No. 2 UCLA women’s basketball bearing down during final stretch

• February 25, 2025

UCLA women’s basketball coach Cori Close has been asking her team for toughness. She’s vocalized the need for grittiness in press conferences and been hard on the team during practice, leaning into players — doing everything short of putting on football pads.

The Bruins are giving Close what she wants and what the team needs, and it started in a 67-65 win over Iowa on the road.

“We had to earn some toughness tonight and we did,” Close told reporters after the game. “And I thought we had to do it with our defense and we did.

UCLA (26-1 overall, 14-1 Big Ten) has one more chance to manifest its toughness before returning home for its regular season-ending rematch against USC that’s been sold out since Feb. 12. The Bruins will head to Wisconsin (13-14, 4-12) for a 5 p.m. tip Wednesday.

The team has regained momentum since falling to USC on Feb. 13 in its only loss of the season. It’s gone on a three-game winning streak, with two over ranked teams, to move up to the No. 2 spot in the Associated Press Top 25 poll.

Texas is currently the No. 1 team after going on an 11-game winning streak that included four wins over ranked teams.

The victory over Iowa gave UCLA a program record with 14 conference wins and allowed the Bruins to compete in a high-intensity environment. Nearly 15,000 fans packed into Carver-Hawkeye Arena on Sunday, the biggest crowd UCLA has played in front of all season.

“I knew it was going to be a really cool environment,” 6-foot-7 center Lauren Betts said. “I’m not surprised it was a sold-out crowd. It was just a really great opportunity for our team to experience this and have fun with it and show who we are as a team.”

Wisconsin is coming off of back-to-back road wins against Penn State and Northwestern but has struggled to put together a complete four quarters throughout this season under fourth-year head coach Marisa Moseley.

“We’ve got to be really be able to put scores and stops together,” Moseley told reporters after a loss to Illinois. “That sounds pretty routine, but obviously we’re finding that challenging and so we’ve got to put our team in a better position to do that.”

UCLA will have to contain 6-foot-4 Badgers forward Serah Williams, who is third in the Big Ten in scoring at 19.1 points per game and second in rebounding with 10.2 boards per game. She’s one of only two players in Division I to average in those figures or higher in both categories.

The Bruins’ offense has also been functioning well. Forward Angela Dugalić tied a career-high with six assists against Iowa and the 6-foot-7 Betts is still the second-highest scorer in the conference. The team as a whole is best in the conference in eight statistical categories, including assists per game and field-goal percentage.

And, perhaps most importantly, the intangible toughness the coaching staff harps on began to bloom against Iowa.

“We were down 12 (points), 6:43 in the third quarter and from that point on, I think we won the rebounding battle, we won the hustle battle and we won the toughness battle,” Close said. “We didn’t always win it leading up to it – but that’s how we got the job done.”

No. 2 UCLA (26-1, 14-1) at Wisconsin (13-14, 4-12)

When: 5 p.m. Wednesday

Where: Kohl Center, Madison, Wisconsin

TV: Peacock

​ Orange County Register 

Israel, Hamas agree on new exchange, leaving fragile ceasefire intact

• February 25, 2025

By JOSEF FEDERMAN and ABBY SEWELL

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli and Hamas officials said Tuesday they have reached an agreement to exchange the bodies of dead hostages for the release of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, keeping their fragile ceasefire intact for at least a few more days.

Israel has delayed the release of 600 Palestinian prisoners since Saturday to protest what it says is the cruel treatment of hostages during their release. Hamas has said the delay is a “serious violation” of their ceasefire and that talks on a second phase are not possible until they are freed.

The deadlock had threatened to collapse the ceasefire when the current six-week first phase of the deal expires this weekend.

But late Tuesday, Hamas said an agreement had been reached to resolve the dispute during a visit to Cairo by a delegation headed by Khalil al-Hayya, a top political official in the group.

The breakthrough appeared to clear the way for the return of the bodies of four more dead hostages and hundreds of additional prisoners scheduled to be released under the ceasefire.

The prisoners previously slated for release “will be released simultaneously with the bodies of the Israeli prisoners who were agreed to be handed over,” along with the release of a new set of Palestinian prisoners, the statement said.

An Israeli official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, confirmed an agreement to bring home the bodies in the coming days. He gave no further details.

The agreement could clear the way for the an expected visit for the White House’s Mideast envoy, Steve Witkoff, to the region.

Witkoff has said he wants the sides to move into negotiations on the second phase, during which all remaining hostages held by Hamas are to be released and an end to the war is to be negotiated.

Sewell reported from Beirut.

​ Orange County Register 

Dodgers rocked by Mariners, but Blake Snell debuts with scoreless inning

• February 25, 2025

THE GAME: The Seattle Mariners scored four runs in the second inning and six more in the seventh, handing the Dodgers their fifth loss in six Cactus League games, 11-5, on Tuesday afternoon at Camelback Ranch in Glendale, Arizona.

PITCHING REPORT: Blake Snell went one inning in his spring debut with the Dodgers. He retired three of four batters, giving up a single and striking out one while throwing 30 pitches. “I’d get strike one with the heater, and then tried to work the offspeed. That was my plan today,” Snell said. “I was very happy (with his fastball). I’ve been happy with it all spring. So it’s a matter of getting the slider going, landing the curveball. The changeup, I like where that’s at.” Snell averaged 95.7 mph with his fastball. … The Mariners’ first four-run inning came against minor-league right-hander Carson Hobbs. Julian Fernandez and Ronan Kopp combined to walk four, hit a batter and throw a wild pitch while allowing six runs in the seventh inning. … Ben Casparius gave up a solo home run to Mitch Garver. … Justin Wrobleski retired five of the six batters he faced in two innings.

HITTING REPORT: Miguel Rojas and Austin Barnes drove in runs with doubles in the third inning. … Mookie Betts had a single and a walk. He has reached base five times in his first nine plate appearances this spring (three hits, two walks). … Kody Hoese had a two-run double with two outs in the ninth. … Michael Conforto struck out twice and walked. He has started Cactus League play 0 for 6 with three strikeouts. … James Outman was 1 for 3 but has struck out six times in his first 10 at-bats this spring.

DEFENSE REPORT: Hyeseong Kim committed his second error of the spring, both at shortstop.

UP NEXT: Dodgers (RHP Yoshinobu Yamamoto) vs. Milwaukee Brewers (LHP Tyler Alexander), Wednesday at American Family Fields of Phoenix in Maryvale, 12:05 p.m. PT, SportsNet LA

​ Orange County Register 

Warm spell heats up Orange County – but will it last?

• February 25, 2025

An unseasonable warm spell this week will let people shed their winter layers – but don’t put those big coats away just yet, the summer-like weather is expected to be gone by the weekend.

Still, inland Orange County could see record-breaking temps by Thursday, when areas such as Anaheim are expected to reach mid-to-upper 80s, said National Weather Service meteorologist Sebastian Westerink.

Already on Tuesday, an area of high pressure was causing weather to warm up to the mid-80s in the Inland Empire, he said. Temperatures on Wednesday are expected to be similar, before spiking even higher Thursday.

Though Monday was blue skies.along much of the coastline, a thick marine layer hovered through the afternoon Tuesday.

That fog layer is caused by the warm air overhead constricting colder air below, not allowing the moisture to burn off.

“It’s a very stubborn, widespread coverage area of fog contained by the warm air above pressing down on it,” Westerink said.

A weak Santa Ana wind on Thursday should keep that marine layer offshore, he added, allowing temps to increase at the coast to the low-to-mid 70s.

That day, temps will be 15-to-20 degrees above average. The record high for Anaheim is 87 degrees, and temperatures could come close to breaking that record, Westerink said.

Cooler weather is expected ahead for the weekend, and there’s even a chance for rain.

Right now, two different models are conflicting, so it’s hard to say with certainty if Southern California will receive a needed soak, Westerink said. “Warm weather will be gone, and whether we will see just a drop in temperature or showery rainy weather is unclear.”

There could be a chance for snow at local mountains at the tail end of that storm, he added.

​ Orange County Register 

Diana Taurasi, WNBA’s all-time scoring leader, announces her retirement

• February 25, 2025

PHOENIX — Diana Taurasi is retiring after 20 seasons, ending one of the greatest careers in women’s basketball history.

The WNBA’s career scoring leader and a three-time league champion, Taurasi announced her retirement on Wednesday in an interview with Time magazine. The Phoenix Mercury — the only WNBA team she played for — also confirmed her decision.

“Mentally and physically, I’m just full,” Taurasi told Time. “That’s probably the best way I can describe it. I’m full and I’m happy.”

With her taut hair bun and supreme confidence, Taurasi inspired a generation of players while racking up records and championships.

Taurasi was the 2000 Naismith High School Player of the Year at Don Lugo High in Chino. She then led UConn to three straight national titles from 2001-04 and kept on winning after the Mercury selected her with the No. 1 overall pick of the 2004 WNBA draft.

“It’s hard to put into words, it really is, what this means. When someone’s defined the game, when someone’s had such an impact on so many people and so many places. You can’t define it with a quote,” UConn coach Geno Auriemma said. “It’s a life that is a novel, it’s a movie, it’s a miniseries, it’s a saga. It’s the life of an extraordinary person who, I think, had as much to do with changing women’s basketball as anyone who’s ever played the game.”

The 42-year-old won her sixth Olympic gold medal at the Paris Games and finishes her WNBA career with 10,646 points, nearly 3,000 more than second-place Tina Charles.

In addition to her three WNBA championships with the Mercury, Taurasi won six Euroleague championships while playing year-round most of her career. She was the 2009 WNBA MVP and is one of four players to earn WNBA Finals MVP honors more than once (2009, 2014).

“Diana is the greatest to have ever played the game. I’ve been a fan of her my entire life, she is the ultimate leader and teammate,” Mercury owner Mat Ishbia said in a statement. “She’s had an incredible impact on our franchise, our community and the game of basketball. Her name is synonymous with the Phoenix Mercury and she will forever be part of our family.”

Taurasi made the all-WNBA first team 10 times and was on the first or second team a record 14 times. She’s also an 11-time WNBA All-Star, four-time USA Basketball female athlete of the year and was the 2004 WNBA rookie of the year.

“In my opinion, what the greats have in common is, they transcend the sport and become synonymous with the sport,” Auriemma said. “For as long as people talk about college basketball, WNBA basketball, Olympic basketball, Diana is the greatest winner in the history of basketball, period. I’ve had the pleasure of being around her for a lot of those moments, and she’s the greatest teammate I’ve ever coached.”

The Glendale, California, native holds numerous WNBA records, including playoff scoring, field goals, 3-pointers and 30-point games. She also holds 16 Mercury records.

For her career, Taurasi averaged 18.8 points, 4.2 assists and 3.9 rebounds. She averaged 14.9 points, 3.8 rebounds and 3.4 assists while leading the Mercury to the playoffs during her 20th season.

“In her prime years, she was a whole last problem. I mean, she just scored at all three levels,” Las Vegas Aces coach Becky Hammon said. “Just nasty out there. Just had that nasty, which I love. Like, you love that as a as a competitor. So our league is going to miss her.”

​ Orange County Register 

Angels win pitchers’ duel against Padres

• February 25, 2025

THE GAME: Eight Angels pitchers combined to hold the San Diego Padres to five hits in a 2-1 victory on Tuesday afternoon at the Peoria Sports Complex in Peoria, Arizona. The Angels have won three of their first four Cactus League games.

PITCHING REPORT: Right-hander José Soriano pitched two scoreless innings on 24 pitches, allowing one hit and one walk. He struck out one, getting Jason Heyward looking at a curveball. … Left-hander Garrett McDaniels retired all three hitters he has faced. He has not allowed a baserunner in either of his first two outings. McDaniels is a Rule 5 pick, so the Angels will need to keep him in the majors or offer him back to the Dodgers. … Left-hander Brock Burke pitched a scoreless inning, striking out one. … Right-hander George Klassen pitched a scoreless inning. He allowed two hits, including a sun-aided double. Klassen was the top prospect the Angels received in the Carlos Estévez deal last year. Although Klassen has touched 101 mph, his fastball averaged 95.5 in this outing.

HITTING REPORT: Cole Fontenelle tripled off the fence in center field. One of the Angels’ top prospects, Fontenelle is coming back after missing most of last season because of multiple fractures in his leg. … Ryan Noda challenged a third strike call and was correct. The call was reversed, extending his at-bat. He then popped out. Noda has challenged twice this spring, and been correct both times. … Logan O’Hoppe singled in two trips to the plate. He has three hits in his first four at-bats this spring. … Matthew Lugo had two hits. Lugo, who was acquired in the Luis Garcia trade last summer, is 4 for 9 this spring. … Niko Kavadas doubled off the fence in right field. … The Angels scored two runs in the eighth. Bryce Teodosio drove in one with a sacrifice fly, and then Nelson Rada was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded.

DEFENSE REPORT: O’Hoppe, the catcher, could not find a ball that skipped past him, allowing the runner to take two bases on a wild pitch. He was then erased when first baseman Nolan Schanuel snagged a line drive and threw to third for the double play. … Catcher Juan Flores threw out a runner trying to go to second on a pitch in the dirt. Flores picked the ball and made a strong throw. … Center fielder Jo Adell lost a ball in the sun, allowing it to fall for a double. … Rada made a diving catch in center field.

UP NEXT: Cincinnati Reds (LHP Nick Lodolo) at Angels (LHP Tyler Anderson), Wednesday, 12:10 p.m. PT, at Tempe Diablo Stadium, FanDuel Sports Network West, 830 AM

​ Orange County Register 

Heart’s Nancy Wilson talks restarting tour with sister Ann for 50th anniversary

• February 25, 2025

Sisters Ann and Nancy Wilson and their Rock Hall of Fame band Heart were in the midst of their biggest tour in years when everything suddenly came crashing to a halt in May 2024.

Singer Ann Wilson was diagnosed with a cancerous growth and left the tour for surgery and preventive chemotherapy. The tour, which would have continued from August through December 2024, was put on hold.

Now, Heart is back, guitarist-singer Nancy Wilson says, with makeup dates for most of those shows including a concert at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles on Monday, March 3.

“Ann’s doing great,” Nancy Wilson said on a recent video call from her home in Northern California. “She sounds good, she looks good, she feels good, best of all. And she’s pretty bored. She really wants to get out there.

“I can say we’re kind of itching to do it, because it’s what we know how to do,” Wilson says. “I always joke around. I say, you know, I could stay home and do something else, but I have no other skills.

“I mean, I could probably figure something out eventually,” she says. “I’m pretty good at a lot of stuff. But I’m destined to do the rock job, and this is where I work.”

With the delay, the Royal Flush Tour now coincides with the 50th anniversary of Heart’s 1975 debut album, “Dreamboat Annie,” which includes the fan favorites “Magic Man,” “Crazy On You,” and its title track. There may be a few other changes too, Wilson said about a week or so before the band played a pair of Las Vegas shows before hitting Los Angeles.

“We’re still kind of dreaming it all up,” Wilson says. “Going into rehearsal this coming week. So I’m back on the rock job. I’ve got six bags packed: For the bus, for the hotel room, for the backstage area, for the wardrobe case and for the wellness room where we do the workout stuff.

“I’ve got all my bags to send ahead to Las Vegas, then get on the bus and roll, roll out for the year, basically.”

In an interview edited for length and clarity, Nancy Wilson talked about making “Dreamboat Annie,” about Heart’s long practice of performing Led Zeppelin songs and about how she and Ann have kept Heart together through good times and bad.

Q: It must have been fun on the road last year in April and May before things shut down.

A: We were just getting our momentum, you know? Like when you get a big tour, you rehearse and you get ready, and then you’re kind of really nervous at the beginning, because you think you’re going to screw something up. ‘Maybe I’ll make a mistake. Oh (bleep) I made a mistake.’ Because we play completely live, we don’t have pre-records, so we really have skin in the game when we’re on stage.

So we were just getting our roll going, and the shows were starting to get more and more exceptionally fun. And kind of hair-raisingly thrilling, because those are big places, arenas and theaters. It’s only going to happen that one time, live on a stage like that, so the moments are really precious and larger than life.

We were crestfallen, you know. Ann was really a trooper, as always, a super trooper. She had to do a bunch of treatments and a whole bunch of doctor and hospital stuff. And she survived it. She’s back on her feet. She’s feeling great. So three cheers for modern science, what it allows us these days, the healing you can get.

Q: I realized the delay sets you up now for the 50th anniversary of ‘Dreamboat Annie.’

A: It is a really beautiful marker, you know, a historic sort of moment for us. We’re learning some of the other songs from ‘Dreamboat Annie’ that we haven’t really pulled out for a long time, and we’re going to do more songs from it.

Q: ‘Dreamboat Annie’ put Heart on the map from the very start of the band’s career. What do you remember about recording it and the reception that followed?

A: At the time, I joined what then was Ann’s band. They were just barely called Heart. I went to college for a year and a half before I joined her band. I kind of resisted at first, and then I finally joined in. We were, they were, about to make the album, and we’d been writing already. So went into this studio called Can-Base in Vancouver, where Ann was living with ‘the magic man’ at the time. [She laughs. ‘Magic Man’ is about Mike Fisher, Ann Wilson’s bandmate and boyfriend at the time.]

It was like this huge, important, real recording studio with good microphones and isolation booths and a big drum room. Years later, when we revisited the place, it was this tiny little kind of hole in the wall where we made that album, but they had really great gear. Tube gear in the control room, like the compressors, a tube board, and all the great analog gear that people are collecting nowadays.

But it sounded so good, that album, for that reason. We were so nervous and so intimidated and excited, and we made a really cool album. Made it a concept album with recurring motifs and all kind of stuff.

Q: And when it came out and took off?

A: I think it hit a chord. A song like ‘Crazy On You,’ the energy of that still is fun. It’s fun to play today. When we first heard ‘Crazy On You’ on the radio in the car, we flipped and we had to pull over. Like, ‘We did it! We have to pull over and freak.’ Because it was happening. It was just like in a couple of different movies where you’ve seen the band go running: ‘It’s on the radio!’ It’s exactly that scene in real life.

And 50 years later, it’s still a great song. My theory on all that is that great songs are what it’s really all about. People, if there’s a band where you love that song, it was a soundtrack to your life, and you’d go see the band, even if there are almost no original members left. It’s all for the song. You can’t keep a good song down. It really exists in a place bigger than all of us.

Q: I saw on your setlists for last year that you were covering a couple of Led Zeppelin songs, which I think you usually do.

A: We always do. We have to decide what Led Zeppelin songs not to do. Like, OK, how many can we get away with? We used to be called Little Led Zeppelin in Vancouver because we did a lot of Zeppelin songs. Right now we’re re-learning ‘The Rain Song,’ which is a great Zeppelin song.

I heard the movie, the Zeppelin movie is out. It’s supposed to be great.

Q: There is something about their music. At the FireAid benefit, Pink played a Led Zeppelin song and the Black Crowes with Slash did a Zeppelin song.

A: ‘Going To California,’ yeah? It was great. Those songs are deathless and pretty timeless. Especially nowadays when you just don’t find very many rock bands out there anymore. Rock is kind of at a low ebb. I don’t think it ever dies, per se. There’s just an intermission right now or something. But it never dies because it’s the spark.

The imperfections of rock are kind of what makes it. The character of rock is human and not quite so perfect like a lot of pop music tends to get. There’s flaws, beautiful flaws. We like flaws.

Q: Flaws are good. Flaws make it unique.

A: Like when I made a mistake live before we had to stop the tour. I made a really bad intro to ‘Crazy On You’ because the strings were different and something had changed. It was really like my fingers tripped all over each other and I got it totally wrong. But people were like, ‘That was so cool when you made that mistake!’ It’s like, wow, that tells you a lot about the culture right now, like seeing proof that it’s really, right? It’s pretty cool.

Q: People remember those little unique moments.

A: Human moments.

Q: I want to ask you about keeping the band together for this long, which very few bands can do.

A: I think me and Ann, we represent what Heart is. The perception of Heart is the two of us. If we were still trying to be the original lineup, we would never still be there, you know what I mean? There was a lot of drama, and a lot of just growing up to do since the beginning of Heart, as far as who was in the band and who came through the band and all the different players.

I think our relationship has always been really unique. We’re sisters, so we’re blood. Our love is blood love and as different as we are, which we really are. And as crazy and divergent as our lives could be from each other, and the circumstantial stuff from the outside and all the static that happens around us, we just plow through.

I always felt lucky to have another girl, not to mention a sister, inside of Heart. It’s like being in the eye of the hurricane, the way it’s felt over the years, because all the eras go by and the dramas go through, and there’s cows flying around and tractors in the air, but at the nucleus of the story is the quiet center where me and Ann exist.

We had our own lives and our husbands and our own choices and roads we took. But [the band] is kind of like coming back to the good old oak tree called Heart. It exists there. The roots are deep and it’s bigger than all the rest of it, because the music and the songs are there in the culture. It’s a lovely, steady pillar of power that just exists on its own. Even without me and Ann, it’ll still be there.

Q: I suspect Heart draws a multi-generational audience from original fans to much younger ones.

A: Now there’s more people showing up that are in their college age or even teenagers. I get fan mail from teenagers now. I kind of run the fan club and I like to answer fan mail. It’s because I like to take the temperature of who they are, and that’s one of the things that’s really exciting. And there’s little girls that are like nine that want to pose with a guitar with their pink skirts on.

It’s really cool that little girls and little boys are excited by Heart because they come and see us and they’re kind of like, ‘Whoa, it’s not like TV.’ The energy is different from something that’s been kind of force-fed by the culture to them. We’ve always been different, but I think we remain really kind of an anomaly in pop culture.

Q: Like you said, there are fewer rock bands and a ton of pop.

A: Pop’s great. I love a lot of these pop songs. I’m a Taylor Swift fan.

Q: Did you see Taylor Swift when she was on tour?

A: I couldn’t do it. I wanted to in a big way, but I saw so much footage from all the girls I know that did go. During the pandemic, [Swift’s ‘Folklore’] was my pandemic album. I think it’s my favorite album of hers.

Q: Touring has surely gotten more comfortable since the mid-’70s. What’s it like for you today?

A: Oh, god. [She laughs] Unless you’re at the private jet level – we’re on the bus level – the inconveniences almost outweigh the reward of getting up on a stage for two hours. It’s like everything is aimed for those two hours. The bad pizza, the no sleep, the potholes, overnight in the bus, trying to sleep. You can’t even watch TV half the time because it’s bad reception.

All the scheduling of it. Trying to see your family when you’re home between their school breaks. It’s just a lot of moving parts that you have to be good at. It’s an obstacle course, basically, and you just have to run with your suitcase and get to the stage.

Q: But those two hours on stage?

A: It’s everything my whole life is aimed to be able to do well, or at least as well as possible. People are there. They’re loving you and they love those songs. And it’s a moment that only happens that one time, so you can’t just rewind it, rewatch it.

It’s beautiful, sort of like a mindfulness that happens on stage. You really have to be in the moment. You can’t be thinking, ‘Well, I think I’ll do my laundry later in the sink on the bus or in the hotel room.’ Because then you’re like, ‘Wait, what’s the next chord? I was thinking about my laundry.’

There’s just certainly magic that is transferred in that setting.

​ Orange County Register 

The Black Marlin in Tustin to close temporarily for renovation

• February 25, 2025

Seafood eatery the Black Marlin in Tustin’s Old Town will temporarily close for a major renovation following dinner service on Saturday, March 1.

“This transformation will include essential plumbing upgrades, a modernized kitchen, a reimagined restaurant and bar layout, and an exciting new menu — carefully crafted to become an award-winning favorite,” the Black Marlin team posted to Instagram on Monday, Feb. 24.

Located inside Tustin Garage, a circa-1915 structure that served motorists driving between Los Angeles and San Diego in the early-to-mid 1900s before the construction of the I-5 freeway, the renovation will require a careful overhaul due to the building’s historic nature.

ALSO SEE: The Spaghetti Bender in Newport Beach to close after 55 years

“Due to the complexity of these upgrades and the unique challenges of working within a historic space, we don’t have an exact reopening date just yet,” the restaurant owner explained in the same post. “But rest assured, we’ll be keeping you updated every step of the way.”

In addition to a new look, the Black Marlin, which opened in 2011, will also return with an entirely new menu geared toward a more upscale dining experience, according to the restaurant’s communication team. “When we return, the Black Marlin will not only continue to be your local neighborhood gathering spot for great food, drinks, and special occasions — it will also be a top culinary destination for all of Southern California to enjoy,” the announcement continued.

Chef-owner Noah Almazan’s eatery has earned a loyal following and acclaim over the years, including such honors as being one of the best seafood restaurants according to the Orange County Register’s annual Best of Orange County list.

​ Orange County Register