A new school year is here, bringing another season of high school football, flag football, volleyball, water polo, cross country and more.
Yet consistent local coverage of these high school athletes has all but disappeared.
No one else is covering South Coast high school sports with the consistency Noozhawk is — and certainly not on the scale we are.
In partnership with the Santa Barbara Athletic Round Table, we’re committed to giving our local student athletes and teams the recognition they deserve.
Sports editor Diego Sandoval and his tiny crew of overachievers are doing phenomenal work covering YOUR teams and alma maters — from Santa Barbara, San Marcos and Dos Pueblos to Bishop Diego, Carpinteria, Cate, Laguna Blanca, Providence and beyond.
They’re at the games, reporting scores, taking photos and video, and telling the stories of boys and girls sports throughout the school year.
But that coverage takes reporters, photographers, time and resources. We need your help.
Your financial contribution to the Hawks Club directly helps Noozhawk put them on the sidelines and at the gyms, pools and stadiums where your teams are competing.
Please join, renew or make an additional Hawks Club contribution today. If South Coast prep sports coverage matters to you, your financial support is what makes it possible.
And we are still pursuing consistent funding for a North County sports reporter. If you can help us make that happen, please email me at wmacfadyen@noozhawk.com.
Thank you for your support, and best wishes to all of the fall season’s student athletes!
This past week, Noozhawk drew an audience of 144,214 readers, as tracked by our WordPress analytics.
What follows is my own take on the Top 5 stories you were reading over that period, according to our Google Analytics.
This is my opinion column, which I write in my civic capacity as Noozhawk’s publisher. It is not a news story and I am not a reporter.
1. Speeders Beware: CHP Revs Up Special Enforcement During Monterey Car Week
Noozhawk’s article about a California Highway Patrol warning for Monterey Car Week drivers came racing out of the recesses of our analytics the night of Aug. 13, surging in just a couple of hours to become our most-read story of the week.
As our Janene Scully reported, the CHP has deployed extra officers throughout its Coastal Division — from Ventura County to Santa Cruz — to crack down on speeding during the annual gathering of exotic and high-performance cars.
Apparently, some drivers don’t read Noozhawk.
A Santa Barbara CHP officer conducted a double stop of two of the cars traveling together on northbound Highway 101 in Carpinteria, north of Bailard Avenue.
Both were clocked at 115 mph — 50 mph over the speed limit — and their drivers were cited for unsafe speed and reckless driving.
“Public roads are not racetracks,” the CHP warned.
The special enforcement campaign, continuing through the weekend, includes ground patrols and CHP aircraft spotting speeders from above.
There’s plenty of precedent.
During Monterey Car Week in 2023, officers cited Ferrari, Lamborghini and Porsche drivers, some exceeding 90 mph as they sped through the county.
And in 2022, a CHP officer stopped a Lamborghini rocketing along Highway 154 near Santa Ynez at an astonishing 152 mph.
The CHP’s message is simple: Enjoy the horsepower, but save the racing for the track.
2. Motorcyclist Killed, Another Critically Injured in Crash South of Orcutt
A Corona man was killed and a fellow rider critically injured in a two-motorcycle collision south of Orcutt on Aug. 8.
As our Evelyn Spence reported, emergency crews responded around 3:30 p.m. to the crash scene, where the northbound Highway 135 entrance ramp meets northbound Highway 1.
No details of the wreck have been released, and California Highway Patrol Officer Maria Barriga said the investigation is ongoing.
The Santa Barbara County sheriff’s Coroner’s Bureau identified the dead rider as 64-year-old Timothy Greene of Corona in Riverside County.
County fire Capt. Mike Gray said he was pronounced dead at the scene.
Gray said the second rider, a 60-year-old Huntington Beach man whose identity was not released, suffered critical injuries and was taken by an American Medical Response ambulance to Marian Regional Medical Center in Santa Maria.
The crash caused a considerable traffic backup while authorities investigated.
Anyone with information about the wreck is asked to contact the CHP at 805.608.6310.
Greene’s funeral arrangements are pending but his niece, Kara Kelsen of Corona, established a GoFundMe campaign to help the family with expenses.
Kelsen said he is survived by his wife, Vicky; three daughters; and three granddaughters.
“His sudden passing has left their family facing an unimaginable loss, both emotionally and financially,” she wrote on the site.
As of Aug. 14, the account had raised nearly $12,000. Click here to make an online donation.
3. Pedestrian in Stable Condition After Vehicle Collision in Santa Barbara
A pedestrian struck by a vehicle in downtown Santa Barbara was hospitalized in stable condition after the wreck, one of three such collisions in Santa Barbara County that left one woman dead and another critically injured.
As our Evelyn Spence reported, Santa Barbara police responded about 12:45 a.m. Aug. 8 to the intersection of Chapala and West Ortega streets, where a pedestrian had been hit by a car in the crosswalk near Win~Dow Burgers.
Police Lt. Antonio Montojo said the driver and vehicle were located nearby, and the 600 and 700 blocks of Chapala were temporarily closed for the investigation.
Police did not disclose the pedestrian’s identity, and wouldn’t even reveal whether it was a man or a woman. I have no idea why.
On Aug. 9 in Santa Maria, our Janene Scully reported that a 39-year-old woman was hit by a vehicle and killed while walking outside a marked crosswalk in the 100 block of West Battles Road, west of South Depot Road.
Santa Maria police Lt. Jason Zickuhr told Janene that emergency dispatchers received numerous 9-1-1 calls about the 8:40 p.m. incident.
Santa Maria firefighters and American Medical Response paramedics began life-saving measures, but the woman ultimately died after being taken to Marian Regional Medical Center.
Zickuhr said the driver, a 36-year-old Santa Maria resident, remained at the scene, and DUI was not suspected.
On Aug. 13, police identified the victim as Veronica Medina Jimenez of Guadalupe.
Funeral arrangements are pending but Jimenez’s family established a GoFundMe account to assist with expenses.
According to a post on the site, Jimenez was the mother of two children and is the daughter of Miguel “Frijoles” Jimenez, a well-known soccer referee in Santa Maria.
As of Aug. 14, the campaign had raised a little more than $500. Click here to make an online donation.
On Aug. 11, Evelyn reported that a woman was critically injured just after 8 a.m. when she was struck by a vehicle at Alameda Avenue and Cathedral Oaks Road near Dos Pueblos High School.
Details were scant but Santa Barbara County Fire Department spokeswoman Karen Cruz-Orduña said the woman was taken to Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital with critical injuries.
No one else was hurt, and authorities are investigating the circumstances of the collision.
4. Judge Orders Maximum Sentence for Convicted Rapist Arian Eteghaei, an Ex-UCSB Student Convicted of 2 Sexual Assaults
Convicted rapist Arian Eteghaei will spend at least three decades in prison after a judge imposed the maximum sentence on the UC Santa Barbara dropout for sexually assaulting two fellow students.
As our Rebecca Caraway reported, Santa Barbara County Superior Court Judge Von Deroian sentenced the 24-year-old Eteghaei to 364 days in County Jail followed by 30 years to life in state prison.
Eteghaei, from Dublin in Alameda County, was convicted in January of forcible rape, sexual penetration with a foreign object and domestic-violence battery involving two women identified as Jane Does.
Both survivors described lasting trauma in statements read at his Aug. 10 sentencing.
“I haven’t felt safe in five years,” one wrote, detailing years of therapy, panic and fear.
She said she worries Eteghaei “will try to kill me” for exposing him and sometimes awakens terrified that he has escaped from custody and is coming after her family.
She also condemned Eteghaei’s defense team for how they treated her during the months-long trial.
The second woman described depression, insomnia, nightmares and abandoning a full-ride UCSB graduate scholarship because Santa Barbara and Isla Vista had become too painful.
“When I learned about the others, it made me physically ill,” she said in her letter. “… I still carry guilt for not reporting sooner.
“I wonder if I could have prevented someone else getting hurt.”
Eteghaei initially was charged with sexually assaulting six women, including a former girlfriend.
Deroian rejected ludicrous assertions from Heather Lowry, Eteghaei’s current girlfriend of nine months, that the survivors had moved on, saying their continuing trauma was evident during the trial.
And then there was Eteghaei’s father, Arash Eteghaei, who essentially painted a picture of his son as the victim in his own statement to the court.
Oh, I almost forgot: The younger Eteghaei also faces a separate felony charge for his alleged escape attempt after the jury convicted him back on Jan. 16.
Our Pricila Flores’ video of his brief and ill-fated alleged run for freedom never gets old, so here it is again:
5. Thunderstorms Possible Through Wednesday in Santa Barbara County
It’s not the heat, it’s the humidity, and it’s been killing me.
As our Evelyn Spence reported, Santa Barbara County has been sweltering through hot, humid, unsettled summer weather this past week.
The stretch was capped with National Weather Service forecasts declaring the possibility of thunderstorms, heavy rain and gusty winds through Aug. 12.
A coastal flood advisory also was in effect, with high tides of up to 7½ feet expected.
Although blustery winds blew in the afternoon of Aug. 12, and the temperature dropped 10-15 degrees, the rest of the forecast mostly failed to meet the timeline.
On Aug. 13, it did rain — at least a little — in Montecito and elsewhere. Cloud cover helped keep the heat in check.
The weather service said weekend temperatures should be slightly cooler, with daytime highs in the 70s along the coast and in the upper 80s inland.
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Good Reads
Check out these six stories, too:
» Woman Injured after Being Struck By Train in Santa Barbara — Staff writer Rebecca Caraway is following an unusual story in which a woman apparently survived being struck by an Amtrak passenger train.
» Goleta Planning Commission Rejects Anthem Chapel Project Over Traffic, Size Concerns — Executive editor Giana Magnoli has the details on one of the most telegraphed and blatantly feelings-driven denials of a project that I can recall.
» Providence School Breaks Ground for New Middle, Upper Campus in Santa Barbara — Contributing writer Noelle Cabrera drops in on an exciting day for Providence, the Santa Barbara independent Christian school that will soon have a campus of its own for middle and upper school students.
» Rincon Gateway Property Officially Belongs to City of Carpinteria — South County editor Evelyn Spence covers the City of Carpinteria’s groundbreaking acquisition of 2½ acres of prime Rincon real estate.
» End Near for Iconic Pea Soup Andersen’s Billboards Near Buellton — As Pea Soup Andersen’s reaches its expiration date, North County editor Janene Scully looks at a couple of signs of things to come for Buellton.
» Mark Patton: Beat Goes On for UCSB Women’s Soccer Star Olivia Howard — The 2026 UCSB women’s soccer season has just gotten started but sports columnist Mark Patton has already written the feel-good story of the year.
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Last Year on Noozhawk
What was our most-read story this time last year? Santa Barbara’s Old Spanish Days Fiesta Draws Crowds But Raises Concerns.
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What I’m Up To
Although I’m not looking for a free meal, I occasionally do have free time if you’re looking for a speaker for your club, group or organization and want to hear more about Noozhawk. Email me at wmacfadyen@noozhawk.com.
Oct. 29 — I don’t recognize who Scouting America — Los Padres Council is describing, but I’m being honored with the National Outstanding Eagle Scout Award at the annual Salute to Scouting celebration at the Santa Barbara Club, #myhomeawayfromhome.
Dec. 10 — Having not learned their lesson from last year, the Channel City Club has invited me back to emcee its Christmas brunch at the Hilton Santa Barbara Beachfront Resort. I’m privileged to do this in honor of my close friend, the late Erin Graffy, the club’s longtime host.
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Bill Macfadyen’s Story of the Week
When the airport is a destination unto itself: San Diego Airport’s New Terminal 1 Is a Looker with Curved Glass Panels, Serrated Aluminum Fins.
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Best of Bill’s Instagram
I don’t have a bald eagle in it, but raptors rule in my Instagram feed this past week.
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Watch It
Nature has come for the most famous bald eagle of all time. Like many of you, over the years I’ve spent hours watching Jackie tend to her nest and family — or just sit in the snow — via the Big Bear Bald Eagle Cam livestream. I don’t regret a second of it. Rest in peace.
