in the two games played in Denver’s mile-high altitude. They might have a better chance Sunday at sea level.
“I don’t think we’re creating enough Grade A chances,” he said. “They’re statistically one of the best teams in the neutral zone. So for us to beat them, we’ve got to wear them down in the D zone, make them tired and score goals that way. We haven’t done that enough.”
Every team has its kryptonite and the for the Kings that appears to be the first round of the playoffs. Over the past dozen seasons, the team has gone 9-27 in the postseason, taking a series to a seventh game just once in six tries. Along the way they’ve changed general mangers twice, changed head coaches five times and even changed their opponents, facing the Avs this year after losing four straight series to the Edmonton Oilers.
None of that has changed the results.
Smith, in fact, is an interim coach, having taken over for Jim Hiller with 23 games left in the regular season. He figures to be coaching for his future Sunday since a playoff sweep won’t look good at his resume.
“There’s no quit in there,” Smith said of the Kings’ locker room. “We’ll get reset with practice [Saturday] and I think you’re going to see our best effort.
“Now we’ve got to make a few changes and see if we can spark something.”
If that works, the Kings will be heading back to Denver. If it doesn’t, they’ll be heading home for another long summer.
By early 1963, the Station Hotel in London had become an epicenter of the burgeoning British blues scene. On a blustery, snowy night that February, the Rolling Stones’ classic early lineup took the stage for one of the first times, dazzling the audience with ferocious renditions of blues standards like Muddy Waters’ “I Want to Be Loved” and Jimmy Reed’s “Bright Lights, Big City.”
Multi-instrumentalist Brian Jones, the band’s founder and leader, synchronized guitars with Keith Richards, who favored a distinctive slashing and stinging style. Drummer Charlie Watts, the group’s newest member, a jazz aficionado and an accomplished percussionist, propelled the music forward with a rock-solid beat.
Anchoring the rhythm section with him was bassist Bill Wyman, who was recruited more for his spare VOX AC30 amp that the guitarists could plug into than for his musical skills. The stoic bassist proved a strong and innovative player. Together, he and Watts would go on to form one of rock’s most decorated rhythm sections.
Ian Stewart’s energetic boogie-woogie piano style rounded out the sound. Months later, manager Andrew Loog Oldham kicked him out of the band for being “ugly,” although Stewart continued to record, tour and serve as the band’s road manager until his death in 1985.
This April 8, 1964, file photo shows the Rolling Stones during a rehearsal. The members, from left, are Brian Jones, guitar; Bill Wyman, bass; Charlie Watts, drums; Mick Jagger, vocals; and Keith Richards, guitar.
(Associated Press)
Fronting the group was Mick Jagger. Channeling the music like a crazed shaman, Jagger shimmied and sashayed, owning the stage like few lead singers have before or since. By the end of the night, the Stones had the crowd in a frenzy. Although only 30 people had made it to the gig because of the treacherous weather conditions, the hotel’s booker had seen enough: He offered the Stones a regular gig.
“The Rolling Stones had caught fire. The music they were playing and the way they played it struck a chord with a young crowd starved for something different, something their own… It was soul-stirring, loud and uncompromising,” writes Bob Spitz in “The Rolling Stones: The Biography,” his magisterial work that charts the 60-year journey of “the greatest rock and roll band in the world.”
Spitz, the author of strong biographies on the Beatles and Led Zeppelin, as well as Ronald Reagan and Julia Child, captures the drama, trauma and betrayals that have kept the Stones in the public’s consciousness for more than six decades. It’s all here: The Stones’ evolution from a blues cover band to artistic rival of the Beatles; the musical peaks — “Aftermath,” “Let It Bleed” and “Exile on Main Street” as well as misfires like “Dirty Work”; Keith’s descent into a debilitating heroin addiction that nearly destroyed him and the band; the death of the ‘60s at the ill-fated Altamont free concert; Marianne Faithfull, Anita Pallenberg, Bianca Jagger, Jerry Hall and other lovers, partners and muses; the breakups, makeups and crackups; and perhaps most important, the unbreakable bond between Jagger and Richards at the center of it all.
Although Spitz unearths little new information, he excels at presenting the Stones in glorious Technicolor. Spitz homes in on the telling details and anecdotes that give the band’s story a deep richness and poignancy.
Take “Satisfaction,” the Stones’ 1965 classic and first U.S. chart topper. The oft-told story is that Richards woke up in the middle of the night, grabbed the guitar that was next to his bed, and recorded the iconic riff and the phrase “I can’t get no … satisfaction” on a cassette recorder in his Clearwater, Fla., hotel room before falling back asleep. But as Spitz notes, the song initially went nowhere in the studio. That is until Stewart purchased a fuzz box for Richards a few days later, which gave the tune a raunchier sound that perfectly matched Jagger’s lyrics of frustration and alienation. A classic was born.
Piercing the Stones mythology
Spitz’s deep reporting often pierces the mythology surrounding the band. Contrary to the popular belief of many fans, for instance, Jones bears much of the responsibility for the rift with his bandmates and his tragic demise.
The most musically adventurous member of the group — he plays sitar on “Paint It Black” and dulcimer on “Lady Jane” — Jones wasn’t a songwriter. That stoked his jealousies and insecurities, along with frontman Jagger stealing the spotlight from him. A monster of a man, Jones impregnated multiple teenage girls and physically and emotionally abused several women, including Pallenberg. Perhaps that’s why she left him for Richards. Over time, Jones made fewer contributions in the studio and onstage, becoming a catatonic drug casualty. The Stones fired Jones in June 1969 but would have been justified doing so a couple years earlier. He drowned in his pool less than a month later.
Author Bob Spitz
(Elena Seibert)
Similarly, Stones lore has long romanticized the making of “Exile on Main Street” in the stifling, dingy basement of Richards’ rented Villa Nellcôte in the South of France, where the Stones had decamped to avoid British taxes. In this telling, Richards, deep in the throes of heroin addiction, somehow managed to come up with one indelible riff after another built around his signature open G tuning — taught to him by Ry Cooder — leading the band to create one of the best albums in rock history. That’s not entirely accurate, according to Spitz.
Yes, Richards came up with the licks for “Rocks Off,” “Happy” and “Tumbling Dice.” But it’s equally true that a strung-out Richards missed myriad recording sessions, invited dealers, hangers-on and other distractions to Nellcôte, and repeatedly failed to turn up to write with Jagger. Far from completing the album in the druggy haze of a French basement, the band spent six months on overdubs at Sunset Sound in Los Angeles, where Jagger contributed many of his vocals.
Beatles vs. Stones
One of the more interesting themes Spitz develops is the symbiotic relationship between the Beatles and Stones, with the Fab Four mostly overshadowing them — until they didn’t.
John Lennon and Paul McCartney wrote “I Wanna Be Your Man” and gave it to the Stones, whose 1963 rendition, with Jones on slide guitar, became the group’s first UK Top 20 hit. The Lennon-McCartney songwriting partnership inspired Jagger and Richards to begin penning their own songs. In early 1964, the Beatles came to the U.S. for the first time, making television history with their appearance on “The Ed Sullivan Show” and playing Carnegie Hall. A few months later, the Stones kicked off their inaugural American tour at the Swing Auditorium in San Bernardino. In 1967, the Beatles released “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band,” a psychedelic masterpiece. The Stones responded with “Their Satanic Majesties Request,” a psychedelic mess.
The Rolling Stones: The Biography cover
As the Beatles began to splinter, Spitz writes, the Stones sharpened their focus. The band released “Beggars Banquet” in late 1968 and “Let It Bleed” the following year, albums every bit as innovative and visionary as “The White Album” and “Abbey Road.” For the first time, the two groups stood as equals.
When the Beatles broke up in 1970, the Stones kept rolling. With Jones replaced by virtuoso guitarist Mick Taylor — whose fluid, melodic style served as a tasty foil to Richards — they produced what many consider their finest works, “Sticky Fingers” and “Exile on Main Street.” More impressively, the band, with Taylor’s successor, Ronnie Wood, has continued to dazzle audiences with incendiary live shows, touring as recently as 2024 behind the late-career triumph “Hackney Diamonds.” The Beatles, by contrast, retired from the road in 1966 and devoted their energies to the studio.
Hundreds of books have been written about the Rolling Stones, but few sparkle quite like Spitz’s. For anyone who loves or even likes the Stones, it’s indispensable.
Like most of the band’s biographers, Spitz gives short shrift to the post-“Exile” period after 1972. He curtly dismisses 2005’s strong “A Bigger Bang” and 2016’s “Blue & Lonesome,” a back-to-basics album of blues covers, as “adequate endeavors that signaled a band living on borrowed time.” That critique is both off target and under-developed. Spitz ignores the band’s legendary live album, “Brussels Affair,” recorded in 1973, or why the band waited decades before officially releasing it.
These are small quibbles. Spitz has written a book worthy of its 704-page length; another 50 or so pages covering the later years would have made it even stronger. To quote the Rolling Stones: “I know it’s only rock ‘n roll, but I like it, like it, yes, I do.”
Marc Ballon, a former Times, Forbes and Inc. Magazine reporter, teaches an advanced writing class at USC. He lives in Fullerton.
DENVER — What do you know? The once-stampeding Dodgers have been caged by the Colorado Rockies.
With a 9-6 loss Sunday at Coors Field, the two-time defending World Series champions lost back-to-back games for the first time this season. The Dodgers again couldn’t hold a lead, letting the Rockies tee off for 15 hits.
Nor could the Dodgers keep up offensively at the hitter-friendly park — though they put some pressure on in the ninth inning, when Shohei Ohtani led off with a ground-rule double and the Dodgers scored twice to cut the lead to three runs. Then the new guy, Ryan Ward, made the final out in his big league debut, robbed of a hit and a chance to keep chipping away by a diving Troy Johnston in right field.
Before that, the Rockies — who beat the Dodgers twice in 13 meetings all of last season — chased starter Roki Sasaki from the game in the fifth inning and then ruffled the Dodgers’ relievers. That included closer Edwin Díaz, who came on in the eighth and promptly gave up three singles, a walk and two runs before being pulled with the Dodgers trailing 8-4.
Dodgers starting pitcher Roki Sasaki gave up three runs on seven hits in 4-2/3 innings Sunday against the Rockies in Denver.
(David Zalubowski / Associated Press)
He and Blake Treinen combined to face eight batters without getting an out.
“They both weren’t sharp,” said manager Dave Roberts, who had theories but not many answers — though he did have real concern, especially about Díaz, who recently had his right knee checked out by the medical staff.
Roberts said the closer wanted to pitch after nine days off, even though it wasn’t a save situation. But his velocity was slightly down (95.4 mph vs. 95.8) and so, “today was a tough evaluation,” the manager said.
“It really was,” Roberts said. “Because, you know, I know what it’s supposed to look like, and when it doesn’t look like that, it gets a little concerning, really.”
And losing for the second time to the Rockies, who are now 9-13? Being in danger of losing their four-game series, after arriving in Denver without having lost to a National League opponent, against a club that hasn’t made the postseason since 2018?
It’s well below the bar the Dodgers have set, and it added a bitter note to Ward’s otherwise sweet debut.
Ward punched a big league clock for the first time wearing No. 67 and cranked his first hit off Rockies starter Michael Lorenzen in the fourth inning, lining a changeup to right field for a single that scored Andy Pages, made it 3-0 and got the 20-some members of Ward’s party up, jumping in place, hugging and high-fiving.
“When I was on first base, I got to see them all jumping around up there,” Ward said. “That was a pretty special moment.”
He also singled in the sixth and swung on the first pitch in his first at-bat, a fly out in the third inning.
The Dodgers gave Sasaki a 2-0 lead in the third. Alex Freeland drove in Hyeseong Kim, and Shohei Ohtani doubled in Freeland — and extended his career-best on-base streak to 51 games, moving past Willie Keeler into third place in Dodgers history.
Sasaki went 4-2/3 innings, threw 78 pitches and gave up three runs on seven hits, striking out two and walking two. His ERA after his fourth start: 6.11, worst in the six-man rotation.
The Dodgers fell behind 6-4 in the seventh when Treinen — who was cleared Friday after he was struck in the head by a batted ball during batting practice — gave up four consecutive hits, including a two-run home run by Mickey Moniak.
The result likely will be a minor detail when Ward tells the story years from now about getting the call after first baseman Freddie Freeman was placed on the paternity list.
The Dodgers’ No. 19 prospect and reigning Pacific Coast League MVP spent the last seven years in the minors. Last season, he hit 36 home runs and drove in 122 runs with a .937 on-base-plus-slugging percentage for triple-A Oklahoma City, and he has a 1.020 OPS and four homers this year.
Ward made it a point to improve his chase rate, draw more walks and get on base more frequently, everything the Dodgers asked of him. He also passed the broadest patience test.
“The plate discipline, being a better hitter … he’s done all that,” Roberts said. “He’s improved his defense. But honestly, for me, just not to let his lack of opportunity in the big leagues deter him. That’s easy when you get frustrated and let it affect performance, and he hasn’t done that.”
If anything, Ward said, the waiting made him better.
“I used it to keep going. ‘OK, if I’m not there yet, what do I have to do to get there?’” he said. “‘What part of my game do I need to work on to keep getting better?’
“I used it as fire to keep working.”
That will be the Dodgers’ assignment too.
In the finale of the four-game series Monday, the Dodgers are expected to start left-hander Justin Wrobleski (2-0, 2.12) against Colorado left-hander Jose Quintana (0-1, 5.63).
Anyone who thinks Coachella’s biggest surprises are reserved for Weekend 1 was proven wrong Friday night as Sabrina Carpenter welcomed Madonna on stage during her Weekend 2 headlining set. The crowd exploded with waves of cheers as the iconic pop star came on stage.
Madge joined Carpenter as a surprise guest during “Juno,” in which Carpenter reemerged in a gown that was a nod to Botticelli’s “The Birth of Venus” for a torch-passing duet of Madonna’s 1990 pop-house gauntlet “Vogue.”
The classic was followed by the debut of the gloriously upbeat “I Feel Free,” the first track from the pop icon’s forthcoming new album “Confessions II,” due out July 3.
The singer announced the record, a sequel to 2005’s “Confessions On A Dancefloor,” on April 15, alongside a 60-second teaser video for “I Feel Free.”
The Coachella performance, however, marks the first time the song has been heard in full — a fitting full circle moment 20 after Madonna played the Sahara Tent in 2006, complete with the same boots and costuming from that gig. “Confessions II” will be Madonna’s first full-length album since 2019’s “Madame X.”
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“Let’s try to be together. Let’s try to avoid disagreements,” Madonna said as she spoke about the moon and planets aligning.
Before the pair ended with “Like a Prayer,” accompanied by a choir, Madonna had another reason to be grateful.
“This is probably the first time I’ve ever performed with someone shorter than me,” Madonna said to Carpenter as the crowd laughed. “Thank you for giving me that experience.”
Senior Audience Editor Vanessa Franko contributed to this report.
The Kings looked nothing like a playoff team heading into the NHL’s trade deadline. They had lost six of their last eight games, had just fired their coach and had saw their second-leading scorer go down with a broken leg in the Olympic tournament.
They were backing away from the playoffs, not heading toward them. So general manager Ken Holland did the prudent thing and largely stood pat, trading a couple of veterans for draft picks and making only a pair of minor acquisitions.
Turns out he wasn’t waving a white flag but rather a green one because the Kings hit the gas after that, gathering points in 16 of their final 20 games, finishing the regular season as one of the hottest teams in the NHL. That earned them a fifth straight trip to the playoffs and a first-round meeting with the Colorado Avalanche, the league’s winningest team, beginning Sunday in Denver.
The Ducks, meanwhile, advanced to the postseason for the first time since 2018 but they stumbled in, losing eight of their last 10 and blowing a five-point lead in the Pacific Division and the home-ice advantage that went with it over the final three weeks. The Ducks, the third-place team in the Pacific Division, will start on the road in Edmonton on Monday.
Kings interim coach D.J. Smith during a game in March in Boston.
(Charles Krupa / Associated Press)
“It’s been a climb. Probably didn’t look very good a while ago,” said Kings interim coach D.J. Smith, who could lose the interim part of that title after going 11-6-6 after replacing Jim Hiller behind the bench with 23 games to play. “It’s a credit to the guys, the leadership. They played playoff hockey for a while now. And it’s allowed us this opportunity.”
Actually, crediting the Kings with playing playoff hockey isn’t necessarily a compliment since the team hasn’t won a postseason series since hoisting the Stanley Cup in 2014. But it’s been more than a decade since the Kings have entered the playoffs carrying this kind of momentum and they have a few people to thank for that.
Anton Forsberg has been key for the Kings down the stretch.
(Ronald Martinez / Getty Images)
Journeyman goaltender Anton Forsberg, who spent most of his first season in Los Angeles backing up Darcy Kuemper, won five straight starts in April to key the Kings’ fast finish. Russian winger Artemi Panarin, acquired from the New York Rangers just before the Olympic break and a month before the trade deadline, contributed nine goals and 18 assists in 26 games, helping make up for the loss of forwards Kevin Fiala and Andrei Kuzmenko to injuries. And Quinton Byfield scored 10 times in his final 13 games to set a career high with 24 goals.
“Since the break I feel like we’ve really come together as a group,” Byfield said.
The team displayed uncommon grit as well, going to overtime an NHL-record 33 times. (They lost 20 of those games; if they have gotten the second point in just a third of those, they would have won the division.)
And finally, the Kings were also fueled by a desire to give captain Anze Kopitar one more chance at a title. Kopitar, who announced in September that this season would be his last, gave an emotional good-bye speech to the fans after the final regular-season home game. His teammates were determined to give him an encore in the playoffs.
“That had a lot to do with it,” Smith said. “Guys were playing for him. He gets one more chance to play at home.
“We found a way.”
Kopitar, however, credited his coach for the team’s fast finish.
“Once Smithy came in, he just changed the energy a little bit and we’re trying to be a little more aggressive versus sitting back,” said Kopitar, the Kings’ all-time leader in games, points and assists.
Cutter Gauthier is the first Duck to score 40 goals in a season since Corey Perry in 2013-14.
(Melissa Majchrzak / Associated Press)
For the Ducks, they’re not only returning to the playoffs for the first time in eight seasons — only the Detroit Red Wings have a longer active postseason drought — but they also posted a winning record for the first time since 2018.
Troy Terry, who played two games as a rookie that season, is the only Duck remaining from that team.
“This year has just felt different from the start,” he said. “It was less question marks about the potential of the team. We knew what we could be.”
Which isn’t to say it’s been easy. The team had two seven-game winning streaks but also weathered losing streaks of nine and six games.
“We had a couple of roller coasters there, starting and then slowing down and getting back on it,” said coach Joel Quenneville, who has taken five teams to the NHL playoffs, winning three Stanley Cups in Chicago.
The Ducks’ 273 goals this season are the most in franchise history but the 288 they allowed is third-worst all time, leaving the team with the second-highest goal differential of any playoff team. (Only the Kings are worse at -22.)
Speaking of history, winger Cutter Gauthier, with 18 goals in the final 23 games, is the first Duck to score 40 goals in a season since Corey Perry in 2013-14. At 22, he’s also the second-youngest to get there, trailing only Paul Kariya.
Last fall, “Dr. Pimple Popper” suddenly became a patient herself.
Dr. Sandra Lee, the reality TV dermatologist and surgeon known for tackling ick-inducing skin situations on camera, had a bad day a week before Thanksgiving 2025 while she was taping new episodes of her show at her Upland office.
“I had what I thought was a hot flash. I got super sweaty and didn’t feel like myself,” she told People in an interview published Tuesday. She said she finished the shoot and then headed to her parents’ nearby home, where that evening she experienced shooting pains in one leg and later had trouble navigating down a flight of stairs in the middle of the night.
When she awakened the next day, she said, her left side wasn’t working properly and she was having trouble speaking clearly. It was definitely more than a hot flash.
Her doctor dad — also a dermatologist — told her to get herself to an ER, where she had an MRI that showed evidence of an ischemic stroke, where a vessel supplying blood to the brain gets obstructed. The diagnosis was a shock.
“As a physician I couldn’t deny that I had slurred speech, that I was having weakness on one side,” she said, “but I was like, ‘Well, this is a dream, right?’”
Lee, 55, said unmanaged cholesterol levels and high blood pressure were likely contributors to the stroke, plus the stress of balancing her real-life practice with the demands of “Dr. Pimple Popper.” She returned to production in January, she said, though she was more than a little freaked out.
“I don’t like that I don’t have total control of my left hand or the grip wasn’t as strong. If I feel like I’m not at my best — it’s very scary,” Lee said.
Her neurologist told the outlet that Lee’s symptoms are pretty much gone. Lee said she still notices slight differences when she speaks.
The TV doc is on blood thinners now and is still doing some physical therapy after spending two months post-stroke working through PT and occupational therapy. Lee had to make sure her left hand, among other body parts, was functional and that her balance and movement bounced back.
She does, after all, do precise procedures on camera for the Lifetime audience.
“People watch the videos over and over again because it helps them go to sleep at night,” she told People. But, she added, “Others watch it like it’s a scary movie or a roller coaster.”
