For all Sacred Heart Prep’s firepower with guards JP Kerrigan, TJ O’Brien and Drew Wagner, the Gators need their bigs. That was certainly evident Saturday in the championship round at the San Diego Surf and Slam.
SHP boys’ basketball fell in the title round 58-48 to Whitney-Rocklin at Helix High School, snapping a four-game winning streak with its first double-digit deficit loss of the season.
Through three games — including a 73-52 win over Ogden-Utah in Wednesday’s opener, followed by Thursday’s 66-22 landslide over Christian-El Cajon — the Gators totaled 25 made 3s in the tourney, including 10 in Saturday’s finale. Wagner led the way with five 3s in scoring a game-high 19 points, but it wasn’t enough against the reigning Sac-Joaquin Section Division II champs.
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“The first two games show what we can do when we play together and when we have energy on the court at all times,” Wagner said. “And then the last game shows what happens when we get too stagnant and don’t buy in to the togetherness play as much.”
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Sacred Heart Prep senior Drew Wagner dribbles at the San Diego Surf and Slam in the semifinal round last Thursday against Christian-El Cajon at Helix High School.
Melinda Osterloh
The Gators (7-4) have impressively navigated a challenging non-league schedule without 6-5 center Matthew Norris. The junior big is expected to return from injury in mid-January, but they could have used him in San Diego.
The guard trio was productive, for sure, with Kerrigan adding four 3s to score 14 points. He and Wagner were named to the Surf Division all-tournament team. Despite this, SHP head coach Tony Martinelli said Saturday’s game wasn’t the team’s best performance shooting wise, with little inside scoring presence allowing Whitney to keep up the perimeter pressure.
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“That kind of snowballed into everything else,” Martinelli said.
“Having that threat on the floor, those three guys, that’s a luxury,” Martinelli said of his guards, “… just didn’t get the scores inside that we need to take the pressure off them.”
Whitney (11-6) led throughout, but SHP did keep it close most of the way. The Gators cut it to 29-27 heading into halftime, but Whitney junior Ely Willis — who earned tournament MVP honors — scored a team-high 14 points as the Wildcats pulled away in the second half.
“A lot of just one-possessions and just having to play a lot of defense,” Martinelli said.
The loss was SHP’s first in over two weeks, since falling Dec. 14 at Serra 53-45. The Gators went on to defeat two West Catholic Athletic League teams at the DJ Frandsen Memorial Tournament at Bellarmine — 60-58 over the Bells, followed by 70-69 over St. Francis.
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Traveling to the San Diego Surf and Slam is a long tradition for SHP. It is the eighth time the Gators have played in the tourney, their last appearance coming in 2021-22.
“I thought the on-court stuff was really good,” Martinelli said. “I got to see a bunch of different guys playing, which was nice. … That’s always really a positive when you travel like this and have three different games. … It just didn’t end the way we wanted to … but overall, just a real positive experience.”
The Gators enjoyed plenty of team bonding off the court, including go kart racing and a trip to Dave & Buster’s. At their hotel, they spent time playing the video game NBA 2K as well as some poker, with senior Matthew Wendling proving the team’s resident card shark as the big winner there.
“I think the biggest things came off the court, honestly,” Wagner said. “We were all hanging out together … so, I think we got way closer as a team. … Even though the last game didn’t turn out the way we wanted it to, we all had a ton of fun on the trip. So, that was a huge highlight.”
Plenty of financial and regulatory hurdles still need to be cleared, but a fuels pipeline project that may lead to lower gas prices in San Diego and Southern California has received a healthy amount of interest from other companies.
Phillips 66 and Kinder Morgan have proposed building what they’ve dubbed the Western Gateway Pipeline that would use a combination of existing infrastructure plus new construction to establish a corridor for refined products that would stretch 1,300 miles from St. Louis to California.
If completed, one leg of the pipeline would be the first to deliver motor fuels into California, a state often described as a fuel island that is disconnected from refining hubs in the U.S.
The two companies recently announced the project “has received significant interest” from shippers and investors from what’s called an “open season” that wrapped up on Dec. 19 — so much so that a second round will be held this month for remaining capacity.
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“That’s a strong indicator that people would be willing to commit to put volume on that pipeline to bring it west long enough for them to be able to pay off their investment and provide a return for their investors,” said David Hackett, president of Stillwater Associates, a transportation energy consulting company in Irvine. “They won’t build this thing on spec. They’ll need commitments from shippers to do this.”
The plans for the Western Gateway Pipeline include constructing a new line from the Texas Panhandle town of Borger to Phoenix. Meanwhile, the flow on an existing pipeline that currently runs from the San Bernardino County community of Colton to Arizona would be reversed, allowing more fuel to remain in California.
The entire pipeline system would link refinery supply from the Midwest to Phoenix and California, while also providing a connection into Las Vegas.
The proposed route for the Western Gateway Pipeline, a project announced by Phillips 66 and Kinder Morgan designed to bring refined products like gasoline to states such as Arizona and keep more supplies within California. (Phillips 66)
A spokesperson for Kinder Morgan told the Union-Tribune in October that there are no plans for the project to construct any new pipelines in California and the proposal “should put downward pressure” on prices at the pump.
“With no new builds in California and using pipelines currently in place, it’s an all-around win-win — good for the state and consumers,” Kinder Morgan’s director of corporate communications, Melissa D. Ruiz, said in an email.
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The second round of “open season” will include offerings of new destinations west of Colton that would allow Western Gateway shippers access to markets in Los Angeles.
Even with sufficient investor support, the project would still have to go through an extensive regulatory and permitting process that would undoubtedly receive pushback from environmental groups.
Should the pipeline get built, Hackett said it’s hard to predict what it would mean at the pump for Southern California drivers. But he said the project could ensure more fuel inventory remains inside California, thus reducing reliance on foreign imports, especially given potential political tensions in the South China Sea.
“I’d much rather have our gas come from Texas or Missouri than from Asia, at least from a geopolitical strategic standpoint,” Hackett said.
This past summer, Reuters reported that California’s fuel imports hit their highest levels in four years.
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About 70% of the imports — roughly 187,000 barrels per day — came from South Korea and other Asian countries that have long been top trading partners for California and other states along the West Coast, according to Kpler, an international firm that tracks global shipping and trade.
Fuel supplies and gasoline prices have received greater focus in the wake of a pair of refinery closures in California.
Phillips 66 planned to shutter operations at its twin refinery in the Los Angeles area by the close of 2025, and Valero is scheduled to close down its 145,000-barrel-per-day facility in the Northern California city of Benicia in April. The Valero and Phillips 66 facilities combine to account for about 18% of the state’s crude oil capacity.
The average price for a gallon of gasoline is higher in California than in any other state in the continental U.S., according to AAA.
On Tuesday, the average price in the Golden State was $4.254 while the national average came to $2.815. Hawaii had the highest average in the country, at $4.423 per gallon.
The city of San Diego has filed a lawsuit against the federal government that alleges the construction of a razor wire fence near the U.S.-Mexico border constitutes trespassing on city property and has caused environmental harm to the land.
The complaint filed Monday in San Diego federal court states that razor wire fencing being constructed by U.S. Marines in the Marron Valley area has harmed protected plant and wildlife habitats and that the presence of federal personnel there represents unpermitted trespassing.
The lawsuit, which names the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the U.S. Department of Defense among its defendants, says that city officials first discovered the presence of Marines and federal employees in the area in December.
The fencing under construction has blocked city officials from accessing the property to assess and manage the land, and the construction efforts have” caused and will continue to cause property damage and adverse environmental impacts,” according to the lawsuit.
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The suit seeks an injunction ordering the defendants to cease and desist from any further trespass or construction in the area.
“The city of San Diego will not allow federal agencies to disregard the law and damage city property,” City Attorney Heather Ferbert said in a statement. “We are taking decisive action to protect sensitive habitats, uphold environmental commitments and ensure that the rights and resources of our community are respected.”
Padres roster review: Sung-Mun song – San Diego Union-Tribune
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SUNG-MUN SONG
Position(s): Third base, second base
Bats / Throws: Left / Right
2026 opening day age: 29
Height / Weight: 6-foot / 194 pounds
How acquired: Signed as a free agent in December 2025
Contract status: A four-year, $15 million deal will see Song make $2.5 million in 2026, $3 million in 2027, $3.5 million in 2028 and $4 million in 2029 if he does not opt out of last year; Half of his $1 million signing bonus is due in January 2026 and the other half in 2027; There is a $7 million mutual option for 2030.
.214 — Song’s isolated power in 2025, a career high as he prepared for a jump to the majors. Isolated power measures a player’s raw power (extra bases per at-bat) and Song had a .190 OPS in 2018, in his third year as a pro in Korea, before it dropped to .101 in 2019 and then a career-low .095 in 2023. Hitting 19 homers pushed Song’s isolated power to .178 in 2024 and then a career-high 26 homers push it even higher in 2025.
TRENDING
Idle — Drafted by the Heroes in 2014, Song debuted in the KBO the following year but didn’t become a regular until 2019. A drop-off in production — he had an .884 OPS in 78 games in 2018 and a .597 OPS in 103 games in 2019 — was followed by losing the 2020 season and a chunk of the 2021 season to military service obligations. Then three straight sub-.700 OPS seasons forced Song to rethink his approach to professional baseball, especially in the face of the likes of Ha-Seong Kim,Jung Hoo Lee and Hyeseong Kim generating big-league buzz. Song started with weight training and nutrition. A hitting coach also helped him with balance, pull-side power and the ability to catch up with the sort of fastballs that seem to dog Korean players when they arrive in the States. It all added up to a breakthrough year in which Song paired 19 homers, 104 RBIs and 21 steals with a .340/.409/.518 batting line. To prove it was no fluke, Song followed up his 2024 season with another strong effort that solidified his wish to try his hand in the majors. The ensuing, four-year, $15 million deal that Song signed with the Padres in December cost his new employer a $3 million posting fee to be paid to the Kiwoom Heroes.
2026 OUTLOOK
Like Kim before him, Song appears to be joining the Padres as a utility player with the hope that he blossoms into more as he gets comfortable in a new country and league. Song had experience in Korea at third base (500 starts), second base (149 starts) and first base (38 starts). Padres president of baseball operations A.J. Preller even mentioned outfield reps in passing as he assessed how Song could help the Padres in 2026.
Former KBO player Sung-Mun Song shakes hands with Padres vice president of amateur and international scouting Pete DeYoung after signing a contract with the San Diego Padres at Petco Park on Saturday. (Photo by Armond Feffer/San Diego Padres)
