Sports
Letters to Sports: Celebrating UCLA’s inspiring national title win
Four years ago, at the McDonald’s All-American game, future Bruins Kiki Rice and Gabriela Jaquez stood side by side at the end of the contest, having been named co-MVPs. It was the first time the two MVPs of the annual event were headed to the same college program.
Now, as the only remaining members of UCLA’s 2022 No. 1 recruiting class, they have reached their ultimate goal: an NCAA championship. Their work ethic, their high character, their loyalty, and the pride they take in wearing the four letters on their jerseys will long be remembered and appreciated. With fellow senior and graduate-student teammates — Lauren Betts, Angela Dugalic, Charlisse Leger-Walker and Gianna Kneepkens, all transfers from former Pac-12 teams — they have put themselves into the Bruin record books.
To this awesome group of young women: Thanks for the memories and the joy you have brought to Westwood. You will be missed.
Sandy Siegel
Sherman Oaks
After witnessing their first-round victory in person, the UCLA women looked ready to make a run in the NCAA tournament. What we saw was a way to compete in any style of play. There was a little bit of everything. But clearly they were the best team. Congratulations on your first title. I can’t wait to see the banner hanging in the rafters. Being a lifelong fan of UCLA sports, it just looks right when you see it in lights. UCLA BRUINS, NATIONAL CHAMPIONS!
David DeLong
Thousand Oaks
As a Trojan alum, it was awkward, but nonetheless, I was elated to see UCLA knock off USC. Party on!
David Marshall
Santa Monica
The UCLA women’s basketball team’s first NCAA national championship was especially sweet because they had to defeat USC in the title game!
Nick Rose
Newport Coast
Long live the Pac-12 Avengers!
Mark Ryan
Fullerton
What a great article on Gabriela [Jaquez] by Mirjam [Swanson.] I just so loved rooting for this UCLA women’s team because they’re such wonderful people as well as players. Having said that, Gabriela would have been my choice for MVP, but I’m fine with Lauren [Betts.]
Michael Reuben
Anaheim Hills
It was refreshing to watch the postgame after UCLA soundly defeated the University of South Carolina on Sunday. Everyone was crying — players, coaches, losers because they lost, winners because they won. This was so much nicer than the angry confrontation between coaches at the end of the South Carolina-UConn game on Friday, after which [Geno] Auriemma petulantly stalked off. As in politics, women seem to do it better without men.
Henry A. Hespenheide
Hermosa Beach
Remembering Lopes
Growing up in L.A. during the 1970s, the photo of Davey Lopes sliding into second against Dave Concepcion brought back memories of the Dodgers’ rivalry with the Big Red Machine during that decade. Being a huge fan of those Dodger teams, a large color photo of the Dodger infield of [Steve] Garvey, Lopes, [Bill] Russell and [Ron] Cey adorned my DTLA office for many years.
Davey Lopes was the most exciting of that great infield and the inspirational leader of the ‘74, ‘77, ‘78 and ‘81 World Series teams. Not only was he superior at stealing bases — he stole 47 at the age of 40 — but also hit for power, as exemplified by his team-leading three homers and seven RBIs in the ‘78 World Series. RIP, Davey.
Ken Feldman
Tarzana
Garvey, Cey, Russell and Lopes. What an infield! I grew up with that group, and they cemented my love for the Dodgers at a young age. Every spring you could count on those four as starters in the infield. Davey Lopes was just superb. A terrific base stealer who had over 500 steals in his career. Always reliable at second base and at the plate. He was an All-Star his last four years with the Dodgers, culminating with the World Series win in 1981 over the hated Yankees. Davey, we will miss you for sure.
Dave Ring
Manhattan Beach
Davey Lopes was the heartbeat of those great Dodgers teams — grit, intelligence, and pure excitement every time he reached base. For fans who grew up watching that legendary infield, his passing feels deeply personal, but his legacy will endure.
Steven Ross
Carmel
Championing fans
I had the privilege of attending Major League Baseball ownership meetings for a decade. Arte Moreno and his then team president, John Carpino, were the absolute leaders in advocating that MLB needed to be as financially fan friendly as possible. In my opinion, the Angels fully back their desire to have a sustainable and comfortable fan experience by offering a wonderful game-day fan experience.
When I am able to attend an Angels game, I do not hear gripes about parking costs, concession prices or ticket prices. The stadium staff at every level are simply wonderful and always so welcoming. And while I have no stats, the number of families and children in attendance appear significant.
Should the team ever come under different ownership, I hear that one of the under tapped values of owning the Angels is the ability to increase ticket and related revenues. The proven focus on having a sustainable fan game experience is the sole dictate of the owner.
Lew Wolff
Los Angeles
Sticker shock
After taking the time to sign up for LA28 with the hopes of getting an opportunity to purchase tickets for the Olympics, including tickets to the opening ceremony, I was gravely disappointed after receiving a time slot for purchases to learn that opening ceremony tickets were “currently unavailable.“ In further checking for other opportunities to purchase reasonably priced tickets, I also was disappointed to see that the cheapest tickets available for some of the high-interest sporting events were in the hundreds of dollars. It doesn’t look like the plan to have locals purchase tickets and fill the seats for the venues is going to work out the way LA28 thought it would. Shame on them.
Ruthanne Rozenek
Los Angeles
The Los Angeles Times welcomes expressions of all views. Letters should be brief and become the property of The Times. They may be edited and republished in any format. Each must include a valid mailing address and telephone number. Pseudonyms will not be used.
Email: sports@latimes.com
Sports
WWE star Chelsea Green should be WrestleMania ‘headliner,’ Alba Fyre says
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LAS VEGAS – Chelsea Green has been one of the hardest working pro wrestlers in WWE since she returned to the company in 2023 and has put together history-making moments.
Green was the first women’s United States champion in the belt’s history and the first to have multiple reigns. She’s been knocked off ladders and thrown in dumpsters, and yet, strings of bad luck have kept her off the WrestleMania card for the last three years.
Chelsea Green and Alba Fyre enter the ring during SmackDown at Bell Centre in Montreal, Quebec, on Jan. 23, 2026. (Rich Wade/WWE)
WWE star Alba Fyre, who is a part of Green’s Secret Hervice, told Fox News Digital she would have liked to have seen the Canadian star on the card.
“You know, we’re always rooting for Chelsea,” Fyre said. “Obviously, I’m a big fan of Chelsea, but I think it’s a shame that she’s not on the card this year. She should be the headliner.”
This year, it was a bit out of her hands.
Chelsea Green and Alba Fyre enter the ring during SmackDown at KFC YUM! Center in Louisville, Ky., on Feb. 27, 2026. (Craig Melvin/WWE)
WWE CHAMP JADE CARGILL VERY HOPEFUL TO MEET ‘STONE COLD’ STEVE AUSTIN AT HALL OF FAME CEREMONY
Green suffered an ankle injury in the months leading up to WrestleMania 42. She hasn’t been in the ring in a few weeks, but still remained on screen. She was seen on “Friday Night SmackDown” as of late trying to be in the corner of Tiffany Stratton, who is eyeing the United States Championship herself in a battle with Giulia.
Green was off the card for WrestleMania 40 and 41. She last appeared at the event in a fatal four-way tag team match with Sonya Deville at WrestleMania 39.
Chelsea Green looks on during SmackDown at FLA Live Arena in Sunrise, Fla., on Feb. 20, 2026. (Craig Ambrosio/WWE)
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Pro wrestling fans will be interested to see how the next 12 months go for Green. She may work herself back up the ladder and get into contention for the women’s title once again. If so, she’ll either have to contend with Jade Cargill or Rhea Ripley.
Sports
How Alex Palou became IndyCar’s most successful driver — and why he rejected F1
Alex Palou’s 2025 season was the best for an IndyCar driver in nearly 20 years.
He won a career-high eight races, including the Indianapolis 500. He won his third straight series title and his fourth championship overall. He made the podium 13 times in 17 races.
Yet if you ask Palou, he’ll tell you he’s going into Saturday’s qualifying for Sunday’s Grand Prix of Long Beach needing to prove himself all over again.
“Who cares about what we did last year?” he said. “It’s cool to have four championships, but the only important year is 2026. Everybody started with zero points on the board and we need to do it all over again.”
That’s far easier said than done, although Palou is off to a fast start in his quest for a fifth championship having won two of the first four races on the IndyCar schedule to stand second in the driver standings, two points behind defending Long Beach champion Kyle Kirkwood.
“Last year was magical,” said Palou, who has captured 10 of the last 21 checkered flags, dating to 2024. “As an athlete you always want to keep on improving, but I need to be realistic and understand that to win eight races in IndyCar in the same year, it’s pretty tough to beat.
“So although I want to achieve that, we just need to take 2026 separately and just try our best, try to win as many races as possible and then obviously fight for the [Indy] 500 and the championship.”
Winning Long Beach, one of the few prizes on the IndyCar circuit that has eluded him, would be a big step in that drive for five. But that won’t be easy since passing on the tight 1.968-mile street course, with its 11 turns, is difficult. That makes track position important, putting a premium on Saturday’s qualifying and on pit stops in Sunday’s race.
“It’s always super tough to be competitive there,” Palou said of Long Beach, where he finished second last April, giving him three straight podium finishes. “One of the only bad things about street racing [is] that it’s really tough for us to overtake with how tight the tracks are and all the bumps.
“It just makes it super challenging.”
Alex Palou competes during the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg in Florida on March 1.
(David Jensen / Getty Images)
Not as challenging as the race Palou, the most successful Spanish driver in IndyCar history, had to run just to get into a race car.
As a boy growing up in the tiny Catalan village of Sant Antoni de Vilamajor, Palou started kart racing about the same time he started grade school. He was 15 when he finished second in the 2012 European karting championship yet he didn’t see much of a future beyond that.
Lewis Hamilton had finished in the same spot 13 years earlier, then went on to become the most successful Formula One driver in history. But England has a long-established history with open-wheel racing and Spain did not.
“He came from nothing, showing up at a carting track and then having these big dreams and aspirations. And here he is,” said Barry Wanser, the senior manager of IndyCar operations for Chip Ganassi Racing.
“I know he’s very proud he’s the first Spaniard to win the Indianapolis 500. That’s just absolutely incredible.”
But that was never the goal.
“Honestly,” Palou said, “my goal was just to have fun. When we started, I never wanted to be a race car driver for a living. I never thought that it would be possible.”
Before Palou, Fernando Alonso, a two-time F1 champion, was Spain’s most successful open-wheel driver. After Alonso is Carlos Sainz Jr., who has won four F1 races; Pedro de la Rosa, who made more than 100 F1 starts but climbed the podium just once; and Oriol Servià, who ran 79 IndyCar races in nine years but never placed higher than fourth before retiring in 2019, one year before Palou made his debut in the series.
Aside from Alonso, those drivers were good but not great, leaving the road from Spain to success in open-wheel racing a narrow one. That’s a path Palou is now widening.
“I would say that for sure it’s helping future generations that I’m here and that I had success,” he said, “just because they can know that with a normal European background you can come to the U.S. and fight for wins and championships.”
Alex Palou celebrates after winning the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg on March 1.
(David Jensen / Getty Images)
Wanser said what makes Palou so good is his feel for both the car and the track and his ability to communicate with his team.
“He has a very unique ability to understand what he needs the car to do to maximize performance on the tires,” said Wanser, the race strategist for Ganassi’s No. 10 car who has sometimes been called Palou’s indispensable partner. “You’re talking about road courses, street courses, for the primary [tires] — the hards and the softs — and understanding what he needs for qualifying and also what the car needs for reducing tire deg[redation] during the race.”
For now Palou, who turned 29 earlier this month, appears content with mastering those skills in IndyCar rather that following the natural progression into an F1 ride.
He said he went “all in” to win an F1 seat following his first IndyCar title in 2021, but doubts about whether he’d be given a competitive car led him to back out. Rumors linking him to Red Bull’s F1 team surfaced after last year’s Indy 500, but Palou shot those down too, saying he was staying with Ganassi.
Wanser, obviously, is happy with that decision and hopes it will pay off Sunday in Long Beach.
“Alex is very young, right?” he said. “IndyCar is so competitive that we could never, ever think about being complacent. If we start heading down that road, we will get beat and get beat often.
“It’s nonstop trying to constantly improve, knowing every weekend we show up to the racetrack it’s going to be difficult to win.”
Sports
Mike Trout’s torrid Angels series vs Yankees ends in historic fashion after he blasts fifth home run
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Mike Trout couldn’t stop rounding the bases at Yankee Stadium during the Los Angeles Angels’ four-game series, and he made history doing so.
The future Hall of Famer crushed five home runs, including a blast in the Angels’ 11-4 win Thursday afternoon, and tallied nine RBIs in the series, which Los Angeles split with New York.
The 34-year-old Trout entered the series with only two home runs and seven RBIs on the season, but he’s heading back home this weekend looking like his prime self after what transpired in the Bronx.
Mike Trout of the Los Angeles Angels before a game against the New York Yankees at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx, N.Y., April 13, 2025. (Rich Graessle/Icon Sportswire)
He also heads back with some history as the first visiting player to hit a home run four straight days at Yankee Stadium, according to MLB.com’s Sarah Langs.
Trout’s five homers are also tied for the most in a single series against the Yankees. Only three others — George Bell, Darrell Evans and Jimmie Foxx — have done so in past seasons.
AARON JUDGE CALLS OUT YANKEES’ OFFENSIVE STRUGGLES AFTER GETTING SWEPT
The latest home run from Trout was a solo blast that traveled 446 feet off Yankees reliever Angel Chivilli in the top of the seventh inning Thursday to make it a 7-4 game. Jo Adell’s grand slam later in the game blew it open for Los Angeles to even the series in the end.
Before that, Trout kicked off the series with two home runs and five RBIs in a wild Monday night contest that ended with the Yankees walking it off. Aaron Judge also belted two home runs in the game, as did Trent Grisham, whose game-tying two-run blast in the ninth inning kept the Yankees’ hopes alive.
Mike Trout of the Los Angeles Angels hits a two-run home run during the fifth inning against the New York Yankees at Yankee Stadium April 15, 2026, in New York City. (Dustin Satloff/Getty Images)
But Trout and the Angels got the job done Tuesday night, and the veteran outfielder’s only hit was a solo homer. Then, in Wednesday night’s loss, Trout went 2-for-4 with a homer and two RBIs.
Yankee Stadium in general has been a pleasant place for Trout, a South New Jersey native, as he’s hitting .346 with 13 homers in his career there. He also homered in five straight games against the Yankees if you include the Angels’ last meeting in 2025. That also took place in Yankee Stadium.
“He’s the greatest, the greatest of all time,” Judge said of Trout after Monday’s game. “I know he’s had some tough injuries over the years, but to see himself back in a better spot this year – every time he comes to the Bronx, man, he puts on a show. I hate to see it, but it’s fun competing against a guy like that.”
As Judge mentioned, the Angels are just happy Trout is playing injury-free to start the season, and perhaps this Yankees series has him hitting his stride.
Mike Trout of the Los Angeles Angels hits a three-run home run in the sixth inning against the New York Yankees at Yankee Stadium in New York City on April 13, 2026. (Jim McIsaac/Getty Images)
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The three-time league MVP is heading to Cooperstown one day, but there is always the thought among baseball fans about what could’ve been for his career had injuries not gotten in the way. Trout played 130 games last season for the first time since 2019.
Now 10-10, the Angels are hoping they can get that output from Trout once more in 2026. They’re looking to get back to the playoffs for the first time since 2014.
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