Despite being the defending champion, Cleveland was not the No. 1 seed in the City Section Open Division boys’ water polo playoffs.
When the final game was over, however, the Cavaliers proved they are still the best, beating host Palisades 9-7 in a defensive struggle Thursday night to capture their fourth section title in a row and third straight in the Open Division.
Arthur Petrosian scored six goals, including the winner on a shot from the hole with 1:30 left to break a 7-7 tie.
“I’m used to scoring this many goals in a game,” said Petrosian, who netted his team’s first five goals, two of them on five-meter shots, but had to be careful after getting two ejections in the first half. “This title means the most because we had to beat them in their own pool.”
Charlie Rinsky added an insurance goal 40 seconds later, and after the top-seeded Dolphins were thwarted on their next possession, Cleveland played keep-away to run all but three seconds off the clock.
“We came into the game thinking we’d run them over, but after the first three quarters it was tied and we just kept thinking next play and reset on defense,” added Petrosian, who scored twice on five-meter shots in last year’s 9-4 championship victory over Eagle Rock.
Daris Fathali Nejad scored in the second quarter and again in the fourth and goalie Matthew Prontenko made 10 saves for the second-seeded Cavaliers (21-8), who have won five section titles — the first coming in 2010.
Jake Gallagher, Max Szymanski and Reed Winters each scored twice for Palisades (19-11), which holds the City record with 18 crowns, including the Division I title last year. Kai Gundershaug also scored and Aidan Moriarty had nine saves for the Dolphins.
Cleveland started its Open Division trifecta two years ago by snapping Palisades’ streak of 11 consecutive titles with a 15-4 finals victory at Valley College.
Earlier, Granada Hills beat Eagle Rock 10-8 for the Division I title.
Ali, who fled Somalia’s civil war and settled in London, won the controversial split-decision fight against American Kreps to claim IBO and WBF junior featherweight belts.
Ramla Ali, a British Somali boxer whose life story is the subject of a new film, has realised a long-held dream and won her first world title to claim two vacant junior featherweight belts in the United States.
The 36-year-old landed the biggest titles of her career by winning the IBO and WBF belts in a controversial split-decision victory over American fighter Mikiah Kreps in Arlington, Texas, on Sunday.
The nail-biting nature of the 10-round contest should not have come as too much of a surprise as the duo are former sparring partners and ended the night with an expression of mutual respect.
“Mikiah, I want to share this victory with you because you pushed me for 10 rounds,” an emotional Ali said while addressing her opponent, whom she stopped from exiting the ring after being declared winner.
“I kept saying I’m so tired because your work rate was next level. I don’t know how I kept up, so thank you for being such a great boxer.”
Mikiah Kreps was covered in blood as she fought Ramla Ali [Julio Cortez/AP]
The 30-year-old Niagara Falls native reciprocated the emotion. “I respect you,” Kreps said as both fighters wrapped an arm around each other.
During the fight, Ali had Kreps on the canvas in round three, but she was behind her younger opponent in the overall punch count at the end of the fight.
The outcome of the fight caused controversy from the moment the referee lifted Ali’s arm when the decision was announced.
According to the official punch statistics from the fight, Kreps outlanded Ali by 115 blows to 78 and the American was also way ahead in the power shot count.
One judge scored the bout 98-91 for Kreps but the other judges saw the fight differently and gave Ali the decision win with scores of 97-92 and 96-93.
Veteran promoter Lou Di Bella wrote on social media, “Mikiah Kreps won that fight and it wasn’t even close. Stevie Wonder could see that.”
Kreps lands a punch on Ali during the ninth round [Julio Cortez/AP]
From Somalia’s civil war to world champion
The external noise would have mattered little to Ali who dropped to her knees when the scores were announced.
Ali and her family are no strangers to adversity, having settled in London in 1992 after fleeing Somalia during its civil war.
Years after picking up the sport as a teenager in East London, Ali became the first Somali boxer to compete at the Olympic Games when she represented the country of her birth at Tokyo 2020. She later became the first Muslim woman to win an English amateur boxing title.
Ali’s journey has provided the inspiration for the movie ‘In the Shadows’ starring Top Boy actor Jasmine Jobson.
Ali wept as she dropped to the mat after winning her first world title [Julio Cortez/AP]
The fighter lost her father earlier this year and said she stayed up all night prior to the fight, wishing he would have been around to see her in the ring.
“My father passed away in May so I was really emotional,” she said in a post-fight interview with All The Smoke Boxing.
“Every round, I kept going to my corner to tell my coach I couldn’t do it anymore because I was physically exhausted. I boxed through my skin and I’m glad I got the victory.”
Ali’s career has always been multi-dimensional. As a model and Unicef ambassador, she has projected her voice beyond sporting arenas.
“I can’t put into words what this means to me and what this means to all of Somalia,” she said, fighting back tears, while standing inside the ring.
“I’ve hopefully inspired so many young girls and boys out there to dream big and that’s all I’ve ever wanted to do.”
In this photo from September 11, 2025, Ali poses with Somali students during her visit to the Dadaab refugee camp in Garissa county, Kenya, in her capacity as a UNICEF UK ambassador at a time when humanitarian agencies had warned of the severe impact of global aid reductions on vulnerable populations [File: Thomas Mukoya/Reuters]
All hail the JSerra Lions, the best high school flag football team in California and probably in the nation.
The Lions went 28-0 this season, their second straight unbeaten season. They won the Southern Section Open Division championship game on Saturday night with a 40-14 victory over Newport Harbor at Huntington Beach.
Coach Brian Ong wasn’t supposed to have a better team than the unbeaten 2025 squad, but the Lions pulled it off led by quarterback Kate Meier and receiver Tessa Russell, both of whom are only sophomores.
Meier passed for four touchdowns on Saturday. Russell had 12 receptions for 153 yards. No opponent came closer than 13 points all season. Newport Harbor, the No. 2 team in Southern California, lost three times to the Lions.
LIONS POSTGAME: Sophomore Kate Meier threw for 262 yards and four touchdowns, including three to fellow sophomore Tessa Russell (who had 12 catches for 153 yards), to help spark the JSerra Girls Flag Football team to a 40-14 win over the Newport Harbor Sailors in the CIF-SS Open… pic.twitter.com/3JKAcUoibb
In other finals, Oxnard won its first Division 1 title with an 18-12 win over Palos Verdes. In Division 2, San Clemente defeated Gahr 35-34 in overtime.
In Division 3, Valencia defeated Quartz Hill 12-7. Valencia’s 11-man football quarterback, Evan McCalister, was on hand to help his father, Cedric, the head coach. Camila Quintero threw three touchdown passes.
Valley Christian won Division 4 with a 33-18 win over West Ranch. Loma Linda defeated Peninsula 33-6 in Division 5. St. Monica, in its inaugural season, won Division 6 with a 39-20 victory over Heritage.
Upon hammering her 19th kill on a cross-court attack, Westley Matavao leaped into the arms of her teammates to celebrate Mater Dei’s 24-26, 25-23, 25-21, 25-23 triumph over Sierra Canyon in the CIF Southern Section Division 1 girls’ volleyball final Saturday night at Cerritos College.
Having avenged a loss in the section finals last season, the Monarchs’ next goal is to defend their state championship, and they will be the top seed when the Southern California Regional Open Division bracket is released Sunday.
Westley Matavao goes on the attack for Mater Dei against Sierra Canyon in the CIF Southern Section Division 1 girls’ volleyball championship match on Nov. 7, 2026.
(Steve Galluzzo / For The Times)
“This season it’s important for us to win everything because I’ve been here all four years, this is my last one and I wasn’t going to take losing as an answer,” said Matavao, a senior outside hitter headed to UCLA.
The Monarchs (39-1) have dealt Sierra Canyon (32-2) its only losses this season and the top two programs in the nation could meet for a third time, but for now Mater Dei reigns supreme after earning its second section title in three years. It swept the Trailblazers in the finals two years ago.
Freshman Jimin Seung had 14 kills, Cal-bound middle blocker Emma Kingston had 11 kills and sophomore libero Sienna Cicero finished with a match-high 23 digs, diving all over the floor to keep points alive.
“It was definitely tougher this time around — over half of them are high Division I level players — so you can’t underestimate a team like that,” Cicero said. “Our blockers played great and funneled the ball perfectly for me. My mentality is we’re going to win no matter what.”
Mater Dei beat Sierra Canyon, 25-18, 25-17, in the gold division final at the Durango Fall Classic in September before suffering its only loss to Trinity League rival Santa Margarita 11 days later.
Katherine Nowak, center, celebrates a kill with Mater Dei teammates Jael Smith, left, and Riley Stringer against Sierra Canyon in the CIF Southern Section Division 1 final on Saturday.
(Steve Galluzzo / For The Times)
Sierra Canyon trailed by seven points midway through the first set but rallied to take an 18-17 lead on an ace by McKenna McIntosh, who blasted through a left-side block on the Trailblazers’ first set point. McIntosh, a hitter headed to USC, finished with 10 kills and 19 digs and Nebraska-bound middle blocker Kendall Omoruyi had a match-high 22 kills.
The Monarchs were clinging to a 21-20 lead in the second set when Matavao took control, hammering spikes for her team’s last four points. An ace by Kalea Lee gave Mater Dei a 21-19 lead in the third set and another by Matavao had the Trinity League champions one set away from victory.
Lee (22 assists) and fellow setter Riley Stringer (25 assists) ran the Monarchs’ offense with precision and Matavao, the cousin of Trailblazers setter Lucky Fasavalu, who is committed to Missouri, added 14 digs.
Sierra Canyon’s Kendall Omoruyi hits over Mater Dei blockers Emma Kingston, center, and Jimin Seung in the CIF Southern Section Division 1 championship on Saturday.
(Steve Galluzzo / For The Times)
Concentrating on the task at hand, Matavao said the two did not talk before the match.
“I’m grateful to be part of this team,” Matavao said. “We did all this together.”
In the preceding Division 2 final, Long Beach Poly trailed 14-12 in the fifth set before reeling off the last four points to beat Redondo Union, 25-19, 20-25, 25-18, 23-25, 16-14. It marked the second section title in three seasons for the Jackrabbits, who won the Division 3 title in 2024.
Avery Milburn had 18 kills for second-seeded Poly (29-7) and blocked the Sea Hawks’ top hitter, Asofiafia So’oto, on match point.
“I could see her approach going angle and I knew I had to get my right hand on it and make it the best block ever,” said Milburn, who got a kill to thwart the first of the Sea Hawks’ two chances to end it.
Long Beach Poly’s Alison Wetteland plays a ball at the net in the CIF Southern Section Division 2 girls’ volleyball final against Redondo Union on Saturday.
(Steve Galluzzo / For The Times)
McKennah Iamaleava had 29 kills, 15 digs and two aces and teamed with Alison Wetteland for a block to level the final set at 14-14. Mina Orbiso finished with 32 assists, Cedra Talaga had 20 digs and Aleeya Salima added 18 kills and seven digs for Poly.
So’oto had 17 kills, Abigail Hairrell had 11 kills and Leah Blair had nine kills and 14 digs and Addison Uphoff had five blocks, including one to end the fourth set for Redondo Union (22-12), which had upset No. 1-seeded Newport Harbor in the quarterfinals and No. 4 San Juan Hills in the semifinals.
In the Division 3 final, Corona del Mar outlasted Newbury Park 24-26, 25-20, 25-15, 22-25, 15-13 to capture its first section title in 22 years and the eighth in program history.
Corona del Mar’s Sofia Dajnowiec, right, tips the ball over two Newbury Park blockers in the CIF Southern Section Division 3 girls’ volleyball championship on Saturday.
(Steve Galluzzo / For The Times)
“I’m glad I was able to score that final point,” said senior outside hitter Sofia Dajnowiec, who pounded her 36th kill to end the match. “To win this means everything, it’s the best thing that could happen. We really worked hard in practice and stuck together as a team.”
Isabella Spinella dished out 44 assists, Savannah Dennis had 14 kills and 18 digs, Olivia Rosowski had 25 digs and Dajnowiec added 17 digs for the Sea Kings (26-9), who served 13 aces.
Charley Knupp had 18 kills and 15 digs, Emmery Reynolds had 10 kills and 10 digs, Olena Harasymowycz added 29 digs and Keira Overbeck handed out 32 assists for the Panthers (34-10), who were making their second finals appearance in three seasons, having lost the Division 4 title match to Campbell Hall in 2024.
Taft takes City Section Open Division title
Making its fourth finals appearance in five seasons, Taft defeated West Valley League rival Cleveland in five thrilling sets at Birmingham High to claim the Open Division championship — its seventh City title under coach Arman Mercado since he took over the program in 2000.
The fourth-seeded Toreadors (34-7) avenged two league losses to the third-seeded Cavaliers (31-12), who were vying for their first section crown after going 10-0 in the West Valley League to capture their first outright league title since 2004.
Mercado piloted the Toreadors to the City championship in 2006, the Invitational title in 2008, Division II titles in 2009, 2013 and 2014 and their first Open Division championship in 2024.
Second-seeded Granada Hills Kennedy upset top-seeded Sherman Oaks Center for Enriched Studies in four sets in the Division I final.
Joshua Buatsi and Willy Hutchinson renew their rivalry for the vacant WBC world light-heavyweight title in Manchester on Saturday.
The British rivals first met in a highly entertaining, hard-fought contest on the undercard of Daniel Dubois’ win over Anthony Joshua in September 2024.
Londoner Buatsi, 33, twice knocked down Hutchinson before going on to win by split decision.
Scotland’s Hutchinson, 28, suffered the second defeat of his professional career that night but two wins since have put him in a position to fight for a first world title.
Can Buatsi repeat his victory? Or will Hutchinson gain revenge in Manchester?
BBC Sport spoke to figures from across the boxing world to get their predictions.
If you’re a certain age — say, the generation most excited by the prospect of a “Rocky” origin story — you probably have spent a good few decades watching people imitate Sylvester Stallone. You might be able to pull it off yourself. Start with the gravely voice that rumbles and mumbles, make your eyes as heavy-lidded as possible, add a swaggering shoulder roll and then just brood, baby, brood.
Anthony Ippolito has the moves down pat in “I Play Rocky,” Peter Farrelly’s endearing crowd-pleaser, an underdog story about making the underdog movie that went on to win the Oscar for best picture in 1977. The title comes from Stallone’s repeated insistence that he portray the working-class fighter in the film that he wrote for himself. The studio wanted a star — Ryan O’Neal or Burt Reynolds, among others — and offered Stallone $360,000 for the script if he would just walk away. Stallone refused, even though his bank account was down to $106.
“I told my wife that I’d rather bury it in the backyard and let the caterpillars play Rocky,” he said shortly before the movie opened. “I would have hated myself for selling out, the way we hate most people for selling out.”
And that’s why the new film, written by Peter Gamble, has Ippolito say the title so many times that, by the end, you feel like you’ve gone a full 15 rounds with Apollo Creed and been pummeled into submission.
But as you’re watching this breezy movie as it slipstreams its way down memory lane, it starts to feel like Ippolito really is playing Rocky and not Stallone. The difference might be negligible, since “Rocky” was, in many respects, Stallone’s story: a sensitive palooka struggling for the chance to prove himself and earn a measure of self-respect, all the while supported by a woman who believes in his dream.
But the charming, softie Stallone we see in “I Am Rocky” seems like a character from mythology, a Hercules lacking the prickly complexities that Stallone himself detailed in his recent memoir. His tumultuous relationship with his father, Frank (Matt Dillon), is given little attention. Watching this movie, you might be reminded of the quote from “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance”: “When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.” And while the facts of this oft-told story are, for the most part, accurate, “I Am Rocky” feels too neat, a movie that relies on our love for “Rocky,” the movie and the character.
The film’s first half wastes no time laying the groundwork. It’s 1974 and Stallone is living in squalor in a New York flophouse. When he can’t even afford that, he takes to the streets, sleeping in an alley and adopting a stray bullmastiff that he names Butkus, the same dog that would go on to appear with him in “Rocky.” Desperate for cash, he accepts a part in a softcore porn flick. He eventually takes a job at a movie theater, where he meets Sasha (a lovely AnnaSophia Robb), who, growing weary of his frustrations and their precarious finances, tells him he should write a screenplay with a meaty part for himself.
Stallone soon does just that, cranking out “Rocky” in three and a half days after watching longshot Chuck Wepner (a.k.a. “The Bayonne Bleeder”) go 15 rounds against Muhammad Ali in a heavyweight championship fight. Producers Robert Chartoff (Toby Kebbell) and Irwin Winkler (P.J. Byrne) love the script and take it to brusque studio exec Sandy Maddox (Tracy Letts, gloriously cantankerous playing a composite character), who tells them to give Stallone $50,000 for the screenplay and send this complete unknown on his way. Stallone has a three-word rejoinder.
You don’t need a spoiler alert to know that he indeed does play Rocky, and the second half of the film re-creates the movie’s production, which, because of the shoestring budget, was arduous. The tight schedule forced Stallone to work even when he was sick and hurt. If he didn’t, he feared he’d be fired because the studio still wasn’t thrilled with him playing the lead.
There’s something for everyone in this section. Film nerds will glory in watching Steadicam inventor Garrett Brown (Michael Fuchs) sprinting up the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, smoothly following Stallone, creating “Rocky’s” most famous scene with a fluidity that revolutionized moviemaking. Downtrodden directors will appreciate Jay Duplass’ knowing portrayal of John G. Avildsen, charged with making “Rocky” as quickly and frugally as possible. Avildsen brought the movie in on time and went on to win the Oscar for directing.
And longtime fans will appreciate that the film plays all the hits: the bare-knuckle beef pounding, the training sequences, the intimate ice rink scene with Talia Shire (Kiki Seto). Hollywood loves to celebrate its own scrappy mythmaking. (Ippolito’s biggest part prior to this was playing Al Pacino in “The Offer,” a limited series about the making of “The Godfather.”) Sure, it’s sentimental. And maybe you’d be better off just staying home and revisiting “Rocky.” What can I say? I put Bill Conti’s soaring “Gonna Fly Now” on repeat during the drive home. Nostalgia is a powerful drug.
‘I Play Rocky’
Rated: PG-13, for strong language, brief sexual material, and smoking
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As a nation, we give thanks this month, and readers can, too, since November’s new releases include several kinds of fiction (sci-fi, climate dystopia and thriller, among them) and nonfiction featuring a memoir from a nonagenarian legend, an octogenarian legend and an almost-septuagenarian legend. Happy reading!
FICTION:
Stations: A Novel By Louise Kennedy Riverhead Books: 288 pp., $28 (Nov. 3)
Kennedy (who penned the international bestseller “Trespasses”) is Irish and knows that country’s Roman Catholicism well, which means that her latest book’s title signals differences in class and status — but also has that whiff from the church thurible that signals the Stations of the Cross, or the Way of Sorrows. Roisin, a teen in 1982, falls hard for her friend Tina’s upper-class boyfriend, Red Camelin. She’ll undergo her own sorrows when she finds him again, in London, living in a squat.
Robbie, a young Métis man, thinks the best way to find his missing father is through his Anglo uncle, Doug, who lives in Montana. When Robbie and his mother travel by bus from Alberta, Canada, they part ways for a time before he discovers raging wildfires threaten her location. Meanwhile, Doug has made a confession that haunts the men as they follow a pregnant bison onto an unstable glacier. It’s an unusual, slightly surreal, meditation on climate change.
It’s a familiar scenario: A civil servant gets laid off and moves back in with family, far from Washington, D.C. Scalzi’s latest sees Mike Boyd return to Richland, Ohio, where the town’s major employer might be shutting down, and strange things are happening to mammals both two- and four-legged. As Mike teams up with a few pals, a police officer and an events organizer, a funny and remarkably optimistic story of small-town resistance unfolds.
Okparanta’s “Under the Udala Trees” was set during the 1960s Biafran War; her new novel takes place in 1993, as siblings Alohan and Ivie, ages 11 and 4, face a family tragedy that eventually leads to their separation. As the brother and sister forge lives, more tragedies occur. However, the author wants readers to see that displacement of many kinds, malignant or benign, can have far-reaching consequences — and sometimes those can be overcome.
27 Knots: A Novel By Martin J. Smith Open Road Media: 334 pp., $26 (Nov. 24)
The title refers to knots tied in a U.S. Navy Riverine force beret, each knot symbolizing what the men in those units believe is “an assassination in the name of duty.” Fifty years ago, the teenage Vance was sent to Vietnam and hunted down Viet Cong forces in the Mekong Delta. Today, he’s headed to Washington, D.C., for the funeral of a comrade — but another of his comrades might threaten his carefully constructed life. A thoughtful and riveting thriller.
“As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster,” says Henry Hill in “Goodfellas,” and what better way to be a gangster than to create your own? In this hefty biography of director Martin Scorsese, long-time journalist Binelli leaves no reel unturned as he chronicles his subject’s Little Italy origins, years as a “functioning cokehead,” and rise to fame through films including “Taxi Driver,” “Raging Bull” and “The Departed.”
Burton’s multifaceted roles as Kunta Kinte in “Roots,” as Geordi La Forge in “Star Trek: The Next Generation” and as the host of “Reading Rainbow” have affected his life deeply. As he explains in his lovely memoir, Kunta Kinte allowed him to understand Blackness as a cultural phenomenon, while Geordi LaForge lived in a future where Blackness was no longer an issue — and his passion for liberation led to encouraging kids to “Take a look, it’s in a book.”
While we watch shows like “The Diplomat” and “Black Doves” focusing on our country’s European allies, another global power deserves attention. As longtime political expert Kaplan explains, our understanding of China has been filtered through the perspectives of groups that include today’s technophiles and linguists, who help our government negotiate a land of great progress and huge differences. Perhaps we should send Jack Reacher to Beijing?
Leave it to the tireless singer-songwriter and ganja connoisseur to give his new book such a punny title (and one that also references his song “Last Leaf on the Tree”). Nelson claims he’s slowing down in his old age, but given his prolific touring and recording, plenty of young musicians want what he’s having. His focus on living in the present, his decades-long marriage to wife Annie, and memories of true friends all show Nelson’s wisdom.
Since, along with his colleague Carl Bernstein, Woodward once held that most secret of secrets — the identity of the Watergate informant known as “Deep Throat” — it’s fitting for him to use it as the title for this engrossing memoir. He’s covered everything from the White House to the Pentagon; expect a long list of source names, some of whom, Woodward says, permitted him to do so, while others are now a matter of public record.
Patrick is a freelance critic and author of the memoir “Life B.”
Britain’s Harriet Dart won the first WTA Tour singles title of her career as she beat fast-rising Austrian teenager Lilli Tagger in the Guangzhou Open final.
Dart, 30, was overcome by emotion following a 4-6 6-3 6-4 victory in a tense final.
The British number five, ranked 115th in the world, twice had a lead in the decider wiped out by 18-year-old Tagger.
But Dart broke for a third time for 4-3 and held serve to move within one game of the title.
Dart held two championship points on 53rd-ranked Tagger’s serve in the ninth game – dumping an inviting mid-court ball into the net on the second – but recovered to seal victory in the biggest match of her career.
She took her third championship point with a service winner, falling to the court in joy before celebrating with her team.
The gutsy victory capped a stunning run for Dart, who came through qualifying to reach her first tour-level final at the WTA 250 event.
As well as taking home the trophy, Dart will be rewarded for the best week of her career by climbing back inside the world’s top 100.
It means she will go directly into the main draw of the Australian Open when the opening Grand Slam of the season takes place in January.
The hallmark of Dart’s success this week has been her resilience and ability to recover from losing positions.
Fighting back against 2025 French Open junior champion Tagger was the fourth time in seven matches she won after losing the first set.
The title is rich reward for a superb second half to the season, in which Dart has struck the ball consistently well and continued to grow in confidence.
Dart reached a career high of 70th in the world in 2024, having made the Wimbledon third round and US Open second round, but has been languishing outside the top 100 for most of the past two seasons.
Working with former Wimbledon champion Marion Bartoli has been a big factor in Dart’s resurgence.
Dart has won 19 of her 24 tour-level matches on the hard courts since Wimbledon, taking her overall record on the WTA Tour this season to 23 victories from 34 matches – the highest winning percentage of her career.
“It wasn’t fun to be on the other side of the court today – you’ve had an amazing year,” Tagger, who beat seven-time major champion Venus Williams on her way to the final, told Dart.
The Golden State Valkyries secured the Women’s NBA title in just their second season with a 68-63 victory over the Atlanta Dream.
After the Dream levelled the seven-match series on Thursday, Gabby Williams starred for the Valkyries with 30 points to seal the win in the first Game Seven in WNBA Finals history.
Williams also claimed the WNBA Finals Most Valuable Player award.
“It’s easy when the energy is this good and positive,” said Williams. I wouldn’t change a thing.
“All it took was good people. We have winners, we have people who are ready to put their bodies on the floor to win a game.
“They don’t care about scoring. They just want to do defence and rebounding. Do whatever it takes and we built a beautiful culture here.”
Twenty eight of Williams’ points came in the second half, including a three-pointer with just over two minutes remaining to edge ahead by 60 points to the Dream’s 57, before free throws by Tiffany Hayes and Veronica Burton closed out the win.
The Valkyries are the WNBA’s newest team, having been formed in 2024, and won in front of a sell-out crowd of more than 18,000 fans at San Francisco’s Chase Center.
It is the fourth time that Dream have lost the finals in their 18-year history.
SAN FRANCISCO — Gabby Williams scored her team’s final 11 points of the third quarter and dazzled through the fourth on the way to 30 points, and the Golden State Valkyries captured a championship in just their second season by beating the Atlanta Dream 68-63 in a sensational first WNBA Finals Game 7 on Saturday night.
Jordin Canada scored 18 points, Allisha Gray 16 and Angel Reese had eight points and 12 rebounds for the Dream, denied another championship in the franchise’s fourth try.
Gray made two free throws with 11 seconds left then Atlanta forced a jump ball — Gray against Williams — and Veronica Burton corralled it and converted two free throws with 5.1 seconds to go.
“I’m just so blessed, this is insane!” said Burton, cut by Dallas two years ago.
Rhyne Howard’s layup tied it at 57 with 2:41 left only for Williams to answer once more with a clutch three-pointer. She converted two free throws with 1:40 remaining, then Kiah Stokes scored a late basket. Stokes pulled down 13 rebounds and blocked two more shots to cap her spectacular postseason.
Williams left Seattle with a great feeling about joining Golden State and its close-knit culture, returning to the Bay Area where she played youth basketball to build something special with the Valkyries — and she’s now done that. Fans chanted “Gabby! Gabby!” throughout the fourth quarter.
“All it took was good people,” she said. “All we heard last year was we don’t have no stars. We don’t have no talent. Yeah right! We got good people. We got good people. We got winners. We got people who are ready to put their bodies on the floor to win a game.”
When the final buzzer sounded, the violet-clad sellout crowd at Chase Center went into a frenzy as players sprinted onto the floor to hug and celebrate as confetti fell from the rafters.
“Ballhalla” had become “Boohalla” for this far-but-haunted Halloween night in the raucous arena. Now, with a women’s championship to its name right alongside the one earned by the Golden State Warriors in 2022.
“We gotta build a bigger trophy case,” co-owner Peter Guber said.
The team that led at halftime in the first six matchups had won every game so far, and the Dream were ahead 30-24 at the break. Atlanta also had been 16-0 this season when Reese made at least one 3. The Dream’s DeWanna Bonner became the first player in WNBA history to reach 600 career postseason defensive rebounds.
Valkyries coach Natalie Nakase changed her starting lineup in a move that paid huge dividends after Golden State fell behind 2-1, inserting Kaila Charles and Tiffany Hayes and bringing Kayla Thornton and Cecilia Zandalasini off the bench.
The 37-year-old Hayes, who came out of retirement two years ago and spent 10 seasons with the Dream, scored 11 points in the winner-take-all Game 7 and brought energy all series that made Nakase want to win for the veteran guard as much as anybody.
Valkyries owner Joe Lacob guaranteed a championship within the first five years for this franchise three years ago when the Bay Area was granted an expansion team, and in improbable, joyful fashion, his team accomplished it in Year 2. That after becoming the first expansion organization to reach the playoffs in its inaugural year in 2025.
During the victory ceremony, Lacob shouted out the team and its leaders, while Nakase, general manager Ohemma Nyanin and president Jess Smith hugged. And Lacob thanked the fans who have sold out Chase Center for every game since Day 1.
Hamilton said his pole, on his 43rd start for Ferrari, was “one of the greatest feelings”.
It is not the first time he has qualified fastest for Ferrari – that was when he took sprint pole at the Chinese Grand Prix last year, in only his second race for the team.
But that was followed by a difficult debut season, when he looked a shadow of his former self, and was pretty much taken to the cleaners by Leclerc.
Hamilton’s record is such that his performances last year left many perplexed – not least himself. He was consistently down on himself, even saying at one low point in the summer of 2025 that he was “just useless” and suggesting Ferrari should change drivers.
As this followed a similarly challenging final year for Mercedes, it inevitably led to questions about his future, whether age was catching up with him. After all, he had no explanations for his performances himself.
His form has improved this year, with a car that he finds much more to his liking, and he has a number of times referenced these perfectly valid questions. He did so again on Saturday.
“It’s impossible to rank 105 pole positions,” he said. “They have all been unique in their own way. It feels more special in this period where they’re not every week and it’s the first one with Ferrari in red.
“I’ve now had pole with three different teams, which is pretty phenomenal. And all the questions people had about whether a 40-year-old has still got it, there you go.”
The battle between Hamilton and Leclerc has been much more even this year.
Hamilton leads his team-mate by eight points in the championship and in qualifying there is nothing to choose between them – it is now 12-10 in their head-to-head and Leclerc is ahead on average pace by just 0.037secs, when the gap was 0.15secs last year.
“I have been fortunate to have many great experiences with Mercedes over the years,” said Hamilton. “We have had sprint pole but I have been really dreaming and eyeing for that first pole with the team.
“Charles is very, very quick over one lap. He has had an engineer he has worked with for years. It’s an environment he is very aware of and used to.
“I am still settling in and learning, with new engineers this year. We have really found a good rapport and are really doing a great job. There is lots more to come, we just have to keep on at it, but what an amazing feeling to get that first.”
Hamilton goes into the race with less knowledge than his rivals, a breakdown in second practice meaning he was not able to do his race-simulation run.
“It will will be a massive challenge to find the right balance but I am hopeful, it will be challenging and tough,” he said.
In the Middle East, Saúl “Canelo” Álvarez will return to the ring after a 13-month hiatus in search of more titles.
In Riyadh, many time zones from his native Mexico and second home base in Las Vegas, Álvarez will try to take the World Boxing Council super-middleweight title from Christian Mbilli, an undefeated champion who has never faced an opponent of Álvarez’s caliber.
The Guadalajara-born boxer arrived in Saudi Arabia on Monday, where he was greeted by Faisal Bafarat, CEO of the General Entertainment Authority (GEA). The event has faced unusual complications, with one of the fights on the card canceled because of security concerns raised by one of the boxers and criticism from figures in the boxing world who question the athletes’ safety — especially after several sporting events, including Formula One, WTA and WWE events have been canceled or relocated because of the war in the Middle East.
The fight between Canelo (63-3-2, 39 KOs) and Mbilli (29-0-1, 24 KOs) headlines the “Mexico vs. The World” event at The Venue as part of the seventh edition of Riyadh Season. The bout will be broadcast on pay-per-view via DAZN (10 a.m. Pacific Time, main event around 1:10 p.m.).
Terence Crawford throws a left punch at Canelo Álvarez at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas on Sept. 13, 2025.
(Sarah Stier / Getty Images for Netflix)
After a period of inactivity that included elbow surgery, Álvarez — beyond his opponents — faces his greatest enemy in Father Time, as demonstrated by his September 2025 loss to Terence Crawford, which cost him his four super-middleweight titles. Crawford retired after that victory — the best of his career — and Mbilli went from interim champion to full WBC champion.
After that painful defeat, Álvarez acknowledged that his mind wasn’t on the fight that night.
“When you lose, you always review your mistakes, and at this level there’s very little difference between winning and losing,” said Álvarez, whose training concluded in Spain, where he shared a gym with heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk. “I did a good job preparing for that fight, but during fight week, my mind wasn’t in it.”
For this bout, Álvarez chose to finish his preparation in Spain to avoid the adjustment issues he said he experienced during last year’s fight against William Scull, also in Riyadh.
Álvarez hasn’t knocked out an opponent since defeating Caleb Plant by technical knockout in 2021, and the last opponent he clearly knocked out was Sergey Kovalev in 2019. Although he has defeated several high-caliber opponents who were physically larger than him, he has been unable to secure a knockout, which has fueled speculation that his power and stamina have declined over the years. If he loses, it would mark the first consecutive losses of his career, and criticism regarding his decline would intensify. However, Álvarez has stated that he feels no obligation to win.
“I never think about the pressure. I feel like I work even better when I have it,” Álvarez said. “I don’t think about who says good or bad things.”
Álvarez did not fight in either May or September in Las Vegas, on the dates reserved for boxing’s biggest stars. In May, David Benavidez took the slot after knocking out Gilberto Ramírez, and then Ryan García took the September slot to defeat Conor Benn. For many, García is emerging as the man who will inherit Canelo’s slots in Las Vegas as the “new face of boxing.”
“I love boxing and I’m just focused on that. There’s a lot of young talent always coming out of Mexico, so we’ll see who’s next,” said Álvarez, who made his professional boxing debut 21 years ago.
“He’s the most successful Mexican boxer in the sport,” said Eddy Reynoso, the Jalisco native’s manager and trainer who asked for a round of applause for his fighter on Thursday at the news conference in Riyadh. Álvarez thanked him with a hug.
“We’re going to prove that Canelo is still up for the big challenges,” said Reynoso.
Canelo Álvarez waits in the corner during his fight against Terence Crawford in Las Vegas on Sept. 13, 2025.
(David Becker / Associated Press)
But for many, time has Canelo on the ropes. Both he and his team have acknowledged that his body has taken a toll from fighting since he was 13.
“Now I’m the challenger, but in my mind I’ve always been the champion since I was a kid,” Álvarez said.
Mbilli, 31, a French-Cameroonian with an aggressive style and a high volume of punches, won the interim title by knocking out Maciej Sulecki in the first round in June 2025. In his next fight—on the same card as Canelo vs. Crawford and in front of a packed Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas — he fought to a hard-fought split-decision draw against Guatemalan Lester Martínez. This will be his first title defense as the undisputed champion.
“I think I have the right style to beat Canelo. I have a lot of power, a lot of speed, and a lot of skills to win this fight,” said Mbilli, who claimed to have spotted some mistakes by the Mexican during his fight against Crawford.
“I don’t think age will be a factor; it will be the perfect time for me,” said Mbilli, who is five years younger than Álvarez.
Álvarez is the favorite with the bookmakers thanks to Mbilli’s limited experience against elite opponents. Mbilli has a victory over Sergiy Derevyanchenko in 2024, a win over Sulecki and, in his title defense against Martínez last year, he had a lackluster performance in which he landed punches but also took a lot of hits.
Boxing amid international conflict
This image from CCTV video released by Saudi Arabia’s Media Ministry shows passengers taking cover as flames and smoke fill part of King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on Oct. 10.
(Saudi Media Ministry via Associated Press)
Álvarez’s fight card is proceeding as planned despite the wave of missile and drone attacks attributed to Houthi rebels. The attacks have left at least 20 dead and 370 wounded, and have forced the closure of King Khalid International Airport for two weeks. Last week, the U.S. State Department ordered the evacuation of non-essential government personnel and their families from the country because of the instability.
Accompanying Álvarez were Mexicans Carlos Emiliano, Manuel Salcedo, Rafael Espinoza and Jaime Munguía, as well as Saudi fighter Sultan Al-Muhammad — all of whom were on the fight card. Mbilli had arrived days earlier.
But one person who did not arrive was Lindolfo Delgado, a Mexican boxer who was left off the Oct. 31 card, where he was scheduled to fight Arthur Biyarslanov for the vacant International Boxing Federation super-lightweight title. According to his trainer, Robert García, his fighter did not make the trip due to logistical issues, as he lacked information about flights and there were daily alerts about possible missile attacks. It has not yet been announced whether Biyarslanov will fight a replacement boxer on the card.
“Why would we risk going there without any security guarantees? Flying to another country [Bahrain] and driving five to six hours to get to another location? That’s asking for trouble,” García said in an interview with Boxing Scene.
On Wednesday in Los Angeles, promoter Oscar De La Hoya joined the criticism of the decision to hold the bout in Saudi Arabia. He argued that promoter Turki Alalshikh and Álvarez should have been more responsible and moved the fight to another venue.
Because of the conflict in the Middle East, numerous top-tier events have been moved to other cities or were postponed. The list ranges from the Dakar Rally and the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix to the WTA Finals, the FIFA eSports Finals, and WWE’s Crown Jewel.
“It’s not very responsible when you have a U.S. consul saying it’s dangerous, that it’s a Category 3,” De La Hoya said to independent reporter Albert Pérez. “How can you put the boxers’ lives at risk?… It’s interesting — in the times we live in, when ambition feeds you and feeds your ego, that’s what happens.”
The event is sanctioned by the WBC, and Mauricio Sulaimán, the organization’s president, is in Riyadh.
“I’m coming to fight, to win a world championship,” Álvarez said on Thursday. “Whatever I have to do, wherever I have to go… I’ll do whatever it takes to win it.”
For the 15th time in the last 16 years, Palisades and Granada Hills met for the City Section Open Division girls’ tennis championship Wednesday afternoon.
For the second year in a row, Palisades came out on top, winning eight of nine doubles sets (each worth one and a half points) in the round-robin format on its way to a 20-9.5 victory at Balboa Sports Center in Encino.
It was the 31st City title for the top-seeded Dolphins (21-5), who clinched the championship when their No. 1 doubles team of Remy Trepanier and Penelope Mihal beat the Highlanders’ No. 3 duo of Nicole Khachatourians and Sammi Cho 6-1 to earn Palisades’ 15th point
“We lost our top seven players from last year but these girls worked hard and improved,” Palisades coach Robert Silvers said. “I’m really proud of them.”
Palisades and Granada Hills have combined to win the last 25 upper division crowns (14 by Palisades and 11 by Granada Hills) and since the debut of the Open Division in 2017, Palisades has won the four-team bracket seven times and Granada Hills three.
Mihal and Trepanier dropped only five games in three sets, the Dolphins’ No. 2 pair of Brienne Dominguez and Nina Arasteh swept 7-5, 6-4, 6-1 and the third tandem of McKenna Adham and Sonia Shirley sandwiched a pair of 6-4 wins around a 6-3 defeat to the Highlanders’ No.1 team of Iris Huang and Christina Surmabukian.
Granada Hills High’s No. 2 singles player Ayah Vilien hits a forehand return Wednesday at Balboa Sports Center.
(Steve Galluzzo / For The Times)
The schools split the 16 singles sets (each worth one point). The Dolphins’ No. 1 player Aila Monahan and No. 2 player Charlie Roberts each won three sets before being subbed out for the last round with a second straight title already secure.
Palisades ended Granada Hills’ three-peat bid with a 25-4.5 finals win last fall.
“We expect to play Pali in the finals every year and it’s always a good match,” Granada Hills coach Troy Aiken said.
SAN FRANCISCO — Kiah Stokes had 13 points, eight rebounds and three blocked shots as the Golden State Valkyries moved within one win of a championship in their second season, beating the Atlanta Dream 64-55 in Game 5 of the WNBA Finals on Monday night.
Angel Reese finished with seven points, 15 rebounds and five assists — a big difference from her two standout performances in the first two games of the series at Chase Center. Reese shook her head when whistled for the second of her three offensive fouls with 7:43 to play.
Fans screamed and clapped thunder sticks following the final buzzer as Stokes spoke from the floor to chants of “MVP!”
“We appreciate you,” a smiling Stokes said. “We got one more.”
On a night leading scorer Gabby Williams struggled to find her shooting touch, Golden State found the “strength in numbers” mantra that coach Natalie Nakase has praised all season long and everybody made an influence. Veronica Burton had 13 points and eight rebounds.
On Saturday, Nakase had changed up her lineup for a 67-62 Game 4 win by inserting Tiffany Hayes and Kaila Charles into the starting five. She stayed with those two Monday night, and it worked again. Hayes, who played 10 seasons for Atlanta and came out of retirement two years ago, had 12 points — and Nakase has said she wants to win it all for the veteran guard.
Williams began two for 11 and missed all four of her three three-point tries, but she converted a three-point play with 9:08 remaining to put the Valkyries ahead 49-42 and finished with nine points on three-for-14 shooting and six rebounds.
Atlanta will now try to stave off elimination at home Thursday in Game 6 and force a deciding Game 7 back at Chase Center on Saturday. The Dream hurt themselves with 17 turnovers that led to 21 points for Golden State.
Stokes hit a key three-pointer with 2:46 to go in the third quarter and another with 7:21 left in the game, which ignited chants of “Ki-ah! Ki-ah!” from the crazed, rally towel-waving “Ballhalla” home crowd at Chase Center.
Stokes has recorded three or more blocks in six straight games, tying her with Lisa Leslie in 2003 for the longest such streak in a single WNBA postseason.
The Valkyries used a dominant second half after they led 25-22 at the break, the lowest scoring first half combined score in WNBA Finals history.
Rhyne Howard’s three-point play with 4:59 left in the third pulled Atlanta within 34-31, but after that it was Stokes, Burton and the Valkyries coming up with all the crucial plays on both ends.
Golden State owner Joe Lacob promised a championship within five years in a bold declaration when the expansion franchise was granted to the Bay Area three years ago, yet this season has exceeded even what he could have envisioned.
Neither team could find a flow from three-point range in the first half as the teams combined to shoot five for 29 from deep — three of 16 by Golden State and two for 13 by Atlanta.
Earlier Monday, the league announced Game 6 would be played at 17,000-seat State Farm Arena in Atlanta starting at 12:30 p.m. EDT on Thursday — a time when many fans on both coasts will be working.
“I’d like to see it be a national holiday for all WNBA championship games so whatever somebody can do,” Dream coach Karl Smesko said. “I hope everybody gets to see it somehow and I know that for some people it’s not realistic, they have jobs and won’t be able to make it. So I’m disappointed for that but I’m really hopeful that as many people can see the game as possible.”
PHILADELPHIA — Joel Embiid punished Milwaukee with a triple-double one night and wanted to go right at Detroit and try for another on the next one. So the amiable big man with a career list of injuries that would fit on a scroll or two made a good-natured plea with the media to try to convince the 76ers to let him play in back-to-back games.
“Can you guys put pressure on them?” Embiid said with a laugh. “I want to play tomorrow, so start writing articles and put pressure on them so they’ll let me play.”
Not even the power of the pen can aid Embiid in playing consecutive games.
The 76ers smartly rested their All-Star center — no one game in October in the NBA is worth the potential of long-term harm — and then they went out and got smoked Sunday night by the Detroit Pistons.
LeBron James is in Philadelphia, and that’s a good thing. Jaylen Brown has an NBA Finals MVP on his resume and is serving up one-liners about lamb and gravy in his rivalry with a former Boston teammate.
No matter the star power added to the roster, the natural growth of homegrown talent such as Tyrese Maxey and VJ Edgecombe, the 76ers have always since his 2016 debut — and will always — win as much and go as far in the postseason as Embiid will take them.
The 76ers were outrebounded 54-37 and trailed by 21 points in their first loss of the season to the Pistons. The Pistons pounded the inside and scored 24 second-chance points. They got the kind of looks that only get tougher to attempt when Embiid is in the lineup.
So yes, with the 76ers already thin in frontcourt depth, it was up to James to man a bulk of the minutes at center. The 41-year-old James won the opening tip for the 76ers.
The Pistons won everything else.
“We’re going to have those moments where we have different lineups out there throughout the course of the season,” James said. “I think the more minutes we get, the more games that we get under our belt, the more time we get, we’ll know what works well for us.”
James scored 18 points, grabbed two rebounds and was a minus-22 going up against Paul Reed, and the 76ers were left to hope his presence at center was nothing more than a cameo.
The 76ers were a whopping plus-49 with Embiid on the court over the first three games and minus-25 with him off it.
“I mean [heck], we’ve got an MVP over there,” James said as he looked in the direction of Embiid’s locker.
“I’m not here to have a sustainable role at the five. We’ve got Joel Embiid at the five. I don’t see it being a sustainable role but it’s a role that we know we can tap into if we needed. But sustainable playing the five? If I was to say I was signing here to have a sustainable role at the five, I don’t think none of us would actually want that.”
The 76ers also played without big men Dominck Barlow (back), Jabari Walker (knee) and 7-foot-6 center Tacko Fall. Fall has yet to play this season with a left quadriceps strain.
“We’ve got a 7-7 guy over there who hasn’t played. That would help,” James quipped.
Even with Embiid and his 11 boards in the lineup against the Bucks, the 76ers were still outrebounded 62-39.
Maxey, a first-time All-Star starter last season, had a suggestion to fix the rebounding woes.
“Some of our tall guys could come back,” Maxey said with a smile. “That would be great. We’ve just got to hit, box out, try to fight. We’ve got to figure it out.”
James took inspiration from Detroit’s bench, where Taurean Prince sat and watched the game. Prince didn’t play but he is responsible for one of the great viral interview moments in NCAA tournament history when he deadpanned the definition of a rebound after his Baylor team was outrebound by Yale.
“In the great words of Taurean Prince, who I saw tonight on the bench,” James said, “a good friend of mine, so, the ball goes up into the air. You go grab the ball. That’s what we’ve got to do, man. They got more of those than we did.”
So the 76ers do what they do so many times when Embiid doesn’t play and took the loss.
Let him sit. One game won’t hurt. It’s when those absences start stacking up that always doom the 76ers.
The victory helped the Kazakh take a big step towards securing the year-end number one ranking.
Published On 25 Oct 202625 Oct 2026
Elena Rybakina blazed past unseeded Canadian Leylah Fernandez 6-2 6-2 in the Ningbo Open final to retain her title and lift her first trophy as the world number one ahead of the WTA Finals next month.
The victory on Sunday also helped the Kazakh take a big step towards securing the year-end number one ranking, further burnishing a spectacular season in which she won the Australian Open title before adding the US Open crown to reach the summit.
Top seed Rybakina made the breakthrough with her trademark power in the fifth game and then unleashed a searing crosscourt backhand winner to go 4-2 up, before the 27-year-old wrapped up the opening set in only 38 minutes.
World number 30 Fernandez made a bright start to the next set but Rybakina absorbed the pressure and raised her level to force an error and break for 2-1, with the three-time Grand Slam champion breezing to victory from there.
Rybakina’s latest triumph is a timely lift after setbacks in Beijing and Wuhan, as she turns her attention to the Pan Pacific Open in Tokyo this week before launching her title defence at the season finale in Indian Wells from November 8.
Alexander Volkanovski secured a total knockout in the closing seconds of second round at UFC 333 in Abu Dhabi.
Published On 25 Oct 202625 Oct 2026
Australia’s Alexander Volkanovski has retained his featherweight title after making short work of Russia’s Movsar Evloev in the UFC 333 main event in Abu Dhabi.
Volkanovski secured a technical knockout (TKO) with a right hand, followed by a ground-and-pound move in the closing seconds of the second round of their scheduled five-round fight on Saturday.
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The official time was 4:54, as the fight was called off with six seconds left to the jubilation of the Etihad Arena crowd in the United Arab Emirates capital.
It was Evloev’s first professional loss and he remained classy in defeat.
“Like I said, Alex is a great champion and it was an honour to share the cage with him,” Evloev said after the loss.
Meanwhile, Volkanovski said he wants to keep stacking wins for as long as he can.
“I’m choosing to do [fight], I don’t have to. I said if I didn’t take too much damage, we will probably keep going. So maybe we keep going,” Volkanovski said.
In the co-main event, Petr Yan won his three-fight series against Merab Dvalishvili in a Russia vs Georgia showdown as Yan swept the scorecards 48-47, 48-47, 48-47 with a mix of a gruelling pace, wrestling, dirty boxing and keeping Dvalishvili at distance to defend his UFC bantamweight title.
Yan beat Dvalishvili last December to regain the title for the second time, having previously won it in July 2020 against Jose Aldo at UFC 251.
The finishes kept coming, but this time in the flyweight division. England’s Lone’er Kavanagh secured a TKO stoppage against Uzbekistan’s Ramazan Temirov with an uppercut, followed by strikes, at 4:28 of Round 1.
At heavyweight, Russia’s Alexander Volkov won a unanimous decision over Rizvan Kuniev utilising dominant wrestling and top control to earn his third-straight win. Volkov called for a title shot at Thursday’s presser, which may have stumped UFC CEO Dana White when addressing him.
Kuniev had his two-fight winning streak snapped.
Opening the main card, Aaron Pico needed just over a minute to TKO Losene Keita of Guinea in their featherweight fight. Pico has won back-to-back fights, while Keita has split his last four.
Britain’s Alisha Palmowski says that winning the F1 Academy title is “a dream come true”.
The 20-year-old finished second in Saturday’s reverse grid race at the Circuit of the Americas, which was enough to be crowned champion before Sunday’s feature race and the season finale in Las Vegas in November.
Palmowski becomes the youngest champion of the all-female development series, and is the second British driver to win the title after Abbi Pulling in 2024.
She drives for Campos Racing and is part of the Red Bull driver academy.
Glossop-born Palmowski has won five out of the 11 races held so far this season, only finishing outside of the points once during the reverse grid race at Zandvoort.
In an emotional post-race interview, she dedicated her championship win to her ill grandmother and thanked her family.
“It’s been a really special journey. I started racing when I was eight or nine years old, it was just me and my parents,” she said.
“The sacrifices that they’ve made behind the scenes, they’ve really put their lives on pause to allow me to live my dream.”
Before Saturday’s race, Austrian Emma Felbermayr was the only driver with a mathematical chance of overhauling Palmowski but fourth place was not enough to keep her hopes alive.
Denmark’s Alba Larsen took the chequered flag to secure her first F1 Academy victory, with 17-year-old Lisa Billard of France completing the podium in third.
Kimi Antonelli took pole position for the United States Grand Prix on the weekend on which he can potentially clinch his first world title.
The Mercedes driver beat Red Bull’s Max Verstappen by 0.179 seconds, with the Dutchman’s team-mate Isack Hadjar third ahead of Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton.
Antonelli whooped with delight as he took his first pole position since the Belgian Grand Prix in July and said: “It feels good to be back.”
The 20-year-old Italian will become world champion on Sunday if he wins the race in Austin with Hamilton lower than fourth and Russell lower than eighth.
Hamilton is already below that position having qualified fifth, while Russell will start sixth ahead of the McLarens of Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris.
Antonelli’s pole came as something of a surprise after the Ferraris had topped all three practice sessions and Verstappen had looked strong through the second part of qualifying.
“I wasn’t expecting that,” said Antonelli’s engineer Peter Bonnington, emphasising that his charge’s first lap in final qualifying was good enough for pole.
Verstappen had been fourth quickest in Q2 despite being on used tyres but he found his car lacked the requisite grip in the final session.
Antonelli said: “We got pole so we will try to win tomorrow but Max has been very quick and Isack did an incredible job so it is not going to be easy.
“We try to get a good start and hopefully lead into Turn One and try to set the pace, even though it’s going to be very tight.”
Verstappen said: “Q3 was not good, Q1, Q2 were nice but for whatever reason in run one and two just didn’t have a nice balance. No mistakes, just not enough grip. But if it’s still a P2, I take it.”
Merab Dvalishvili says he has gained 19lb (1st 5lb) in just five hours after weighing in for his bantamweight title fight against Petr Yan at UFC 333 on Saturday.
The Georgian weighed 135lb (9st 9lb), which was the same as Russian champion Yan, before the pair’s co-main event fight in Abu Dhabi.
Dvalishvili later uploaded a video to Instagram showing the 35-year-old stepping on scales and weighing 154lb (11st 0lb).
“I’ve been drinking water and in only five hours I gain back 19 pounds, that’s what we do, let’s go,” he said.
“Now I’m back drinking and recovering. Now I’m going to start eating. Eat food first, then tomorrow you guys already know who I’m going to eat.”
Fighters typically cut weight by shedding water in the days before a bout, before rehydrating to regain weight – a process that can provide a physical advantage inside the octagon.
The UFC has taken a number of steps to make weight cuts safer over the years, including banning IV drips, which forces fighters to hydrate in a healthier way, and building the Performance Institute, which provides guidance for its athletes from professional health experts.
UFC fighters are recommended to lose no more than 8% of their body weight during fight week.
On fight night they are recommended to stay within 10% of their weight class.
Dvalishvili is aiming to win back the title he lost against two-time champion Yan last December.
During their face-off, the pair engaged in an intense but respectful stare-down.
In the main event, champion Alexander Volkanovski and Movsar Evloev both made weight before their featherweight world title contest.
Australia’s Volkanovski is looking to earn a record ninth win in UFC featherweight title fights against Russia’s Evloev, who is undefeated in 20 bouts.
On the undercard, British flyweight Lone’er Kavanagh takes on Uzbekistan’s Ramazan Temirov.
The 27-year-old Kavanagh is aiming to bounce back from defeat by American Brandon Royval in July.
By Lisa Hanawalt Drawn and Quarterly: 250 pages, $25
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While growing up in Palo Alto, it was not uncommon for animator Lisa Hanawalt to pretend she was a horse. This game of make-believe was a way for Hanawalt to escape her “burdensome and awkward” body, as she writes in her candid new illustrated memoir, “I Can’t Stop Thinking About Horses And Sex.” “But when I was a horse, I was powerful, graceful, and gorgeous.”
Although Hanawalt might be an unapologetic horse girl, she really hates a horse pun. So when it came time to choose a title for the book, she decided to keep it literal. “This is just the most true version of what this book actually is,” Hanawalt says about the utterly confessional nature of her book’s title, which groups two seemingly unrelated subjects that her mind wanders to when she’s bored. “They’re the two most mentally engaging things I can imagine,” she writes as a self-described “anixous lil freak.”
“I Can’t Stop Thinking About Horses and Sex” by Lisa Hanawalt
(Drawn & Quarterly)
Sitting in her Los Angeles home, the designer of such adult animated touchstones as Netflix’s “BoJack Horseman,”“Long Story Short,” and her personal creation “Tuca & Bertie” is drinking from a mug of tea as we chat over Zoom. When I ask what people’s responses have been so far to her book’s cheeky title, she says, “They just laugh. A lot of them are just like, ‘Well, I have to read that.’”
In many ways, “I Can’t Stop” represents a culmination of Hanawalt’s shtick for truth-telling via colorful anthropomorphized characters. The 43-year-old’s sketches are famously loose, bright and unrefined. Topics like weird body stuff, sex and horniness are never off the table. A typical drawing might feature an animal-human hybrid (say, a bird head on a human body) doing something utterly mundane while Hanawalt’s inner monologue appears in thought bubbles to reveal an intensely personal thought most people would never say out loud, let alone publish in a book.
“They all have personal things in them, some more overtly than others,” Hanawalt says about her particular oeuvre, which includes 2013’s “My Dirty Dumb Eyes,” 2016’s “Hot Dog Taste Test,” 2018’s “Coyote Doggirl” and 2020’s archival collection “I Want You,” as well as countless contributions over the years to publications like the New York Times, McSweeney’s, Vanity Fair and the now-defunct women’s humor blog the Hairpin.
“I think [‘I Can’t Stop Thinking About Horses and Sex’] fits in with ‘My Dirty Dumb Eyes’ and ‘Hot Dog Taste Test’ in that it’s another kind of mishmash book, and it all goes together in my mind,” Hanawalt adds of her nonlinear storytelling, which in this book intersperses memories of couples therapy and egg-freezing with drawings of a sloth dancing with a bear. Or a deep dive on the filmography of Kevin Costner.
Hanawalt has never shied away from getting personal, but there’s no question that “I Can’t Stop” takes her disarming and revelatory style to a new level. “I think it just needed that extra layer of me going through a midlife crisis and breaking up with my partner and going through all this weird stuff. It’s a weird combo with the horse stuff because my love of horses is so pure.”
An illustration from “I Can’t Stop Thinking About Horses and Sex” by Lisa Hanawalt.
(Drawn & Quarterly)
If Hanawalt ever felt embarrassment at being a horse girl (and she certainly has — as she got older, Hanawalt eased off of the horse games out of fear of being bullied), that shame has since evaporated. About eight years ago, as she faced a combination of career burnout and gut-health issues, Hanawalt started taking riding lessons in an attempt at self-care. “There’s something about riding that clears my head and eases my physical pain, for a moment,” she writes in a comic titled “How I Got a Horse.” When her then-partner (comedian and podcaster Adam Conover) noted how relaxed Hanawalt seemed when she’d return home from riding, he urged her to consider buying a horse of her own.
So Hanawalt reactivated her dormant Facebook account and began scrolling through local horse sale groups. That’s where she discovered Juniper (“Juni” for short), a 2006 Norwegian Fjord Mare. “I bought her somewhat impulsively,” Hanawalt says. “It was a huge lifestyle shift. Having a horse is often very stressful because it’s like a pet you have to rent an apartment for. It’s expensive, and they injure themselves … But then, being with her, I’m present in a way that I never am in the rest of my life. It just feels nice to care for another creature, human or animal.”
Spending time with Juni and a cast of new friends at the stables was physically and emotionally therapeutic for Hanawalt, particularly as new issues began to sneak up on her. For instance, she began to wonder if she still wanted to remain child-free. Simultaneously, her long-term relationship of 14 years was beginning to come apart. She describes in the book how she and Conover made a Hail Mary attempt at ethical nonmonogamy — an experience she’s glad to have had, even if Hanawalt jokes today about how she’s “a true polyamory fail.” She adds, “I don’t think it’s for me at all, and I never did. But I was willing to give it a go [as a] last-ditch effort to save something I really cared about. I think that’s the case for a lot of people.”
An illustration from “I Can’t Stop Thinking About Horses and Sex” by Lisa Hanawalt.
(Drawn & Quarterly)
Hanawalt admits how anxious she was to talk about her breakup in the book — so much so that she considered avoiding it altogether. “I was dancing around it, and then I was like, ‘I don’t need to explain every little part of it,’” she says. Hanawalt even solicited creative feedback from Conover, who responded by playing her bits of a new stand-up special, which showcased his perspective of their breakup (that special will be the forthcoming “Big Divorce Energy,” out Oct. 23 on YouTube).
“It’s really nice that we still have that kind of relationship,” Hanawalt says of her ongoing connection and friendship with Conover. “Because I really value his opinion and input. He’s just a really smart, creative person, and that was always a strong point in our relationship. I also just wanted him to be OK with how I was representing us. I’m still very protective of that.”
The latter half of “I Can’t Stop” finds Hanawalt processing the end of her relationship, dipping a toe back into the dating world, and exploring fertility options such as egg-freezing. Despite its heavy subject matter — one especially tough passage looks back at a sexual assault Hanawalt experienced when she was an adolescent — “I Can’t Stop” is packed with absurdist doodles that keep the mood light without seeming dismissive. For example, as she describes how Juni behaves when she’s in heat, Hanawalt considers her own overwhelming “livestock mode,” which once included a hyper-fixation on Kevin Costner. This is all laid out in a section titled “Costner Watch,” where Hanawalt decides to consume every film the actor ever made.
Artist and author Lisa Hanawalt with her beloved horse Juniper.
(Annie Noelker / For The Times)
“Yeah, I was losing my mind,” Hanawalt laughs at “Costner Watch.” “I don’t know. It was a cope, in hindsight.”
As she prepares to celebrate the release of “I Can’t Stop” with a six-date book tour, Hanawalt can’t say for sure if she’s answered any existential midlife questions. She jokes that her eggs are “still on ice.” She’s working on several new animation projects, though isn’t sure at this point which, if any, will move forward. (It probably also doesn’t help that the animation industry is currently experiencing a severe downturn, with record-high unemployment among even the most seasoned creators. “It’s a weird time,” she says.) To round things out, Hanawalt says she’s “selling hats” and even working with a perfume maker to eventually release a “horsey-themed” fragrance.
Hanawalt also has no clue what being a self-proclaimed horse girl even means in the year 2026. The other horse people she hangs out with at the barn, where Juni lives, come from “every possible income level and political belief, and they’re all kind of shoved together,” Hanawalt tells me. “It’s kind of like ‘Lord of the Flies.’
“It’s just so fun to have a community with people and be able to trust them,” Hanawalt says of the friendships she’s made through caring for Juni. “We help each other. Just to be able to go out on the trail and talk about blow jobs or whatever with women I truly connect to … They’re some of the coolest people I’ve ever met in my whole life.”
All that is to say, Hanawalt has grown more comfortable in not quite knowing what’s next. “You’re never fully happy or fulfilled,” she says. “And that’s part of being alive.”
He is unwavering in his belief that the newly constructed Lakers can compete for an NBA championship this season and that is the conviction coach JJ Redick has instilled into his group.
It is why the Lakers play the game, Redick mused, and it is the standard this organization has set.
The Lakers have won 17 NBA championships — the second most in the league — with the last coming in 2020.
So, as the Lakers prepared to open the regular season Wednesday night against the Golden State Warriors at Crypto.com Arena, Redick explained why he believes these Lakers are championship contenders.
“Well, I think that every season,” he said. “Unless somebody blatantly tells me that we’re not trying to win, I think that every year. That’s why I say I’m confident. I said the same thing last year and for all of January and February that we were going to figure it out at some point and we did. And then we had some injuries. So, being a championship-level team or being a — I don’t like the word ‘contender’ — but being a team that can make a run and can play in the playoffs and can play different ways in the playoffs, those things take time and it doesn’t mean you’re going to be in the NBA Finals.
“It’s just not the way this works, particularly with the way the playoffs work in terms of just matchups and what you can exploit and what you can’t exploit versus certain teams. But I think because of our talent, because of our fit, because of our depth, I really like our team.”
Luka Doncic said his first glimpse of what the Lakers could become was when he invited his teammates to his home country of Slovenia for a bonding experience.
As the unquestioned leader of the Lakers now that LeBron James has departed to Philadelphia, Doncic organized the trip. It was basketball, golfing and rowing. It was dinners and get-to-know-you conversations.
It was over these four or five days in August that Doncic also saw a Lakers team with championship potential.
“Since the first day. That simple,” Doncic said. “Since the first day everybody came together in Slovenia, I believed that we can win a championship.”
Yet this is a team with nine new players and Redick is trying to incorporate them on a Lakers team that is playing in the uber-tough Western Conference that most experts believe the San Antonio Spurs and Oklahoma City Thunder are the creme de la creme of the NBA.
The Lakers acquired Walker Kessler, a 7-foot-2 center they received from Utah in a sign-and-trade deal in which he was paid $130 million over four years and in which L.A. sent two unprotected first-round picks and two first-round swaps to the Jazz.
Lakers center Walker Kessler tries to block a shot by Warriors center Yaxel Lendeborg during a preseason game last week.
(Ethan Miller / Getty Images)
The Lakers added depth in Quentin Grimes, Collin Sexton, Matisse Thybulle, Ziaire Williams, Sandro Mamukelashvili and Kevon Looney.
They join Doncic, Austin Reaves, Jake LaRavia, Adou Thiero and others to form the 2026-27 Lakers.
“I think in terms of integrating all the new guys that have been available, which I think is everybody except for Collin in live play, it’s been pretty seamless,” Redick said. “It’s a smart group. … We’ve been able to probably install more, particularly on the defensive end, than we have in the last couple years.
“Last year we had six total practices in the preseason because of the amount of games and the back-to-backs and the travel and all that. And we played opening night, so that’s another day that we didn’t get to practice. So I think we end up with 12 [practices] this year. We get double the amount of practice time, so I think that’s a blessing when you have new guys.”
The starting five is still unclear.
Doncic, Reaves and Kessler are the sure things, but the other two spots are not certain. Those three started alongside Williams and Thybulle in the final preseason game against the Denver Nuggets on Friday night. Grimes started the first four preseason games.
Lakers guard Luka Doncic, left, bring the ball upcourt under pressure from Nuggets guard Christian Braun their final preseason game on Friday.
(Ben Liebenberg / Associated Press)
“I think we have a lot of guys that could start,” Reaves said. “Unfortunately there’s five guys that are gonna start. Like JJ said a while back, he’s pretty sure of three of them. The other two, regardless of who we roll out there, we have high confidence in.”
Reaves is the longest-tenured Laker entering his sixth season and he knows the high expectations that come with playing for the iconic franchise.
Last season, he had James to lean on, Marcus Smart was steady and Rui Hachimura was part of the fabric.
But they are all gone and now Reaves, who signed a four-year, $180-million contract extension, is one of the leaders.
“Yeah, I don’t know anything else,” Reaves said. “This is what I came to, but obviously it’s the Lakers, and it’s one of the most covered sports organizations in the world. So they’re gonna praise you when you’re doing good and not when you’re not.
“So you just gotta [know] whatever that goes on outside these walls doesn’t really matter. It’s just what goes on inside these walls. And if anybody has any questions, I’ll give them the best knowledge I have. But like I said, they’re high character guys that care about the right things. So, I think that’ll take care of itself.”
Lakers guard Austin Reaves gets past the Warriors defense for a left-handed layup during a preseason game last week.
(David Becker / Associated Press)
The Lakers were 53-29 last season, finishing fourth in the West and getting knocked out in the second round by the Thunder.
They have two more days of practice before the journey begins.
“I think you’re always trying to get better,” Redick said. “And even later in the season, you tweak plays, you tweak the offense and you tweak coverages. It’s just constantly evolving. There’s no like, ‘Oh, we’re done. Now we’re going to go play.’
