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SACRAMENTO — Heartbreaking loss.

That’s the only way to describe what San Juan Hills players, coaches and fans were feeling on Saturday at Golden 1 Center when Alex Osterloh made two of three free throws with 0.3 seconds left to give Atherton Sacred Heart Prep a 47-45 victory in the Division IV state boys’ basketball championship game.

Osterloh was fouled at the top of the key by Kellen Owens with the scored tied.

“I’m pretty sure I was fouled,” Osterloh said.

San Juan Hills had earlier lost the ball on a turnover, its 19th of the game, surrendering its chance to take the lead.

“It was a tough ending,” San Juan Hills coach Jason Efstathiou said. “We turned over the ball too much. Nineteen is insane. Ultimately we didn’t do a good enough job handling pressure.”

San Juan Hills (22-14) came back from a 12-point deficit in the second quarter to take a four-point lead in the fourth quarter.

Garrett Brehmer finished with 17 points while Rocco Jensen had 10 points and eight rebounds for San Juan Hills. Osterloh scored 15 points and Pat Bala had 13.

“There’s a little distaste,” Efstathiou said, “but at the same time we got to be here.”

Two top City Section baseball teams, El Camino Real and San Fernando, faced off Friday in a pitcher’s duel that went eight innings.

Senior Ray Pelayo of San Fernando kept throwing strikes, keeping El Camino Real off balance for 7⅔ scoreless innings with eight strikeouts and one walk. But then came a balk that scored the winning run in El Camino Real’s 1-0 victory.

Hudson December threw six scoreless innings for El Camino Real and Andrew Katzman struck out three in two scoreless innings.

South Torrance 4, El Segundo 3: In a battle of unbeaten Pioneer League teams, South Torrance (6-0) received a walk-off single from Owen Rhodes in the bottom of the seventh. El Segundo tied it 3-3 in the top of the seventh on a two-out, three-run home run by Chase Mattoon. Issac Orozco struck out nine in five innings and also homered for the Spartans.

Crespi 3, Saugus 2: Justin Kim had two RBIs for the Celts.

Sylmar 7, Legacy 1: Rickee Luevano threw a two-hitter with nine strikeouts.

Sierra Canyon 12, West Ranch 1: Isaias Tirado hit a three-run home run and four pitchers combined to give up five hits.

Mater Dei 15, Rockwall-Heath (Texas) 1: Ezekiel Lara had three hits and five RBIs in Texas. Earlier, the Monarchs gave up seven runs in the third inning of an 8-1 loss to Rockwall-Heath.

St. John Bosco 1, Gahr 0: Star closer Jack Champlin got a strikeout to end the game, finishing two shutout innings of relief. Champlin drove in the game’s only run with an RBI double in the sixth inning. Julian Garcia struck out six with no walks in five innings for St. John Bosco.

San Juan Hills 11, Cypress 0: Garrett Gandolfo threw five scoreless innings with seven strikeouts and Clay Riggs contributed three RBIs for San Juan Hills.

Santa Margarita 1, Damien 0: Warren Gravely IV had the only RBI in the Eagles’ win. Tyler Unter struck out six in five shutout innings.

Garfield 9, Cleveland 7: Omar Martinez had three hits and Victor Alvarez drove in three runs for Garfield. Joshua Pearlstein finished with three hits for Cleveland.

Palos Verdes 8, West Torrance 0: Kai Van Scoyoc struck out nine in five innings and Asher Friedman had a home run and a double for Palos Verdes.

Valencia 12, Chatsworth 0: An eight-run second inning helped lead the Vikings to a five-inning win.

Bishop Amat 13, Gardena Serra 2: Joaquin Ortiz finished with three hits and four RBIs.

Corona Centennial 19, Eastvale Roosevelt 3: Devin Bishop and Emiliano Castaneda each hit home runs for Centennial. Ethan Miller had a double and triple.

Servite 6, Anaheim Canyon 1: Mickey Cabral went three for four and Cole Grothues struck out three in 2⅓ innings of scoreless relief.

Corona Santiago 5, Crean Lutheran 4: Jonathan Thorton delivered three hits and two RBIs for the Sharks.

Fullerton 1, Chaparral 0: Garrett Wrightman threw four innings of scoreless relief and Caleb Brown had an RBI double in the third inning for Fullerton.

Edison 11, Tesoro 7: Ben Wilson hit a grand slam and finished with five RBIs for Edison.

El Dorado 10, Granada Hills 4: Lorenzo Favela hit a three-run home run to lead El Dorado.

Ayala 7, San Dimas 1: Caleb Trugman struck out nine with zero walks in a complete game.

Loyola 14, Venice 1: Wyatt Clougherty had three hits and Luca Marucci contributed three RBIs for Loyola.

Softball

JSerra 2, Norco 0: In Arizona, the Lions knocked off No. 1-ranked Norco behind Liliana Escobar, who struck out 13 in six innings.

Norco 5, Torrance 0: Coral Williams struck out 10 in six innings. Leighton Gray and Rae Logue hit home runs.

Garden Grove Pacifica 4, Anaheim Canyon 2: Natalia Amezquita had a two-run single for Pacifica, which later defeated Orange Lutheran 6-2.

Orange Lutheran 7, Perry 1: Mia Scott had four RBIs for the Lancers.

Sherman Oaks Notre Dame 15, Culver City 0: Ellayne Tellez-Perez had three hits and five RBIs.

AMERICA’S first bullet train which will slash travel time between Los Angeles and San Francisco has been revealed.

The highly anticipated rail project will make the trip just two hours and 40 minutes – compared to nearly six hours by car.

Once completed, the bullet train scheme will provide speedy trips between the Bay Area and the Los Angeles region.

It will also connect the communities in between — Gilroy, Merced, Fresno, Bakersfield, Palmdale, and others — to the state’s largest job centers and innovation hub, said the California High Speed Rail Authority on February 28.

Many have been awaiting the project to be completed, as the past decade of construction has been focused on an initial segment in Central Valley.

There are five planned stations in the Central Valley: Bakersfield, Fresno, Merced, Madera and Kings/Tulare.

Newly-released renderings show the stations will feature plenty of modern twists, with spacious canopies and open concourses.

The stations’ architectural designs are set to incorporate natural materials like stone and wood.

If plans go according to schedule, the area could open as soon as 2032.

The Central Valley’s initial operating segment is expected to transition from civil construction to laying out tracks and installing systems later this year.

But there has yet to be a confirmed project opened date for the route between San Francisco and Los Angeles due to delays in planning and funding.

The overall projected cost for Phase 1 delivery, between San Francisco and Los Angeles/Anaheim, dropped by $1.7 billion.

The High-Speed Rail Authority has just released its Draft 2026 Business Plan for public review and comment.

“The authority has entered a new era of construction: laying track across the Central Valley and electrifying the corridor,” the plan said.

“With the southern railhead in Kern County ready ahead of schedule, deliveries of steel, concrete ties, and ballast material can begin, and work can commence.

“The authority has set construction milestones for the 119-mile Central Valley segment and developed a procurement schedule to keep the project on pace for completion of the Merced – Bakersfield early operating segment in 2032.”

The project has created thousands of jobs, with rail bosses partnering with California colleges and universities to build a skilled local workforce, it added.

President Donald Trump has previously slammed the project as a “train to nowhere.”

“The Railroad we were promised still does not exist, and never will,” Trump warned on Truth Social last July.

“This project was Severely Overpriced, Overregulated, and NEVER DELIVERED.”

Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom wants lawmakers to reauthorize the state’s cap-and-trade program through 2045.

He also wants to ensure that high-speed rail receives $1 billion a year from it.

Last December, California dropped a lawsuit officials filed against the Trump administration over the federal government’s withdrawing of $4 billion for the project.

The U.S. Transportation Department slashed funds for the bullet train.

Gov. Newsom slammed the federal government’s decision as “a political stunt to punish California.”

A strange quirk at San Quentin state prison is that most of those incarcerated behind its towering walls are unable to see the San Francisco Bay that literally laps at the shore a few yards away.

That changed recently with the completion of new buildings — holding among other accouterments a self-serve kitchen, a library, a cafe and a film studio — and third-floor classrooms that look out over that beautiful blue expanse, long a symbol of freedom and possibility.

In the new San Quentin Rehabilitation Center, along with learning job skills and earning degrees, incarcerated men can do their own laundry, make their own meals, and interact with guards as mentors and colleagues of sorts, once a taboo kind of relationship in the us-and-them world of incarceration.

“You want to clothes wash? You wash them,” said Gov. Gavin Newsom, debuting the new facilities, including laundry machines, for reporters last week. “You want to get something to eat. You can do it, whenever.”

“All of a sudden, it’s like you’re starting to make decisions for yourself,” he said. “It’s called life.”

Listen closely, and one can almost hear President Trump’s brain exploding with glee and outrage as his favorite Democratic foil seemingly coddles criminals. A cafe? C’mon. Bring on the midterms!

March 2024 of the East Block of San Quentin’s former death row.

(Robert Gauthier/Los Angeles Times)

But what Newsom has done inside California’s most notorious prison, once home to the largest death row in the Western Hemisphere, is nothing short of a remarkable shift of thinking, culture and implementation around what it means to take away someone’s freedom — and eventually give it back. Adapted from European models, it’s a vision of incarceration that is meant to deal with the reality that 95% of people who go to prison are eventually released. That’s more than 30,000 people each year in California alone.

“What kind of neighbors do you want them to be?” Newsom asked. “Are they coming back broken? Are they coming back better? Are they coming back more enlivened, more capable? Are they coming back into prison over and over?”

When it comes to reforming criminals, “success looks like more and more people gravitating to their own journey, their own personal reform,” Newsom said, sounding more like a lifestyle influencer than a presidential contender. “It’s not forced on you, because then it’s fake, man. If it’s coerced, I don’t buy it.”

Of course, coming back better should be the goal — because better people commit fewer crimes, and that benefits us all. But coming back over and over has become the norm.

Traditional incarceration, a lock-’em-up and watch-them-suffer approach, has dramatically failed not only our communities and public safety writ large, but also inmates and even those who guard them.

Incarcerated people come out of prison too often in California (and across the country) with addictions and emotional troubles still firmly in place, and no job or educational skills to help them muddle through a crime-free life. That means they often commit more crimes, create more victims and cycle back into this failed, expensive, tough-on-crime system.

Still, it’s a favorite trope of Trump, and the justification for both his immigration roundups and his deployment of National Guard troops in Democratic cities, that policies such as Newsom’s are weak on crime and have led to the decline of American society.

This narrative of fear and grievance goes back decades, recycled every election by the so-called law-and-order party because it’s effective — voters crave safety, especially in a chaotic world. And locking people up seems safe, at least until we let them go again.

But, as Chance Andes, the warden of San Quentin, pointed out last week, “Humanity is safety,” and treating incarcerated people like, well, people, actually makes them want to behave better.

Here’s where the tough-on-crime folks will begin composing their angry emails. Why are we paying for killers to have a view? Why should I care if a rapist has a good book to read? Our budget is bleeding red, why are tax dollars being used for prison lattes? (To be fair, I do not know whether they actually have lattes.)

But consider this: The prison guards back Newsom.

“Done right, it improves working conditions for our officers and strengthens public safety,” said Steve Adney, executive vice president of the California Correctional Peace Officers Assn., the union that represents guards, of the California model, as Newsom calls his vision.

Faced with high rates of suicide and other ills such as addiction, corrections officers have long been concerned about the stress and violence of their jobs. A few years ago, some union members traveled to Norway to see prisons there. I tagged along.

A correctional officer at Halden prison in Norway checks out the ice cream freezer in the grocery store inside the facility.

(Javad Parsa/For The Times)

The American officers were shocked to see Norwegian prisoners access kitchen knives and power tools, but even more shocked that the guards had built relationships with these criminals that allowed them to do their jobs with far less fear.

Rather than jailers, these corrections officers were more like social workers or guides to a better way of living. Of course, the corrections officers aren’t dumb. That only works with vetted inmates, such as those at San Quentin, who have proved they want to change.

But when you have officers and incarcerated people who are able to coexist with respect and maybe a dash of kindness, you get a different outcome for both sides.

“If we are capable of building this at San Quentin, then we are capable of making the workplace safe for every officer who walks in the gates,” said CCPOA President Neil Flood, a startling statement in favor of radical reform from a law enforcement officer.

But in a moment when most Democrats with ambitions for national office (or even an eye on replacing Newsom) are backing away from criminal justice reform, it would be naive to think the California model won’t be used to bludgeon Newsom in a presidential race, and provide further fuel to the dumpster-fire narrative about the state.

Soon — before the midterms — many expect Congress to move forward on Trump’s expressed desire for a crime bill that would empower police with even greater immunity for wrongdoing, create longer sentences for crimes including those involving drugs and further erode criminal justice reform in the name of public safety.

Trump is going hard in the opposite direction, toward more punishment, always the easier and more understandable route for voters fed up with crime (even though crime rates have been declining since President Biden was in office).

The California model is “a political liability in this environment,” said Tinisch Hollins, a victims advocate who worked on the San Quentin transition and heads Californians for Safety and Justice.

But she retains faith that “the majority of people don’t believe that shoving everyone into prison is how we resolve the problem.”

Newsom deserves credit for standing by that position, when simply backing away and dropping the California model would have been the simpler and safer route — it’s complicated and messy and oh-so-easy to make it sound dumb.

I refer you back to the cafe. If construction had been cut at San Quentin, the budget cited as the reason, no one would have noticed and few would have complained.

Instead, sounding a bit like Trump, Newsom said he “threatened the hell out of them if they didn’t get it done before I was gone.”

“This is not left or right,” he said. “This is just being smart and pragmatic and you know, I just … I believe people are not the worst thing they’ve done.”

Politically at least, San Quentin is a legacy for Newsom now, the best or worst thing he’s done on crime, depending on your personal views of second chances.

But it is undeniably a vision of public safety starkly at odds with Trump, one Newsom will carry into his next political fight — where it is certain to cause him some pain.