PHOENIX — Gophers football coach P.J. Fleck uses bowl games as a bridge.

“It’s a celebration of the (2025) season. … The seniors and everything they’ve given to this program and really start building toward 2026,” Fleck said last week. “Every bowl game we’ve ever been associated with, that is the approach we’ve taken: to be 1-0 (in the bowl) and to continue to prepare.”

After the team arrived in Arizona on Sunday, Fleck shared with the Pioneer Press a handful of young, unsung players who have stood out during practices for Friday’s Rate Bowl against New Mexico.

These types of players are showcased the first week after the regular-season finale. The Gophers routinely give veterans much-needed rest and turn over the keys to underclassmen until prep for the Lobos hits full swing.

Looking ahead, Fleck’s top-of-mind position is linebacker. It’s a group he mentioned at points during the season, too.

“I think Ethan Stendel has done a tremendous job on defense; I know he’s young,” Fleck said. “Mason Carrier had a great bowl prep. Nate Cleveland. I love the future at linebacker in our program.”

Stendel is a true freshman from Caledonia; Cleveland is a true freshman from Hoffman Estates, Ill.; and Carrier is a redshirt freshman from Detroit Lakes. The trio played primarily on special teams: Carrier (12 games), Stendel (10) and Cleveland (seven).

The Gophers have had five receivers express plans to enter the transfer portal in January, and a sixth, senior Le’Meke Brockington, is a candidate to opt out of the bowl game. He had team highs in receptions (46) and yards (439) along with four touchdowns.

“I thought Bradley Martino had a really good bowl prep,” Fleck said. “We were a little bit limited on the receiving corps, so it was good for Bradley to dip into that piece a little bit.”

Martino didn’t play in a game this fall, but he stands 6-foot-3 and is a four-star prospect from Naples, Fla., who competed in the Navy All-American Bowl.

Gophers offensive coordinator Greg Harbaugh said two young offensive lineman — redshirt freshman Brett Carroll and true freshman Kaveon Lee — were playing with the first unit during a bowl practices. Then they were called out during a meeting with the entire offense.

“So, we have their play up there (on the screen) where, ‘OK they do something really well in the play before, and then, OK, we’re critiquing them and coaching them on the next play,” Harbaugh said. “I think that’s beneficial in this time of the year.”

Fleck also mentioned D.J. Shipp, a true freshman from Eastvale, Calif. Shipp didn’t play in a game, neither did Lee, but Carroll, a well-regarded center prospect, played in two.

Going in to the Duke’s Mayo Bowl last year, Fleck boosted offensive tackle Nathan Roy, who played in the win against Virginia Tech and used that as a springboard to start all 12 games at left tackle last season.

Next season, the Gophers’ defensive line will lose senior tackles Deven Eastern and Jalen Logan-Redding and need young players to step up. The list of potentials includes Riley Sunram, a 6-5, 300-pound redshirt freshman from Kindred, N.D., and Jaylin Hicks, a 6-3, 260-pound redshirt freshman from Harlem, N.Y. Sunram and Hicks each got got a taste in eight games.

“Some of the young lineman who have actually played — D-lineman — have stepped up in a big way,” Fleck said.

Fleck also mentioned safety Zach Harden, a 6-1 true freshman from Eatonton, Ga., who saw the field in 10 games last season.

“He did a really good job,” Fleck said.

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By WYATTE GRANTHAM-PHILIPS, Associated Press Business Writer

Paramount is sweetening its hostile takeover bid for Warner Bros. Discovery with an “irrevocable personal guarantee” from Larry Ellison, who is putting up billions of dollars to back the deal for his son’s company.

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On Monday, Skydance-owned Paramount announced that Larry Ellison — the founder of Oracle and father of Paramount CEO David Ellison — had personally agreed to be responsible for $40.4 billion of equity financing for the company’s offer, as well as any damage claims.

Paramount had previously said that the Ellison family trust would be backing more than $40 billion of its bid for Warner. But Warner’s board was critical of that decision last week, arguing that Paramount had “consistently misled” shareholders about the Ellison family’s backing because a “revocable trust is no replacement for a secured commitment.”

Paramount took a swipe at that assertion on Monday — maintaining that Larry Ellison holds the majority of the trust’s assets and that Warner had not previously asked for a personal guarantee. But nevertheless, the company said, it “elected to address WBD’s current stated concerns.”

Beyond doubling down on Ellison’s backing, Paramount also said it would increased its payout if the deal is blocked by regulators. The company is now upping the breakup fee to $5.8 billion — matching what Netflix has already put on the table for its proposed transaction.

The value of Paramount’s $30 per share offer otherwise remains unchanged. But the company is extending the window for shareholders to “tender” their shares, with a deadline now set for Jan. 21.

“Paramount has repeatedly demonstrated its commitment to acquiring WBD,” Paramount CEO David Ellison said in a statement, adding that his company’s offer continues to be “the superior option to maximize value for WBD shareholders.”

Paramount’s all-cash bid for all of Warner’s properties — including networks like CNN and Discovery — is valued at $77.9 billion, not including debt. But Warner’s board has urged shareholders to back the cash-and-stock deal it struck with Netflix earlier this month, which would sell its studio and streaming business for $72 billion.

The Associated Press reached out to media contacts for Warner and Netflix for further comments on Monday. In a letter to shareholders last week, Warner’s board maintained that the terms of the Netflix merger were superior, while “the PSKY offer is illusory.”

Shares of Paramount-Skydance jumped nearly 7% in Monday morning trading. Warner Bros. Discovery stock was up more than 2%, while Netflix slipped almost 0.7%.

By MICHAEL R. SISAK and LARRY NEUMEISTER, Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — The Senate’s top Democrat urged his colleagues Monday to take legal action over the Justice Department’s incremental and heavily redacted release of records pertaining to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

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Minority Leader Chuck Schumer introduced a resolution that, if passed, would direct the Senate to file or join lawsuits aimed at forcing the Justice Department to comply with the Epstein Files Transparency Act, the law enacted last month that required disclosure of records by last Friday.

“Instead of transparency, the Trump administration released a tiny fraction of the files and blacked out massive portions of what little they provided,” Schumer, D-N.Y. said in a statement. “This is a blatant cover-up.”

In lieu of Republican support, Schumer’s resolution is largely symbolic. The senate is off until Jan. 5, more than two weeks after the deadline. Even then, it’ll likely face an uphill battle for passage. But it allows Democrats to continue a pressure campaign for disclosure that Republicans had hoped to put behind them.

The Justice Department said it plans to release records on a rolling basis by the end of the year. It blamed the delay on the time-consuming process of obscuring victims’ names and other identifying information. So far, the department hasn’t given any notice when new records arrive.

That approach angered some accusers and members of Congress who fought to pass the transparency act. Records that were released, including photographs, interview transcripts, call logs, court records and other documents, were either already public or heavily blacked out, and many lacked necessary context.

There were few revelations in the tens of thousands of pages of records that have been released so far. Some of the most eagerly awaited records, such as FBI victim interviews and internal memos shedding light on charging decisions, weren’t there.

Nor were there any mentions of some powerful figures who’ve been in Epstein’s orbit, like Britain’s former Prince Andrew.

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche on Sunday defended the Justice Department’s decision to release just a fraction of the files by the deadline as necessary to protect survivors of sexual abuse by the disgraced financier.

Blanche pledged that the Trump administration would meet its obligation required by law. But he stressed that the department was obligated to act with caution as it goes about making public thousands of documents that can include sensitive information.

Blanche, the Justice Department’s second-in-command, also defended its decision to remove several files related to the case from its public webpage, including a photograph showing Trump, less than a day after they were posted.

The missing files, which were available Friday but no longer accessible by Saturday, included images of paintings depicting nude women, and one showed a series of photographs along a credenza and in drawers. In that image, inside a drawer among other photos, was a photograph of Trump, alongside Epstein, Melania Trump and Epstein’s longtime associate, Ghislaine Maxwell.

Blanche said the documents were removed because they also showed victims of Epstein. Blanche said the Trump photo and the other documents will be reposted once redactions are made to protect survivors.

“We are not redacting information around President Trump, around any other individual involved with Mr. Epstein, and that narrative, which is not based on fact at all, is completely false,” Blanche told NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

Blanche said Trump, a Republican, has labeled the Epstein matter “a hoax” because “there’s this narrative out there that the Department of Justice is hiding and protecting information about him, which is completely false.”

“The Epstein files existed for years and years and years and you did not hear a peep out of a single Democrat for the past four years and yet … lo and behold, all of a sudden, out of the blue, Senator Schumer suddenly cares about the Epstein files,” Blanche said. “That’s the hoax.”

Associated Press reporter Kevin Freking in Washington contributed to this report.

An annual vigil honors the New Yorkers who died living on the streets and in the city’s shelters. “Every life lost to homelessness was preventable,” the event’s organizers said. “People do not die because they lack resilience or will.”

Urban Pathways and Care for the Homeless hosted the 2025 Homeless Persons’ Memorial Day at Congregation Rodeph Sholom in Manhattan on Dec. 18. (Adi Talwar/City Limits)

The bell rang 380 times. Between each chime a name was read. After, a candle was lit.

All 380 people honored died this year. All 380 were homeless. 

Held around the winter solstice each year, this December observance remembers New Yorkers who experienced homelessness and lost their lives—on the street, in shelters, or shortly after they moved into housing. The ceremony, which assembles unhoused residents, service providers, and officials, casts light on the struggles that homeless New Yorkers face in hopes that the city can do better.

“Every life lost to homelessness was preventable. People do not die because they lack resilience or will,” said representatives for the Supportive Housing Network of New York, Care For the Homeless, and Urban Pathways, three groups who organize the event, in statement.

“They die because of policy choices—because safe and affordable housing was treated as a privilege rather than a right; because health care access is fragmented; because our safety net systems failed to catch them in time; and because our collective response failed to match the scale of the need.”

Being poor and unstably housed is bad for a person’s health. The homeless are more likely to experience health problems, and have shorter life expectancies.

“We refuse to let their deaths be forgotten or dismissed as inevitable,” added the event’s organizers, in their statement. 

A wall of remembrance for those honored at Thursday’s ceremony. (Adi Talwar/City Limits)

The list of names is crowdsourced by shelter staff and clients who submit them. Those lost ranged in age, from as young as 24 to as old as 87. Some were remembered by their first name, a nickname, or a note about how they lived.

Frank Garcia played guitar. James Coaxum enjoyed pastrami sandwiches and listening to his handheld radio. Charleton Davis left behind two sons.

The 380 remembered Thursday evening were just a fraction of the New Yorkers who died experiencing homelessness.

The number of unhoused who died in New York City spiked to 613 in 2021. Each year since has set a new high, with 887 unhoused New Yorkers dying between July 2023 and June 2024, the most recent period for which data is available.

Drugs, disease, and poor health ended the lives of many unhoused, according to the city’s latest mortality report. Sixteen died by suicide.

“Each person we remember today was more than the circumstances that surrounded their passing. They were individuals with histories, relationships, dreams and purpose. They were loved,” said Department of Social Services Commissioner Molly Park, who oversees the city’s shelter system.

Some of those honored eventually found housing, but years of poor health from living on the streets and in shelters caught up with them.

Among those eulogized at the event was Jimmy Vargas, who died a month after he moved into supportive housing this fall. (Adi Talwar/City Limits)

Noam Cohen, an organizer with VOCAL-NY, said that he lived with Jimmy Vargas and 21 other roommates together in a Fort Greene, Brooklyn shelter for a year. Vargas died just a month after he moved into supportive housing this October, according to Cohen, who eulogized his friend. 

“That’s devastating to me. It’s also given me the courage and the motivation that I need to recommit myself to this fight, to building the base of this movement that’s dedicated to amplifying the stories of people like Jimmy,” said Cohen.

Living on the street can be violent. Twelve New Yorkers experiencing homelessness were killed in homicides in the year that ended last July. In a high profile murder shortly after last year’s memorial, Debrina Kawam was horrifically set on fire in a subway car in Coney Island.

Shivonne Thompson, another New Yorker living unsheltered, was killed violently under an overpass in East Harlem. “Despite her efforts to find safety and stability. She remained on the streets for years, relying on strangers, libraries and the faint hope that she could one day escape homelessness,” said Cynthia English, a board member and advocate with Care for the Homeless, who eulogized Thompson.

A choir performs at the annual Homeless Persons Memorial Day event in Manhattan (Adi Talwar/City Limits)

With the grief came an acknowledgement that the city can and should do better.

The number of people living in city shelters remained high in 2025, at over 100,000, according to City Limits’ shelter tracker. Around 30,000 are asylum seekers.

The Department of Social Services is placing more homeless New Yorkers in subsidized housing with vouchers than ever before—including 32,000 during fiscal year 2025, a 17 percent increase over the prior year, according to the agency.

But Commissioner Park, as well as the advocates gathered Thursday, said there’s still more to be done. “Their lives mattered. Their deaths must move us to act, and their memory calls on us to do better for those still here and for those yet to come,” said Park.

Speakers highlighted the urgent need for services and resources to support the health of unhoused New Yorkers. But more than anything, they highlighted the need for more housing.

Elizabeth Mackey, a leader with VOCAL-NY, read a eulogy at the event. (Adi Talwar/City Limits)

“We really could prevent all of this if they stopped with the red [tape] and the bureaucracy of getting them the voucher,” said Elizabeth Mackey, a leader with VOCAL-NY.

City Limits has previously reported on the difficulty of using city housing vouchers, despite the program’s record enrollment and budget.

“Next year we’re gonna be back here again with more people, and more people, and more people. How much more?” Mackey added.

To reach the reporter behind this story, contact Patrick@citylimits.org. To reach the editor, contact Jeanmarie@citylimits.org

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The post Remembering the Unhoused New Yorkers Who Lost Their Lives in 2025 appeared first on City Limits.