ARLINGTON, Texas — Paige Bueckers scored 19 points, Jessica Shepard had her fifth triple-double of the season with 13 points, 11 rebounds and 12 assists, and the Dallas Wings beat the Sparks 97-77 on Thursday night for their fifth straight victory.
Both teams were returning from the break for the FIBA World Cup in Germany, where Bueckers helped lead the United States to the title.
Dallas (25-16) tied the franchise record for wins in a season set by the 2003 WNBA champion Detroit Shock (25-9). The Wings have three games remaining in the regular season.
Shepard has the third-most triple-doubles in a season in WNBA history, trailing Alyssa Thomas’ six in the 2023 and eight in 2025.
Maddy Siegrist added 12 points and Arike Ogunbowale had 11 for Dallas. Kitija Laksa and Aziaha James each scored 10 off the bench. Odyssey Sims did not play in the fourth quarter after injuring her right knee late in the third.
The Sparks have hired a new general manager from the NBA ranks.
Ariana Andonian will officially join the organization next month, the Sparks said Friday. She replaces Raegan Pebley, who was fired in mid-July after 2½ years.
The Sparks (15-25) are headed toward a sixth consecutive losing season. The organization owns three WNBA championships, but none since 2016.
Andonian, 31, has been general manager of the Delaware Blue Coats, the NBA G League affiliate of the Philadelphia 76ers, while also serving as the 76ers’ vice president of player personnel.
While Pebley had no previous executive experience, Andonian has spent over 10 years working in basketball operations, scouting, player personnel and talent evaluation across the NBA and NBA G League.
“Ariana has distinguished herself throughout her career as an exceptional evaluator of talent and a thoughtful, forward-thinking basketball executive,” Sparks managing partner and governor Eric Holoman said in a statement. “She has earned the respect of some of the best basketball minds in the game, but what stood out to us throughout this process was her vision for building a team and an organization.”
Andonian is a California native who graduated from USC. She earned an MBA from Duke University, where she worked directly with Hall of Fame coach Mike Krzyzewski and current head coach Jon Scheyer as a player personnel consultant for the men’s basketball program.
“It was clear to me throughout this process that the Sparks ownership group is committed to delivering for our fans,” she said in a statement. “My goal as GM is to build a culture of excellence centered around great people, strong processes and doing everything within our power to best support our players on and off the court.”
Andonian joined the 76ers in 2024 as vice president of player personnel, where she ran the organization’s professional scouting group and co-led its extended scouting efforts. She was named GM of the Delaware Blue Coats last year.
Andonian began her NBA career with the Houston Rockets in 2015. In four seasons, she worked in basketball operations and scouting, becoming the NBA’s only female scout at the time and ultimately helping coordinate the Rockets’ scouting group.
In 2020, Andonian joined the Memphis Grizzlies, where she spent four seasons and advanced to director of player personnel.
Walking through downtown Santa Barbara, it’s impossible to not turn your head when you see it: those marshmallow-like plaster walls, wiggly wrought ironwork and tile that looks as though it belongs in a palace you’d stumble upon in a storybook.
This is the effect architect Jeff Shelton’s signature design has on viewers: the ability to pluck you out of the monotony of the day, if only briefly.
When asked why he thinks this is so, Shelton is quick to point to the tried-and-true architectural methods of the past, which he proudly uses. Buildings, he said, had to be designed “to act more independently” in serving the needs of their specific inhabitants. A window’s primary purpose, for example, was to allow the ideal amount of light to enter.
“So therefore they had taller windows,” he said, sitting opposite me in his Fig Avenue office in downtown Santa Barbara, surrounded by endless sketches and pattern mock-ups.
Shelton obsesses over other design details that are often overlooked in modern architecture yet instinctively felt when you encounter them: high ceilings, for one (his are 14 to 18 feet from the ground floor), as well as smaller touches like ironwork, stonework and glass. Crucially, all are made by people, designed by people — “nothing,” he said, “out of the catalog.”
Before going solo, Shelton spent a decade working in downtown Los Angeles with architect Brenda Levin on projects including the Bradbury Building and Grand Central Market. He then returned to his hometown of Santa Barbara, where he has designed 90 buildings since 1994, many of them within Santa Barbara’s Historic Landmarks District, commonly referred to as El Pueblo Viejo.
Following Santa Barbara’s 1925 earthquake, which destroyed much of downtown, new construction in the area was required to adopt the Spanish Revival style, which, according to the city’s website, “is key to the identity and beauty of Santa Barbara.” New buildings in the district must draw inspiration from Andalusia and Southern Spain and incorporate elements such as tile, terra-cotta, plaster and ironwork.
For Shelton, the guidelines are merely a reference. When designing, he doesn’t “try to make it like Spain at all,” he said, rather matter-of-factly. “I try to just use the materials and proportions and the craft of what’s so great about being in Spain.”
That approach shines through in his many projects near his Fig Street office, a 10-block radius Shelton has dubbed the “Fig District,” where 10 of his most lauded projects lie, inadvertently creating a kind of architectural museum in the heart of downtown.
Seeing them requires little more than a two-hour self-guided tour, carving your own path or following the map on Shelton’s website. By the end of the excursion, you, too, may ask yourself the same question I did: Why did we ever stop building this way?
Shelton didn’t have an answer. He could only promise to never stop.
“Every building I do is my last building,” said Shelton, now 68. “If I die tomorrow, at least I put everything in this last building.”
Without further ado, here are designs by Shelton all located in the Fig District, including iron gates designed by his brother, David.
Mark Walter doesn’t need to sell the Sparks. It said so in a release from his company Wednesday: “TWG is not looking to sell its sports assets at ‘fire sale’ prices to raise capital for its insurance operations.”
Not because of the investigations into allegations that insurance companies under Walter’s umbrella failed to properly disclose and conduct transactions between other companies he controls.
But for the sake of the storied WNBA franchise, which hasn’t won a championship in a decade and is about to miss the playoffs for the sixth consecutive season — something that would have been unthinkable six seasons ago.
Sell for the sake of the Sparks, who have long deserved an owner who wants seriously to run the team like Walter’s group runs, well, the Dodgers.
With passion and pride, foresight and smarts.
A steel beam is raised as the final structuarl piece of the Sparks’ $150-million training facility in El Segundo on Wednesday.
(Ronaldo Bolanos / Los Angeles Times)
And, yes, the new $150-million training facility that’s going to open in El Segundo next year is a better-late-than-never step in that direction.
It’s not too little; the 64,000-square-foot space, which will be tremendous in a prime location near the beach and shopping.
But it’s very late. Wednesday’s topping-out ceremony, when a construction crew lifted the final structural beam into place, doesn’t change that.
While so many of the Sparks’ rivals have had the upper hand in recruiting and retaining talent with state-of-the-art private practice spaces for the past few years, the Sparks have been — to use star forward Nneka Ogwumike’s word — “nomads.”
The Sparks have always offered fans a famously fun game-day experience, but their players had to continually get familiar with facilities all over Southern California, from L.A. Southwest and El Camino College to Academy USA in Glendale to Jump Beyond Sports in Torrance, from Windward School and Galen Center to JR286, the gym in Torrance where they practice now.
Starting next season, they’ll have a home.
A rendering of the Sparks’ new training facility in El Segundo.
(Ronaldo Bolanos / Los Angeles Times)
But it’s not because the Sparks’ ownership wanted to do what Mark Davis did with the Las Vegas Aces when he was the first owner to provide fancy new digs in 2023.
Not because they were resolute about giving the Sparks a first-class experience, like Joe Tsai did when he chartered flights for New York Liberty before the league said it was legal, getting himself fined $500,000.
But because the Sparks would fall further behind if they didn’t.
Because now “it’s the bare minimum,” said forward Dearica Hamby, whose input — dedicated spaces for family and naps — was incorporated into the building’s design.
It also will include two regulation basketball courts, a performance and training environment, hydrotherapy and recovery rooms and a player sanctuary.
“It represents a belief in our players,” said Stacy Johns, the team’s president. “It represents a belief in the future of the Sparks. And it represents a belief in where women’s basketball and women’s sports are going.”
Members of the media and guests gather with the Sparks’ front-office staff for the topping-out ceremony in El Segundo on Wednesday.
(Ronaldo Bolanos / Los Angeles Times)
Where’s that? Up.
Valuations are growing. In May, CNBC reported that the WNBA’s current teams were worth an average of $460 million — 84% more than the league’s most recent expansion fee of $250 million.
The Sparks — without taking the new facility, the largest investment to date in the history of women’s sports, into account — were valued at $415 million, seventh among the WNBA’s 15 teams.
The Golden State Valkyries, an expansion team in 2025, were valued at a record $1 billion, more than any women’s sports team in history.
That’s because the Valkyries — who are owned by the Golden State Warriors’ Joe Lacob and Peter Guber — have been innovative and imaginative, run more like the Dodgers than the Sparks, who are owned mostly by the same folks as the Dodgers.
The Dodgers instituted a private player-only plane and added Japanese-style toilets after then-recruit Roki Sasaki asked. The Valkyries established a 30-plus network of area bars for fans to gather to watch games and they helped a player with sleeping problems by offering everything from a different comforter to a sleep study.
Rendering of the inside the contrition of the Sparks’ new training facility, including a dining area.
(Ronaldo Bolanos / Los Angeles Times)
The Dodgers gave the keys to Andrew Friedman and Dave Roberts. The Valkyries’ GM is Ohemaa Nyanin, formerly an assistant GM with the WNBA champion New York Liberty, and their coach is former UCLA Bruin Natalie Nakase, before an assistant on Aces championship teams and an NBA assistant for years with the Clippers.
The Sparks have for the past several seasons cycled through unproven coaches and GMs, or fired experienced ones. Unable to pick a lane and drive it, they keep ricocheting between preaching patience and acting impatiently. And at the moment, they don’t even have a GM after firing Raegan Pebley in July.
Johns, who was brought on to oversee the team’s business in April, said things are changing. And change takes time.
The Sparks are 13-25, behind the expansion Portland Fire in the standings and having lost twice to the expansion Toronto Tempo. But they’ve tripled their sports staff this year, adding performance and mental health therapists and additional basketball data people — who apparently aided in the construction of an old, uncompetitive roster.
“I couldn’t tell you what happened or who woke up one day and decided,” said Johns, who worked for the MLS champion LAFC and Super Bowl champion Indianapolis Colts. “But when I was recruited … I was explicitly told like, ‘This is changing,’ and like, ‘We’re hiring you because we want to signal change.’”
The biggest change that could help the Sparks? At the top, with someone who wants to push the envelope instead of compensate and play catchup.
Rendering of the inside the contrition of the Sparks’ new training facility, including a basketball court.
RAIL commuters have been warned of disruption to services over the bank holiday weekend.
With strike action set to take place, a number of services will be effected on Sunday and Monday.
A number of rail disruptions will take place over the upcoming bank holiday weekend (stock image)Credit: LNPTravel chaos is expected this weekend as East Midlands Railway announces plans for a ‘significantly reduced’ timetable in response to strike action (stock image)Credit: East Midlands Railway
EMR has confirmed plans for a “significantly reduced” timetable for services to and from London on both days.
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It has advised passengers to check details before embarking on their journeys and to only travel if absolutely essential this bank holiday weekend.
This Sunday (August 30) will see even further disruption, with no LNER trains running between London King’s Cross and Peterborough as digital signalling upgrades are carried out by Network Rail.
EMR services to and from London St Pancras are expected to be extremely busy on Sunday, with the increase in demand coinciding with the reduced services.
Meanwhile, Sheffield station and Nottingham station will be very busy, with queues to board services set to be in place.
The strike action comes as the RMT continues to voice concerns about safety issues on some trains.
EMR said it is holding “constructive discussions” with the RMT, meeting with the union six times as it works towards resolving the issues.
Philippa Cresswell, customer experience director at EMR, said the company recognise “how frustrating this disruption will be for customers”.
“We are very sorry for the impact this will have on August bank holiday plans,” she said.
“We strongly advise customers to only travel to or from London if their journey is essential on Sunday, August 30 and Monday, August 31, and to check their full journey, including first and last trains, before setting out.”
Meanwhile, the RMT said its members have been instructed to refuse to work a Class 810 train if a list of specified faults continue, including lack of air-con, door faults, and non-working toilets.
The union’s general secretary Eddie Dempsey said it would ensure representatives will be permanently involved in discussions with both EMR and manufacturers Hitachi to try to improve the situation.
“RMT is demanding that whilst these faults exist and until these trains are shown to be operating properly, they should be taken out of service,” he said.
“It is now time for EMR management to act on the safety concerns of our members.”
Rae Burrell scored 20 points and the Sparks ended a six-game losing streak with a 77-68 win over the Connecticut Sun on Saturday night.
Nneka Ogwumike, who announced Wednesday she will retire at the end of the season, had 11 points and 11 rebounds for the Sparks (13-24), her 131st career double-double. Erica Wheeler also had 11 points and Dearica Hamby had 10.
Saniya Rivers scored 14 points off the bench to lead the Sun (9-27), who were without Brittney Griner (knee) and Aaliyah Edwards (ankle). Leila Lacan added 13 points and Kennedy Burke 10.
The Sparks, which has given up an average of 93.6 points a game, held the league’s worst offense to 11 points below its average after surrendering 124 points to Atlanta on Thursday. The Sparks did that despite giving up 30 points on 25 turnovers.
A three-pointer from Wheeler at 6:12 of the fourth quarter produced a 77-55 lead but the Sun reeled off 13 straight for a single-digit deficit with less than two minutes to go but missed their last five shots.
The Sparks led 44-36 at halftime.
Connecticut hit four of 16 shots while the Sparks rebounded to make nine of 12 shots in the third quarter to boost their lead to 66-46.
Hamby was ejected early in the fourth quarter when she flung her right hand back while boxing out Raegan Beers, smacking her in the jaw. No foul was called as Beers went down, but as she went to the locker room the play was reviewed. Beers was given a loose ball foul while Hamby received a flagrant 2 foul for unnecessary and excessive contact.
Up next for the Sparks: Game three in a four-game home stand Monday against Atlanta.
The Iran war has pushed the global energy system into a deeper crisis, with the disruption increasingly shifting from crude oil supplies to the refined fuels that power transportation, industry and economies worldwide.
While global oil markets have adapted relatively well to the loss of a significant share of Middle Eastern crude production, the refining industry has had far fewer options to compensate.
That imbalance is already visible in fuel prices.
Brent crude is around $90 a barrel, roughly 25% above its level when the conflict began on February 28 but well below its wartime peak of $118.
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Refined fuel prices, however, have remained much higher. European diesel prices have risen more than 70% since the start of the war, while U.S. gasoline prices have increased around 60%.
The growing divergence suggests that the biggest energy shock may no longer be coming from crude oil itself, but from the world’s ability to turn crude into usable fuel.
Why Are Fuel Prices Rising Faster Than Oil?
The key problem is declining refinery capacity.
The International Energy Agency estimates that more than 20% of the Middle East’s 9.6 million barrels per day of refining capacity was knocked out during the conflict.
At the same time, the closure of the Strait of Hormuz has restricted fuel exports and disrupted the movement of Gulf crude.
The result has been a chain reaction.
Refineries, particularly in Asia, have had to reduce operations because of difficulties obtaining crude, while damaged Middle Eastern facilities have struggled to return to normal production.
This has created a shortage of diesel, gasoline and other refined products even as crude oil prices have retreated from their wartime highs.
How Has Russia Made the Fuel Crisis Worse?
The Middle East is not the only source of disruption.
Months of Ukrainian attacks on Russian energy infrastructure have also reduced global refining capacity.
Russian refinery throughput has fallen by nearly 30% in recent months to below 4 million barrels per day.
The decline has forced Moscow to restrict diesel exports, removing another major source of refined fuel from international markets.
The combination of Middle Eastern refinery damage and reduced Russian output has left the global market with fewer alternatives.
That is particularly important for diesel, which is essential for freight transportation, agriculture, construction and industrial activity.
Why Are Diesel Refining Margins Surging?
The shortage is reflected in refining margins.
European diesel refining margins have more than tripled since February, rising above $75 a barrel.
U.S. diesel margins have increased more than 140%, reaching a record $100 earlier this week.
These figures demonstrate how severe the shortage has become.
Refineries capable of producing diesel and other fuels are commanding exceptionally high margins because demand remains strong while available capacity is shrinking.
The problem is that simply increasing refining margins does not immediately create new refining capacity.
Building or repairing refineries can take months or years, particularly when specialised equipment is required.
Have Global Fuel Inventories Been Depleted?
Yes, and that could become one of the biggest problems in the months ahead.
Fuel stockpiles provided an important buffer when the conflict began.
That buffer is now largely gone.
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, global oil inventories fell at a rate of around 3.5 million barrels per day between March and July.
Stocks are expected to continue declining through the end of the year.
U.S. diesel inventories are already at their lowest seasonal level in three decades, while gasoline stocks are at their weakest seasonal level since 2012.
This leaves the market increasingly exposed to any additional disruption.
Is There a Global Fuel Production Shortfall?
The data suggests there is.
Global refinery runs during the second quarter were 5.1 million barrels per day lower than a year earlier, according to the IEA.
High fuel prices have reduced consumption, with demand for refined products falling by around 4 million barrels per day.
But that reduction has not been sufficient.
The result was still a shortfall of more than 1 million barrels per day.
The imbalance could become even worse during the third quarter.
Refinery runs are expected to remain 4.1 million barrels per day below last year’s level, while demand is projected to fall by only 2.4 million barrels per day.
In other words, fuel supply is declining faster than demand.
Would Reopening the Strait of Hormuz Solve the Crisis?
Not necessarily.
A diplomatic breakthrough between Washington and Tehran that permanently reopened the Strait of Hormuz could send crude prices sharply lower.
But cheaper crude would not automatically translate into cheaper gasoline and diesel.
The reason is that the refining infrastructure itself has been damaged.
More than 20 Gulf refineries suffered damage during the war, and many require extensive repairs.
Crucial equipment such as compressors, heat exchangers and specialised catalysts can take significant time to obtain.
Lead times for some of these components were already stretched before the conflict.
Consequently, even if crude shipments resume quickly, refinery capacity could remain constrained for much longer.
Why Is China Important to the Energy Crisis?
China’s response could have a major impact on global fuel markets.
China is the world’s second-largest refining centre and sharply reduced refinery processing rates and fuel exports during the conflict.
If Beijing keeps exports limited, the international market will lose another potential source of refined products.
Conversely, an increase in Chinese refinery utilisation and exports could provide some relief.
But China must also balance domestic fuel demand, inventory requirements and its own energy security.
That makes its decisions particularly important for Asia and the wider global market.
Could the Energy Crisis Fuel Global Inflation?
The answer could be yes.
The immediate impact of higher fuel prices is already appearing in inflation data.
U.S. consumer prices rose 3.4% year-on-year in July, with energy costs increasing 14.7% and gasoline prices rising 24.6%.
Euro zone inflation accelerated to 2.9%, driven partly by a 10% increase in energy costs.
Japan’s producer price index rose 7.2% in July.
These figures raise concerns that the energy shock could spread beyond fuel markets.
Higher transportation costs increase the cost of moving goods, while expensive diesel raises costs for agriculture, manufacturing and logistics.
If those increases persist, businesses may eventually pass them on to consumers.
Why Could the Energy Crisis Last for Years?
The central problem is that refining capacity cannot be restored as quickly as crude production.
Oil wells can continue producing once transportation routes reopen.
Refineries, however, require complex infrastructure, specialised machinery, skilled workers and maintenance.
If damaged facilities need major reconstruction, restoring capacity could take years.
At the same time, depleted fuel inventories will eventually need to be rebuilt.
That means refiners could face sustained pressure to process more crude even after the immediate crisis ends.
The result could be a prolonged period of elevated refining margins and fuel prices.
What Does This Mean for Europe and Asia?
Europe and Asia could face particularly severe pressure.
Both regions rely heavily on imported energy and have already experienced increases in refined fuel and liquefied natural gas prices.
For European economies, expensive diesel could increase transportation and industrial costs.
For Asian economies, disruptions to Gulf crude supplies and reduced Chinese fuel exports could create additional pressure.
The combination of higher fuel and LNG prices could therefore create a broader energy inflation shock rather than an isolated oil-market disruption.
Could Consumers Eventually Reduce Demand?
Demand destruction remains one of the few mechanisms capable of restoring balance.
If fuel prices remain extremely high, consumers may drive less and businesses may reduce transportation and energy consumption.
Companies may also delay investment and cut production.
That could eventually reduce demand enough to ease pressure on the refining system.
But demand destruction carries an economic cost.
A reduction in fuel consumption caused by efficiency improvements is very different from a decline caused by households and businesses being unable to afford energy.
The latter can slow economic growth while inflation remains elevated.
Analysis: Why the Refining Crisis May Matter More Than the Oil Shock
The most important lesson from the Iran war energy crisis is that the global energy system is not simply dependent on how much oil exists, but on whether the world can refine and transport that oil into usable fuel.
The crude market has shown considerable resilience.
Refined fuel markets have not.
That distinction could determine how long the current energy shock lasts.
Even if diplomacy reopens the Strait of Hormuz and crude prices fall, damaged refineries, depleted inventories and reduced Russian exports will continue to constrain fuel supplies.
This creates a particularly difficult situation for central banks.
If energy prices rise temporarily, policymakers can theoretically look through the shock. But if fuel shortages persist for months or years, higher transportation and production costs can become embedded across the economy.
That would make the assumption of a short-lived inflation shock increasingly difficult to defend.
The depletion of global inventories is perhaps the biggest warning sign.
Stockpiles normally provide a cushion against geopolitical disruptions. That cushion has now been significantly weakened.
As a result, another major refinery outage, shipping disruption or escalation in the Middle East could produce a much larger price response than it would have before the war.
The world therefore faces a dangerous mismatch: crude supplies may recover faster than the infrastructure needed to turn them into fuel.
That is why the energy crisis could outlast the war itself.
The Iran conflict may have started as a crude oil shock, but its most consequential economic legacy could be a prolonged global shortage of refined fuels, keeping inflation and energy costs elevated long after the fighting ends.
