The Times-Picayune 03-04-2025 by The Advocate

HAPPY MARDI GRAS!

LUNDI LIGHTS

Monarch Bianca Del Rio tosses beads to the crowd as the Krewe of Orpheus rolls on Monday.

King Zulu 2025 Rodney P. Mason Jr. continues his father’s legacy in club At 39, he grew up on ‘The Lion King’ and is a millennial Mardi Gras monarch

BY KEITH SPERA Staff writer

Rodney P. Mason Jr was reluctant to join the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club.

He was an Alabama A&M University undergraduate when his father, a Zulu stalwart, ﬁrst extended the invitation.

“I looked at it as my dad’s club,” Mason recalled. “You pass down Broad Street and you see those old guys hanging out (at Zulu headquarters). They were older than my dad.” But he soon reconsidered. At 21 he became Zulu’s youngest full-ﬂedged member Those “old guys” became his buddies. Fast-forward 18 years. On Fat Tuesday, Mason will

Flambeaux light the way for the Krewe of Orpheus on Monday.

Flat Tuesday

BY MIKE SMITH, JAMES FINN, BOB WARREN and LARA NICHOLSON Staff writers

The threat of severe weather has left New Orleans Mardi Gras traditions at risk, with parades being shortened or canceled, warnings issued over ﬂying debris and ofﬁcials urging extreme caution on the eve of the region’s biggest celebration.

The threat of storms and dangerously high winds has forced Zulu and Rex to plan to roll with streamlined processions and much earlier start times if they are allowed to go ahead at all. In a city deeply enmeshed in tradition, cancellations would be nothing short of historic.

The new schedule will see Zulu roll at 6:30 a.m. instead of 8 a.m., while Rex will follow about 9:30 a.m. instead of 10:30 a.m. The route will be shortened, with Zulu following its traditional path until Poydras Street, eventually stopping at Loyola Avenue, and Rex turning left on Jackson Avenue before ﬁnishing on Claiborne Avenue. There will be no marchers or bands. The Krewe of Elks truck parade was rescheduled to Sunday Jefferson Parish has canceled its two parades outright, with no clear indication of when they could be rescheduled.

Parades on the northshore were also moved earlier or postponed as forecasters warned of wind gusts reaching as high as 60 mph along with the possibility of hail and tornadoes. The National Weather Service issued a high wind warning for between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m., though strong gusts would begin even before that.

Rex, in existence since 1872, has not been canceled due to weather since 1933. Zulu, started in 1909, is believed to have never been called off for that reason, a spokesperson said. Organizers and ofﬁcials will be watching closely

Threat of severe weather prompts Rex and Zulu to shorten routes while Jefferson Parish cancels parades ä See TUESDAY, page 7A

‘They just kind of adopted me,’ lawyer Garry Jordan says

BY LARA NICHOLSON Staff writer

“They just kind of adopted me, I guess,” Jordan said. For Mardi Gras this year,

STAFF PHOTOS By SCOTT THRELKELD

The Krewe of Orpheus rolls to the theme ‘As Above So Below’ on the Uptown route on Monday.

BRIEFS FROM WIRE REPORTS

Germany: 2 killed after driver rams into crowd

BERLIN A driver rammed a car into a crowd Monday in the southwestern German city of Mannheim, and authorities said two people were killed and 11 others injured, ﬁve of them severely A 40-year-old German from the nearby state of RhinelandPalatinate was detained and in a hospital after being injured, State Interior Minister Thomas Strobl of Baden-Württemberg, where Mannheim is based, told German news agency dpa.

He later told reporters in Mannheim that “as far as the speciﬁc motivation of the crime is concerned, we have no indication of an extremist or religious background at the moment. The motivation could rather be based in the person of the perpetrator himself.”

German police and prosecutors said Monday at a joint news conference that the driver intentionally rammed his car into people and is being investigated for murder and attempted murder. They said the driver shot himself in the mouth when he was arrested and had to undergo medical treatment at a hospital. He could not yet be questioned. Investigators are looking into the possibility that the driver may suffer from psychological problems.

Hegseth pauses Russian cyberoperations

WASHINGTON Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has paused offensive cyberoperations against Russia by U.S. Cyber Command, rolling back some efforts to contend with a key adversary even as national security experts call for the U.S. to expand those capabilities.

A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive operations, on Monday conﬁrmed the pause.

Hegseth’s decision does not affect cyberoperations conducted by other agencies, including the CIA and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency But the Trump administration also has rolled back other efforts at the FBI and other agencies related to countering digital and cyber threats.

The Pentagon decision which was first reported by The Record, comes as many national security and cybersecurity experts have urged greater investments in cyber defense and offense, particularly as China and Russia have sought to interfere with the nation’s economy, elections and security Republican lawmakers and national security experts have all called for a greater offensive posture. During his Senate conﬁrmation hearing this year, CIA Director John Ratcliffe said America’s rivals have shown that they believe cyberespionage retrieving sensitive information and disrupting American business and infrastructure — to be an essential weapon of the modern arsenal.

McMahon confirmed as education secretary

WASHINGTON The Senate voted Monday to conﬁrm former wrestling executive Linda McMahon as the nation’s education chief, a role that places her atop a department that President Donald Trump has viliﬁed and vowed to dismantle.

McMahon will face the competing tasks of winding down the Education Department while also escalating efforts to achieve Trump’s agenda. Already the Republican president has signed sweeping orders to rid America’s schools of diversity programs and accommodations for transgender students while also calling for expanded school choice programs. At the same time, Trump has promised to shut down the department and said he wants McMahon “to put herself out of a job.”

The Senate voted to confirm McMahon 51-45. A billionaire and former CEO of World Wrestling Entertainment, McMahon, 76, is an unconventional pick for the role. She spent a year on Connecticut’s state board of education and is a longtime trustee at Sacred Heart University but otherwise has little traditional education leadership.

Trump halts U.S. aid to Ukraine

‘Pause’ comes after blowup at Oval Office

meeting

BY AAMER MADHANI Associated Press

WASHINGTON President Donald Trump on Monday directed a “pause” to U.S. assistance to Ukraine after a disastrous Oval Office meeting as he seeks to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to engage in peace talks with Russia A White House official said Trump is focused on reaching a peace deal to end the more than three-year war sparked by Russia’s all-out invasion of Ukraine, and wants Zelenskyy “committed” to that goal. The ofﬁcial added that the U.S. was “pausing and reviewing” its aid to “ensure that it is contributing to a solution.” The ofﬁcial spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the assistance.

The moment comes some ﬁve years after Trump held up congressionally authorized assistance to Ukraine in 2019 as he sought to pressure Zelenskyy to launch investigations into Joe Biden, then a Democratic presidential candidate. The moment led to Trump’s ﬁrst impeachment.

Trump in the lead-up to his 2024 election win vowed to quickly end the war in Ukraine He’s expressed increasing frustration with Zelenskyy over the war, while simultaneously expressing confidence that Russian President Vladimir Putin can be trusted to keep the peace if a truce in the conﬂict is reached.

Trump earlier on Monday slammed Zelenskyy for suggesting that the end of Russia’s war against Ukraine likely “is still very, very far away.”

The comments come as prominent Trump allies escalate pressure on Zelenskyy to dramatically change his approach to the

U.S. president, who has made quickly ending the war a top priority, or step aside.

The long complicated relationship between the leaders has reached a nadir following the disastrous White House meeting in which Trump and Vice President JD Vance excoriated Zelenskyy for not being sufficiently thankful for U.S. support for Ukraine since Putin ordered the February 2022 invasion.

“This is the worst statement that could have been made by Zelenskyy, and America will not put up with it for much longer!”

Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform about

the comments Zelenskyy made late Sunday while speaking to reporters in London.

Trump at an event at the White House later on Monday referred to Zelenskyy’s reported comments, and asserted the Ukrainian leader “better not be right about that.”

“If somebody doesn’t want to make a deal, I think that person won’t be around very long,” Trump added.

“That person will not be listened to very long.”

Trump took issue with Zelenskyy suggesting it would take time to come to an agreement to end the war The Ukrainian leader also tried to offer a positive

take on the U.S.-Ukraine relationship in the aftermath of last week’s White House meeting. Asked by a reporter about the outlines of a new European initiative to end Russia’s war, Zelenskyy said: “We are talking about the ﬁrst steps today, and, therefore, until they are on paper I would not like to talk about them in great detail.”

“An agreement to end the war is still very, very far away, and no one has started all these steps yet,” he added.

But Trump was only further irritated by Zelenskyy’s suggesting it will take time for the conﬂict to come to a close.

“It is what I was saying, this guy doesn’t want there to be Peace as long as he has America’s backing and, Europe, in the meeting they had with Zelenskyy stated flatly that they cannot do the job without the U.S — Probably not a great statement to have been made in terms of a show of strength against Russia,” Trump added in his post. “What are they thinking?” Zelenskyy took to social media soon after Trump’s latest criticism. He did not directly refer to Trump’s comments, but underscored that it “is very important that we try to make our diplomacy really substantive to end this war the soonest possible.”

President confirms tariffs will start Tuesday

25% duties will target goods from Mexico, Canada

BY JOSH BOAK, ZEKE MILLER and ROB GILLIES Associated Press

WASHINGTON President Donald Trump said Monday that 25% taxes on imports from Mexico and Canada would start Tuesday sparking renewed fears of a North American trade war that already showed signs of pushing up inﬂation and hindering growth.

“Tomorrow — tariffs 25% on Canada and 25% on Mexico. And that’ll start,” Trump told reporters in the Roosevelt Room. “They’re going to have to have a tariff.”

Mexico President Claudia Sheinbaum went into Monday waiting to see what Trump would say

“It’s a decision that depends on the United States government, on the United States president,” Sheinbaum said ahead of Trump’s statement. “So whatever his decision is, we will make our decisions and there is a plan, there is unity in Mexico.”

smuggling of the drug from Canada into the United States appears to be relatively modest. As late as Sunday, it remained unclear what choice Trump would make on tariff rates. Lutnick told Fox News Channel’s “Sunday Morning Futures” that the decision was “ﬂuid.”

ä Stocks drop sharply as economy worries build. PAGE 6A

Trump has said the tariffs are to force the two U.S. neighbors to step up their ﬁght against fentanyl trafﬁcking and stop illegal immigration. But Trump has also indicated that he wants to eliminate the Americas’ trade imbalances as well and push more factories to relocate in the United States.

His comments quickly rattled the U.S stock market, with the S&P 500

index down 2% in Monday afternoon trading. It’s a sign of the political and economic risks that Trump feels compelled to take, given the possibility of higher inﬂation and the possible demise of a decadeslong trade partnership with Mexico and Canada as the tariffs would go into effect at 12:01 a.m. Tuesday Yet the Trump administration remains conﬁdent that tariffs are the best choice to boost U.S. manufacturing and attract foreign investment. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said Monday that the computer chipmaker TSMC had expanded its investment in the United States because of the possibility of separate 25% tariffs.

In February, Trump put a 10% tariff on imports from China. He reemphasized Monday that the rate

would be doubling to 20% on Tuesday Trump provided a onemonth delay in February as both Mexico and Canada promised concessions.

But Trump said Monday that there was “no room left for Mexico or for Canada” to avoid the steep new tariffs, which were also set to tax Canadian energy products such as oil and electricity at a lower 10% rate.

“If Trump is imposing tariffs, we are ready,” said Canadian Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly “We are ready with $155 billion worth of tariffs and we’re ready with the ﬁrst tranche of tariffs, which is $30 billion.”

Joly said Canada has a very strong border plan and explained that to Trump administration ofﬁcials last week She said the diplomatic efforts are continuing. She spoke after Trump made his comments Tuesday

Pope suffers new breathing crises, is back on noninvasive ventilation

BY NICOLE WINFIELD Associated Press

ROME Pope Francis suffered two new acute respiratory crises Monday and was put back on noninvasive mechanical ventilation in another setback to his battle to ﬁght pneumonia, the Vatican said. Doctors extracted “copious” amounts of mucus from his lungs during two bronchoscopies, in which a camera-tipped tube was sent down into his airways with a sucker at the tip to suction out ﬂuid. The Vatican said the mucus was

his body’s reaction to the original pneumonia infection and not a new infection, given laboratory tests don’t indicate any new bacteria. Francis remained alert, oriented and cooperated with medical personnel. The prognosis remained guarded. Doctors didn’t say if he remained in stable condition, though they referred to the crises in the past tense, suggesting they were over The crises were a new setback in what has become a more than twoweek battle by the 88-year-

old pope, who has chronic lung disease and had part of one lung removed, to overcome a complex respiratory infection.

Dr John Coleman, a pulmonary critical care doctor at Northwestern Medicine in Chicago, said the episodes were more concerning than the last one on Friday, in which Francis had a coughing ﬁt, inhaled some vomit that needed to be extracted and then was put on the noninvasive mechanical ventilation for a day and then didn’t need it anymore.

Both countries have tried to show action in response to Trump’s concerns. Mexico sent 10,000 National Guard troops to their shared border to crack down on drug trafficking and illegal immigration Canada named a fentanyl czar, even though

“He’s sort of thinking about right now how exactly he wants to play it with Mexico and Canada,” Lutnick said. “And that is a ﬂuid situation. There are going to be tariffs on Tuesday on Mexico and Canada. Exactly what they are, we’re going to leave that for the president and his team to negotiate.”

ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE PHOTO By PAUL SANCyA

President Donald Trump said Monday that 25% tariffs on imports from Mexico and Canada would start Tuesday.

ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTO By BEN CURTIS

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, right, is greeted by President Donald Trump on Friday at the White House in Washington.

Courts weigh La. execution protocols release

Stay sought in Jessie Hoffman’s scheduled March 18 death

BY MEGHAN FRIEDMANN and JOHN SIMERMAN Staff writers

A court battle is gearing up over whether Louisiana’s nitrogen gas execution protocol is a public record as the federal courts weigh a case that could determine whether the state performs its ﬁrst execution using the method later this month.

Lawyers for Jessie Hoffman, who is scheduled to be executed on March 18, have asked U.S. District Judge Shelly Dick of Louisiana’s Middle District to unseal the state’s execution protocol so that the public can see it. Hoffman is also seeking a stay of execution

“This is a public record under the Public Records Act,” said Cecelia Kappel, an attorney for Hoffman.

“It is created by a public body, the Department of Corrections. And it relates to the most solemn government action that the government can take, which is to take somebody’s life.”

“That document should be subject to public scrutiny,” she added. Hoffman’s attorneys have been allowed to review an unredacted version of the execution protocol, Kappel said, adding that she is not allowed to share it or comment on it. Dick, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, issued an order last week that instructed Louisiana’s Department of Public Safety & Corrections to ﬁle a redacted execution protocol under court seal into the court record. She also said Hoffman’s attorneys could ﬁle a motion asking that the protocol be unsealed

The state recently denied a public records request for the protocol from The Advocate | The TimesPicayune, saying that state statute exempts it from release. And the state argued against Hoffman’s motion to unseal the protocol in court filings late Monday, saying that keeping the protocol secret ensures the safety of all involved in the execution, including Hoffman himself.

“It is no secret that the State’s use of nitrogen hypoxia is the sub-

Lawyers for Jessie Hoffman, who is scheduled to be executed on March 18, have asked the courts to unseal the state’s execution protocol so that the public can see it. Hoffman is also seeking a stay of execution.

ject of considerable and passionate debate within Louisiana and across the country,” the state’s filing states. “To avoid the ‘promotion of public scandal’ and ensure the State and its officials can carry out its duties safely and efficiently under the law, the protocol should thus remain sealed.”

Hoffman’s lawyers argue the protocol is a public record, despite a new law passed last year that added more secrecy to state executions.

That law provided for the “absolute conﬁdentiality of the identifying information of any person, business, organization, or other entity directly or indirectly involved in the execution of a death sentence within this state.”

It forbids, for example, the identification of manufacturers providing supplies for an execution.

It also gives any person identiﬁed as a participant in an execution the right to sue whomever disclosed the information.

Still, Hoffman’s team says the law does not exempt the entire protocol from public record. They wrote in court filings that it’s appropriate for the state to redact identities of people and entities listed in the new nitrogen gas protocol if they are exempted from the state Public Records Act.

“Otherwise, Mr. Hoffman requests that all other redactions be removed and that version of the protocol be unsealed so as to allow the public access to this public record,” the court ﬁling states.

Like Louisiana many states have laws protecting the identities of members of the execution team, according to the Death Penalty In-

formation Center A number, such as Arizona, Oklahoma and Mississippi, also protect the names of drug suppliers.

Alabama sets the stage

The only state to have successfully carried out an execution by gas in the modern era is Alabama, which has moved forward with those executions without courts standing in the way

Many expect Louisiana’s game plan to hew closely to that of Alabama, which has publicly released a redacted version of its protocol.

Failed legal challenges over whether Alabama could use nitrogen hypoxia to put inmates to death could also provide a hint as to whether Hoffman’s lawsuit will succeed.

Hoffman’s bid to avert a March 18 execution date includes a claim that his execution by nitrogen gas would violate the U.S. Constitution’s Eighth Amendment protections against cruel and unusual punishment. Dick will consider Hoffman’s request for a preliminary injunction at a hearing Friday Federal judges in Alabama have rejected similar arguments in allowing four executions to go forward by lethal gas since 2024. Witness accounts of those executions described prolonged anguish from what has been dubbed “conscious suffocation.”

In the most recent case, U.S. District Judge Emily Marks of Alabama’s Middle District chastised death row inmate Demetrius Frazier for delaying his legal challenge, and she rejected his plea to receive a sedative before

his gassing.

“A state’s administration of capital punishment, which remains constitutional subject to the Eighth Amendment’s protections, presumes the prospect of some pain,” wrote Marks, who was nominated to the federal bench by President Donald Trump.

Other pending actions

Hoffman sits on death row for the 1996 rape and execution-style killing of 28-year-old Mary “Molly” Elliott. He kidnapped her the night before Thanksgiving as she walked to her car in New Orleans after work, then took her to the Middle Pearl River in St. Tammany Parish. Hoffman raped and killed her, then left her body He was 18 at the time of the crime.

If his execution goes forward, Hoffman would be the first person put to death in Louisiana since 2010, when Gerald Bordelon volunteered.

Hoffman’s attorneys say he had a “transformation” during his time in prison and is respected by prison staff and fellow inmates alike. He is a devout Buddhist, according to his lawsuit. His attorneys last week applied for clemency

Hoffman has come up against the state before in another federal case that remains open. He and other death row inmates sued the state 12 years ago over its execution protocols. Dick also handled that case.

In 2022, then-Attorney General Jeff Landry asked Dick to dismiss the case as moot because of the state’s difficulty obtaining lethal injection drugs. Dick dismissed the case but allowed the plaintiffs to ask to reopen it if it again became relevant

Hoffman’s team moved to reopen the case last month after Landry, now governor, announced the state had a protocol in place for execution by nitrogen hypoxia. A St. Tammany judge signed Hoffman’s death warrant shortly afterward.

Dick then agreed to reopen Hoffman’s long-running case.

But at the behest of state Attorney General Liz Murrill, the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals stayed Dick’s decision to reopen the case. Murrill’s team also argued that Hoffman should not be allowed to proceed with reopening his old case while also litigating his new one.

Storms to threaten South

BY JEFF MARTIN and JACK BROOK Associated Press

Powerful storms with a threat of tornadoes are expected to punch through Louisiana and other parts of the South on Tuesday just as huge parades and costumed revelers are set to celebrate Mardi Gras in New Orleans and other southern cities. The alarming forecast will be one of the first big tests for the National Weather Service after hundreds of its forecasters were fired last week under President Donald Trump’s moves to slash the size of the federal government. Former employees say the firing of meteorologists who make crucial local forecasts across the U.S. could put lives at risk.

Multiple weather threats loom this week for the U.S., starting with dust storms that brought near-zero visibility to parts of New Mexico and west Texas, prompting the National Weather Service to issue Dust Storm Warnings, the agency said. “Widespread blowing dust,” was expected Tuesday, said the weather service ofﬁce covering Midland and Odessa, Texas. A strong weather system this week will bring “a threat of blizzard conditions, high winds ﬂash flooding, severe weather, dust storms, and critical to extreme fire weather conditions to the nation’s heartland,” the weather service said in an update Monday On Tuesday, twisters, damaging winds and large hail are all possible as a strong storm system moves across the nation’s midsection into Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi, the federal Storm Prediction Center warns. The bullseye is a zone designated at an enhanced risk of severe weather — an area stretching from east Texas to Alabama that’s home to more than 7 million people. The area under threat includes Baton Rouge; Shreveport; Jackson, Mississippi; and Mobile, Alabama.

STAFF FILE PHOTO By TED JACKSON

LUNDI GRAS

STAFF PHOTO By BRETT DUKE

A float is pulled through Kenner’s Rivertown during a Lundi Gras celebration on Monday

STAFF PHOTO By BRETT DUKE Argus XL Garrison Jordan and Queen Argus XL Sophie Elizabeth Chailland toast during the annual Lundi Gras celebration hosted by the city of Kenner on Monday

STAFF PHOTO By BRETT DUKE

Queen Zulu 2025 Kristen Bonds Mason and King Zulu 2025 Rodney P Mason Jr toast during the annual Lundi Gras celebration hosted by the city of Kenner on Monday

STAFF PHOTOS By CHRIS GRANGER

ABOVE AND BELOW: The Krewes of Red Beans, Dead Beans and Queer Beans cook up some fun as they parade through the Bywater and Marigny neighborhoods of New Orleans on Monday.

Al ‘Carnival Time’ Johnson rides with the Krewes of Red Beans, Dead Beans and Queer Beans during their Mardi Gras parade on Monday.

ABOVE: A crowd gathers to see the arrival of Zulu royalty at the 31st Annual Zulu Lundi Gras Festival at Woldenberg Park on Monday.

RIGHT: King Zulu 2025 Rodney P Mason Jr and Queen Zulu 2025

Kristen Bonds Mason arrive at Woldenberg Park on Monday.

STAFF PHOTOS By SOPHIA GERMER

movie as a kid in the 1990s.

In the animated ﬁlm, the young lion Simba claims the throne previously occupied by his late father Mufasa. Within Zulu, Mason inherited the legacy of his father, who lived long enough to see his son elected king, but not long enough to see him ride.

“My favorite segment of ‘The Lion King’ was when Mufasa passed and Simba becomes the king,” Mason said. “It’s the circle of life.

“The theme of my reign is the circle of life. Daddy joined the organization in 1979. I joined in 2006. I continued the legacy of our family by becoming King Zulu.”

From St. Aug to the throne

Rodney Paul Mason Sr spent 45 years in Zulu. A music therapist, real estate broker and church organist, he took immense pride in his involvement.

His children were indoctrinated early “Coming out the womb, you’re Zulu,” said his namesake, who served as a king’s page in 1994. “All I knew was Zulu.”

At St. Augustine High School, the junior Mason led the famed Marching 100’s trumpet section. At the time, the school still dispensed corporal punishment via paddle. That, Mason Jr said, imprinted the lesson that actions have consequences.

He also credits St. Aug for teaching him how to lead among peers, a skill that has served him well in Zulu. When he joined, membership was down following Hurricane Katrina The self-described workaholic fully committed, serving on 26 committees over the years. In 2018, he was elected “Mayor,” one of Zulu’s signature characters.

“To continue the legacy of the organization, you have to contribute in some form,” Mason Jr said. “You can’t outright be King Zulu; you can’t outright be a character or an ofﬁcer So let’s work our way up to that point.”

For a decade, he was a Zulu Tramp, one of the colorfully costumed pranksters

ARGUS

Continued from page 1A

Queen Argus XL Sophie Elizabeth Chailland. But inclement weather threw a wrench into Jefferson’s Fat Tuesday celebration, prompting officials to cancel all parades. Parish President Cynthia Lee Sheng said Monday she was working with Argus to ﬁnd an alternative parade date, but had not as of late in the day If and when Argus takes to the streets, its theme will be “Let the Games Begin” and the procession will feature more than 300 riders on 20 ﬂoats. Throws will include peacock plushies, Argus playing cards and coffee in biodegradable bags.

From UNC to Tulane Law

Jordan originally hails from Monroe, where he lived until the age of 10 when he and his family moved to Salisbury, North Carolina, population 36,000 He stayed in North Carolina for college, attending the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for his undergraduate degree.

Jordan moved to the New Orleans area to attend Tulane Law School in 1982. After graduating, he worked

who walk the parade route handing out coconuts and cutting up.

Is being a Tramp more fun than being king?

“Yes until you become king,” Mason Jr clarified.

“Once you become king, it’s a different feeling. It feels great to be king.”

A special nomination

To reach that plateau requires playing the long game.

“You don’t set yourself up to run for King Zulu the year before,” Mason Jr said. “You set yourself up the minute that you walk through the threshold

Cultivating relationships is key He takes pride in knowing all 800 Zulu members by name.

Nominations for king were made at a meeting on the ﬁrst Sunday in May Mason Jr initially wanted a previous king to nominate him. But the ex-king suggested he ask his own father, his “biggest king” and “biggest hero,” to do the honors.

“He put that in my head and I thought about it,” Mason Jr said. “Dad was getting sick. But he had that last willpower to stand up tall

for two years as an assistant district attorney under Harry Connick Sr. Pursuing law was a nobrainer for Jordan, whose father attended LSU Law School. He likened the courtroom to a sports arena, where his competitiveness could ﬂourish during trials.

After working for Connick, Jordan partnered at Macaluso and Jordan law ﬁrm based in Hammond and then worked in a private practice for himself. He joined Chehardy Sherman and Williams in 2018, specializing in criminal defense law; Lawrence Chehardy, a co-managing partner at the ﬁrm, captains the Argus parade.

Jordan joined the Krewe of Argus in 2020 after Brian Chehardy, a local wine purveyor and 2020 Argus king, recruited him. Jordan said he enjoys meeting new people in the parade’s family-oriented environment, where it feels “almost like a fraternity atmosphere.”

Jordan said he’s enjoyed serving as Argus’ king throughout the last year, namely at the Galaxy Ball and meeting with Zulu royalty on Lundi Gras. But the part he most enjoys Argus for is simple: to see children light up as he hands them throws on Mardi Gras.

“To me, Mardi Gras is re-

and say, ‘I, Rodney P. Mason

Sr 45-year member nominate my son, 18-year member Rodney P. Mason Jr.’ It was a blessing, something that you can never forget.”

Mason Jr and the two other King Zulu 2025 candidates “were friends before, we’re friends today But during that (election), we were competitive.”

During the campaign, Mason Jr gave out coasters, coffee mugs and business card holders. He hosted a Good Friday blowout featuring fellow trumpeter Kermit Rufﬁns.

“By me being a trumpet player, I kind of fell in love with him,” Mason Jr said. “I kept going to his Mother-inLaw Lounge to make sure he was gonna show up.”

Election day at Zulu headquarters is a big party The senior Mason was admitted to the hospital that day, but still texted his son to check on absentee ballot tallies.

When the ﬁnal results were announced, the king-elect texted his father: “‘Dad, I won King Zulu.’ That was huge to say that to him.”

Three weeks after the election, on June 18, Mason Sr died at age 82.

ally about the children and the smiles on their faces,” Jordan said.

Family first for Jordan

Family is a high priority for Jordan.

His son, Graham, died in 2017 from a fentanyl overdose while attending LSU. He was found unresponsive in his dorm after a night out at Bogie’s, a popular bar near campus.

The Jordans launched a memorial scholarship in their son’s name, awarded each year to a rising senior at St. Paul’s Catholic School in Covington, Graham’s alma mater The school’s lacrosse team, which their son co-captained, also gives his out jersey number, No. 17, to a senior player each year

“It’s something positive to raise awareness, because it’s still a problem in this country,” Jordan said.

Jordan and his wife also remain involved with their daughters’ school, St. Scholastica Academy, and their church St. Anselm Catholic Church in Madisonville.

If he’s not at his law ofﬁce, his church or his home, you may ﬁnd Jordan on his boat out on the Tchefuncte River

Argus was founded in 1972 and began choosing kings from its membership in 1985.

His son is thankful that his father previously rode on Randolph “Rudy” Davis’ king’s ﬂoat in 2022.

“That was one of the top five moments of my Zulu membership,” Mason Jr. said. “I knew at some point Dad would not be here. For my dad to ride the king ﬂoat, that was a cool honor.”

No other choice for queen

When it came time to se-

lect his queen, his choice was obvious. Kristen Bonds Mason is, in his words, “my wife, the love of my life, the sparkle in my eye, my shining star, my beautiful lady.”

A health physicist who inspects facilities licensed to handle radioactive material, she is also a Carnival enthusiast and dancer She’s a member of the Mystic Krewe of Femme Fatale, the Cherchez

La Femme Dance Krewe and the Sunkissed Femmes.

“I messed with her a little,” Mason Jr said. “I said, ‘With Zulu, we have a selection process. I have to ask the organization to relinquish that right for me to select my queen. You might not get selected.’”

But if he wanted to remain a resident of the couple’s Central City home, Mason Jr said with a smile, he “had no other choice but to select my wife as Queen Zulu.” When not performing kingly duties, Mason Jr works for the city’s Capital Projects Administration, which manages the design phase for new construction projects. “The mission is to make sure the citizens of New Orleans have the best facilities and infrastructure,” he said. He hopes to build Zulu’s infrastructure as well. He’d like the club to acquire a float den. With the recent purchase of 12 new floats, Zulu now owns 22. Being king at 39 means he may have many more years to serve Zulu.

“I would like to see us being stewards and pillars of the community Continually educating our community on what Zulu is and what Zulu stands for Continue the unique traditions that our forefathers started,” he said. “Those guys in 1909 would never imagine where we’d be at in 2025. I want to continue that.”

BUSINESS

BRIEFS FROM WIRE REPORTS

Taiwan chipmaker to expand manufacturing

Chip giant Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. plans to invest $100 billion in the United States, President Donald Trump said Monday, on top of $65 billion in investments the company had previously announced.

TSMC, the world’s biggest semiconductor manufacturer, produces chips for companies including Apple Intel and Nvidia. The company had already begun constructing three plants in Arizona after the Biden administration offered billions in subsidies. Its first factory in Arizona has started mass production of its 4-nanometer chips.

Trump, who appeared with TSMC’s chief executive ofﬁcer C.C. Wei at the White House, called it a “tremendous move” and “a matter of economic security.”

“Semiconductors are the backbone of the 21st-century economy And really, without the semiconductors, there is no economy,” the president said. “Powering everything from AI to automobiles to advanced manufacturing, we must be able to build the chips and semiconductors that we need right here in American factories with American skill and American labor.” Wei said the investment will be for three more chip manufacturing plants, along with two packaging facilities, in Arizona Treasury to end small-business rule

The U.S. Treasury Department announced it will not enforce a Biden-era smallbusiness rule intended to curb money laundering and shell company formation.

In a Sunday evening announcement, Treasury said in a news release that it will not impose penalties now or in the future if companies fail to register for the agency’s beneﬁcial ownership information database that was created during the Biden administration. Despite efforts by small businesses to undo the rule in the courts, it remains in effect.

On Sunday, President Donald Trump on his Truth Social media site praised the suspension of enforcement of the rule and said the database is “outrageous and invasive.” Supporters of the database raised alarm.

Ian Gary, executive director of the FACT Coalition, an advocacy group for transparency in government and business, said “with one tweet the Administration has contradicted 15 years of bipartisan work by Congress to end the scourge of anonymous shell companies – which are a favorite tool of our nation’s global adversaries and criminals including fentanyl trafﬁckers, money launderers, and tax cheats.”

In September 2022, the Treasury Department started rulemaking to create a database that would contain personal information on the owners of at least 32 million U.S. businesses as part of an effort to combat shell company formations and illicit ﬁnance.

Kroger CEO resigns following investigation

Kroger Chairman and CEO Rodney McMullen has resigned after an internal investigation into his personal conduct.

Kroger, the nation’s largest grocery chain, said Monday the investigation into McMullen’s conduct was unrelated to the business, but was found to be inconsistent with its business ethics policy

McMullen, 64, began his career with Kroger in 1978 as a part-time stock clerk and bagger at a store in Lexington, Kentucky He worked his way up through the company becoming chief financial officer in 1995 and chief operating officer in 2009. McMullen was named Kroger’s CEO in 2014 and became the company’s chairman the following year

Trump announces plan for ‘strategic reserve’

BY ALAN SUDERMAN Associated Press

Cryptocurrency prices briefly jumped after President Donald Trump’s surprise announcement he wants the U.S. government to purchase and hold a variety of digital assets in a strategic reserve fund, an announcement that highlights Trump’s growing attempts to use volatile cryptocurrency prices as a barometer of his public support.

Trump said on social media

Sunday that his administration is working toward creating a “Crypto Strategic Reserve” that will include lesser-known cryptocurrencies XRP, Solana, and Cardano. He

later followed up with another post saying his planned reserve would also include bitcoin and ether, the two most popular cryptocurrencies.

The announcement helped crypto prices enjoy a brief rebound after recent sell-offs.

Bitcoin shot up to about $95,000 after dipping below $80,000 last week. XRP, Solana and Cardano saw massive spikes in their prices after Trump’s announcement Sunday

But by Monday afternoon, prices had fallen roughly back to where they were before Trump’s announcement.

Advocates for the government holding a crypto reserve said it would help diversify government holdings and hedge against ﬁnancial risks. Critics say the volatility of cryptocurrencies makes them a poor choice as a reserve asset.

On the campaign trail, Trump

pledged support for a “strategic national bitcoin” stockpile, which would include bitcoin the U.S. government has previously seized in law enforcement actions Sunday’s announcement was the ﬁrst time he advocated for the government to hold other types of cryptocurrencies.

The inclusion of cryptocurrencies other than bitcoin is likely to face sustained pushback among some corners of the heavily divided cryptocurrency industry Bitcoin is the oldest and by far most popular cryptocurrency, and accounts for more than half of the world’s global crypto market cap.

Some of Trump’s major allies in the industry expressed surprise and some skepticism of Trump’s plan.

“Just bitcoin would probably be the best option simplest, and clear story as successor to gold,” said Brian Armstrong, the CEO of

the crypto exchange Coinbase.

The White House did not immediately provide additional details, including how much of each type of cryptocurrency Trump wanted the U.S. to hold, and how the government would acquire them, and whether he favored including other types of cryptocurrencies as well.

The president has cast himself as hero to the crypto industry, which he said in his announcement had been the target of “years of corrupt attacks by the Biden administration.”

The crypto industry felt unfairly targeted by the Biden administration and spent heavily to help Trump win the election. The ﬁrst several weeks of his administration have seen several moves to boost crypto, including ending or pausing high-proﬁle enforcement actions by the Securities and Exchange Commission.

BY STAN CHOE AP business writer

NEW YORK U.S stocks tumbled Monday and wiped out even more of their gains since President Donald Trump‘s election in November, after he said that tariffs announced earlier on Canada and Mexico would take effect within hours.

The S&P 500 dropped after Trump said there was “no room left” for negotiations that could lower the tariffs set to begin Tuesday for imports from Canada and Mexico. Trump had already delayed the tariffs once before to allow more time for talks Trump’s announcement dashed hopes on Wall Street that he would choose a less painful path for global trade, and it followed the latest warning signal on the U.S. economy’s strength. Monday’s loss shaved the S&P 500’s gain since Election Day down to just over 1% from a peak of more than 6%. That rally had been built largely on hopes for policies from Trump that would help strengthen the U.S. economy and businesses

The Dow Jones Industrial Average and the Nasdaq composite both slumped.

Monday’s slide punctuated a rocky couple of weeks for Wall Street. After the S&P 500 set a record last month following a parade of fatter-than-expected proﬁt reports from big U.S. companies, the market began diving following weaker-than-expected reports on the U.S. economy, including a couple showing U.S. households are getting much more pessimistic about inﬂation because of the threat of tariffs.

The latest such report arrived Monday on U.S. manufacturing. Overall activity is still growing, but not by quite as much as economists had forecast. Perhaps more discouragingly, manufacturers are seeing a contraction in new orders. Prices, meanwhile, rose amid discussions about who will pay for Trump’s tariffs.

BY JOSH BOAK Associated Press

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. Commerce

Secretary Howard Lutnick said government spending could be separated from gross domestic product reports in response to questions about whether the spending cuts pushed by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency could possibly cause an economic downturn.

“You know, that governments historically have messed with GDP,” Lutnick said on Fox News Channel’s “Sunday Morning Futures.” “They count government spending as part of GDP So I’m going to separate those two and make it transparent.”

Doing so could potentially complicate or distort a fundamental measure of the U.S. economy’s health. Government spending is traditionally included in the GDP because changes in taxes, spending, deﬁcits and regulations by the government can impact the path of overall growth. GDP reports already include extensive details

“Demand eased, production stabilized, and destafﬁng continued as panelists’ companies experience the ﬁrst operational shock of the new administration’s tariff policy,” said Timothy Fiore, chair of the Institute for Supply Management’s manufacturing business survey committee. The hope on Wall Street had been that Trump was using the threat of tariffs as a tool for negotiations and that he would ulti-

mately go through with potentially less damaging policies for the global economy and trade. But Trump’s going forward with the Mexican and Canadian tariffs hit a market that wasn’t certain about what would happen next.

The market’s recent slump has hit Nvidia and some other formerly high-ﬂying areas of the market particularly hard. They fell even more Monday, with Nvidia down 8.8% and Elon Musk’s Tesla down 2.8%.

the economy at large.

The commerce secretary’s remarks echoed Musk’s arguments made Friday on X that government spending doesn’t create value for the economy

“A more accurate measure of GDP would exclude government spending,” Musk wrote on his social media platform. “Otherwise, you can scale GDP artiﬁcially high by spending money on things that don’t make people’s lives better.”

The argument as articulated so far by Trump administration officials appears to play down the economic benefits created by Social Security payments, infrastructure spending, scientific research and other forms of government spending that can shape an economy’s trajectory

Bureau of Economic Analysis published its most recent GDP report on Thursday, showing that the economy grew at an annual rate of 2.3% in the ﬁnal three months of last year

on government spending, offering a level of transparency for economists. Musk’s efforts to downsize federal agencies could result in the layoffs of tens of thousands of federal workers, whose lost income could potentially reduce their spending, affecting businesses and

“If the government buys a tank, that’s GDP,” Lutnick said Sunday “But paying 1,000 people to think about buying a tank is not GDP That is wasted inefﬁciency, wasted money And cutting that, while it shows in GDP, we’re going to get rid of that.” The Commerce Department’s

The report makes it possible to measure the forces driving the economy, showing that the gains at the end of last year were largely driven by greater consumer spending and an upward revision to federal government spending related to defense. Still, the federal government’s component of the GDP report for all of 2024 increased at 2.6%, slightly lower than overall economic growth last year of 2.8%. In the GDP report, government spending accounts for almost oneﬁfth of people’s personal income, which totaled more than $24.6 trillion last year This includes Social Security payments, benefits for military veterans, Medicare and Medicaid and other programs. But the report also measures the amount of people’s

ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTO By SETH WENIG

U.S. stocks tumbled Monday and wiped out even more of their gains since President Donald Trump’s election in November, after he said that tariffs announced earlier on Canada and Mexico would take effect within hours

ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTO Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick

overnight and early Tuesday in hopes of avoiding doing so this year New Orleans Police Superintendent Anne Kirkpatrick made clear she would shut them down if needed for safety, even with many thousands of tourists in town for the party

The legions of other celebrants, from Mardi Gras Indians to the Society of St Anne walking krewe, will also have to adjust.

National Weather Service forecasters and police were cautioning over the potential for chairs, ladders, portable restrooms and other items to be blown by tropical stormforce winds. Tents and portable chairs were among items that were being banned, and ofﬁcials said it was essential that paradegoers remove them from sidewalks and neutral grounds.

It has all added to a chaotic start to 2025 that has repeatedly set New Orleans and the region on edge, beginning with the deadly Jan 1 Bourbon Street vehicle attack, then a record snowstorm a few weeks later Frantic preparations for the Super Bowl added to the whirlwind.

Now it’s Mardi Gras the most cherished of all the city’s unique rituals and central to its identity Throw us a break, mister Mardi Gras historian Arthur Hardy said he was concerned about the safety of riders and the public, noting the police could still pull the plug on Tuesday’s parades.

But he said New Orleanians will ﬁnd ways to mark the day “You won’t cancel Mardi Gras,” Hardy said. “You canceled parades in 1979 with the police strike. You canceled parades in COVID. But you didn’t cancel Mardi Gras. People celebrated in the streets and in other areas The Rex Ball will go on So it can be greatly affected, but it’s really incorrect to say it will be canceled.” Kirkpatrick said at an af-

ternoon news conference that paradegoers should be headed home early “At 11:30, you’re out of here,” she said. Portable restrooms must be secured, she said.

“Pee before you come to the parades,” said Kirkpatrick.

She said the weather forecast had created a limited stretch of time for the parades to safely roll — and it could grow smaller depending on changes in the forecast. She said she could call them off completely if the forecast worsens.

Jefferson Parish opted out completely President Cynthia Lee Sheng said the parish was working with the Krewe of Argus and the Krewe of Elks-Jeffersonians on an alternative date.

“These are not conditions where we would invite family, including the elderly and children, to stand in the street out in the open,” Lee Sheng said.

On the northshore, the Covington Lions, Mystic Krewe of Covington and Bogue Falaya parades which run in succession, will begin 45 minutes early at 9:15 a.m.

The parades, which annually draw thousands of spectators, are the largest in St. Tammany Parish on Fat Tuesday Smaller processions also announced changes.

New Orleans is used to hurricanes and ﬂooding, but Tuesday’s weather threat is somewhat outside the ordinary

A front sweeping Monday night and Tuesday through the central United States on Monday is bringing with it extremely high winds and thunderstorms, forecasters said. Winds of 15-20 mph could begin as early as 8 a.m., with gusts as high as 35 mph.

It will only worsen from there. By noon, sustained winds could be as high as 30 mph with frequent gusts of 40 or greater, National Weather Service forecasters said. The winds will pick up more speed throughout the afternoon, with gusts potentially reaching 60 mph.

That’s not all. Thunder-

storms with the potential for tornadoes and hail are forecast to whip through the Baton Rouge area between noon and 6 p.m., the New Orleans area between 2 p.m. and 8 p.m., and Plaquemines, St Bernard and the Mississippi Gulf Coast between 4 p.m. and 10 p.m.

Beyond taking care of the parade route, the weather service also urged residents to secure loose items at their homes.

“PLEASE Secure all loose items! Limit the usage of ladders and chairs that could be a hazard to others!” it said.

The only good news is that ﬂooding inland is not a serious concern, with less than an inch expected for most areas.

The potential for such severe weather though, should not be taken lightly Hardy has written of a disaster in 1970, when the Krewe of Carrollton was hit by a mini-tornado, resulting in death and injury Staff writer Doug MacCash contributed to this story

Float riders in the Krewe of Orpheus

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New Orleans & Co. sponsors musical

Performance will be a new way to market the city

BY STEPHANIE RIEGEL Staff writer

In its efforts to attract visitors to the Crescent City New Orleans & Company advertises on social media sites, sponsors major sporting events and hosts travel writers from around the world.

Now the city’s tourism marketing agency is trying a new way to reach a high-dollar audience: sponsoring a Broadway musical that debuts next month in the heart of the Big Apple’s theater district

Titled “Pirates! The Penzance Musical,” the play is a reimagining of Gilbert and Sullivan’s 19thcentury comic opera, “The Pirates of Penzance,” that is set in New Orleans and features jazz and bluesy adaptations of the popular classic’s musical numbers.

The play is a production of the Roundabout Theatre Company, which pitched New Orleans & Co on underwriting the performance last summer The nearly six-ﬁgure sponsorship promises to be a good return for a relatively modest spend, according to New Orleans & Co. senior adviser Mark Romig, who declined to provide the exact amount of the sponsorship but said it is less than $100,000.

“To advertise in New York is typically so expensive, it’s beyond our budget,” Romig said. “So, when they came to us, we thought it was an interesting way to reach a New York market in a relatively low-cost way.”

For Roundabout, the nation’s largest nonproﬁt theater company, the deal is beneﬁcial not only

ä See MUSICAL, page 2B

Developers’ suit heads to court

No settlement reached in Mandeville project deal

BY BOB WARREN Staff writer

Lawyers for the city of Mandeville and the developers of a proposed $150 million retailresidential development on Lake Pontchartrain have not been able to reach a settlement after the city shot down the Sucette Harbor proposal in 2023. So now it appears the developers’ lawsuit will move forward through the federal court system.

The developers, Woodward Harbor, sued the city after the Mandeville City Council in September 2023 unanimously voted to deny an ordinance that would have allowed Sucette to be built on 15 acres of land just east of the Causeway bridge. The suit sat quietly for months before U.S. District Judge Brandon Long on Jan. 31 ordered the sides to a settlement conference. That conference was held Feb. 24, but a court ﬁling says the parties were not able to negotiate a settlement.

page 2B

LIGHT UP THE NIGHT

ABOVE: The Krewe of Centurions parades down Veterans Boulevard in Metairie on Monday

LEFT: Riders toss throws to paradegoers.

Lundi Gras honors old, new traditions

Celebrations, toasting and more make way for Mardi Gras

BY ANTHONY McCAULEY Staff writer

Pat Campbell, lead singer of the Topcats, was belting out a version of “Tennessee Whiskey” from the Lundi Gras stage in Rivertown on Monday morning, as hundreds gathered along the 400 block of Williams Boulevard awaiting royalty from the krewes of Argus and Zulu to lead the small, familyfriendly parade.

The annual meeting between the Krewe of Argus and the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club in Kenner a localized version of the Meeting of the Courts,” has become a cherished tradition since it was first introduced 25 years ago, Kenner Mayor Michael Glaser said just before the procession began.

The tradition was initiated by Argus, a krewe established in 1972 by civic-minded Jefferson Parish business owners, and Zulu, founded in 1909 and well established as one of the biggest krewes in the city to “enrich the Mardi Gras experience for the community,” the mayor said.

Though the Kenner event was held in perfect early spring weather anxiety was in the air as storms were forecast to roll through the metro area on Tuesday and put a dampener on the big Mardi Gras parades that bring the season to its ﬁnale.

Already, Tuesday’s Jefferson Parish parades, in which the Krewe of Argus and their king and queen, J. “Garry” Jordan and Sophie Elizabeth Chailland, would

have rolled, had been postponed to an unspeciﬁed later date.

At the event in Kenner Zulu President Elroy James was on a conference call with Mayor LaToya Cantrell, who was considering what action to take for Tuesday’s Orleans Parish parades.

It was decided that Zulu and Rex, the two biggest parades on Fat Tuesday would roll earlier than scheduled but without marchers, bands or truck ﬂoats

because of the risk of damage from high winds, he relayed to the Kenner crowd.

A fatter Monday

Traditionally, Lundi Gras had been a quieter day leading up to the grand celebrations of Mardi Gras. It was used for ﬁnal preparations, informal gatherings and rest before Fat Tuesday But that has long since given way to a day rich with its own festivities, including the Proteus and Orpheus parades rolling Uptown in the early evening.

Zulu’s Lundi Gras Festival, a free event at Woldenberg Park along the Mississippi River, which ﬁrst started in 1993, drew crowds on Monday for its combination of music stages, food vendors, arts and crafts, and an opportunity to meet the characters of Zulu.

A small plane dragged a large sign for a personal injury attorney in the partly cloudy skies above the park, as the crowds began to swell midafternoon.

Terry Russell, who was running the Zulu Memorabilia stall at the festival, said business had been steady enough but he expected it to pick up later in the day “It’ll probably get a lot busier later when people start coming for the

ä See LUNDI, page 2B

Krewe of Thoth removes 2 members for throws

Decision comes after Confederate beads posted online

BY JONI HESS Staff writer

Two members have been removed from the all-male Krewe of Thoth for throwing beads emblazoned with Confederate ﬂags, the club’s leaders said Monday six years after removing another

member for a similar incident.

Thoth spokesperson Penny Larson, contacted Monday, said he removed a krewe member and the ﬂoat’s lieutenant for going against the krewe’s policies that prohibit riders from throwing any items that are sexual, politically oriented or offensive, he said.

“They’re

his friends were watching Sunday’s parade at the corner of St. Joseph Street and St Charles Avenue when a rider threw him the beads. Lambert, disgusted, threw the beads in the trash.

“We all made light of the situation because nobody wanted to ruin the Mardi Gras vibe,” he said. “But it was a weird situa-

tion.” Larson said although there’s policies prohibiting such incidents, it’s nearly impossible to monitor all 2,400 members’ throws on the front end.

“We’re

STAFF PHOTOS By JOHN McCUSKER

STAFF PHOTO By BRETT DUKE

From left, King Zulu 2025 Rodney P Mason Jr., Queen Zulu 2025

Kristen Bonds Mason, Queen Argus XL Sophie Elizabeth Chailland and Argus XL J. ‘Garry’ Jordan greet the crowd during

parade at the annual Lundi Gras celebration in Kenner on Monday.

meeting of Rex and Zulu royalty,” Russell said.

Rex, the King of Carnival, arrives by boat along the Mississippi River and meets with his Zulu counterpart at Spanish Plaza, a ceremony presided over by the mayor and marking the ofﬁcial start of Mardi Gras. It typically takes place around 6.30 p.m. on Lundi Gras.

While the arrival of Rex by boat has been a tradition since 1874 (revived in 1987), the formal Meeting of the Kings — where the monarchs of Rex and Zulu come together in a public ceremony — was established as part of the expanding Lundi Gras celebrations in 1999

This meeting is now a highly anticipated tradition, symbolizing the unity of different Mardi Gras traditions and celebrating the cultural diversity of New Orleans. Another even more recent Lundi Gras tradition also has been expanding and diversifying: the Krewe of Red Beans.

Founded by Devin De Wulf in 2009, the walking parade started as a small community-driven event celebrating New Orleans culture, creativity and tradition honoring the city’s classic Monday red beans and rice meal. Since its inception, the Krewe of Red Beans inspired several spinoff groups like the Dead Beans and Feijao (a Brazilian-inspired krewe).

This year, those spinoff

MUSICAL

Continued from page 1B

because it provides direct financial support but because New Orleans & Co is helping to promote the play

“We want people to come to New York and see and support Broadway, and New Orleans wants people to come to New Orleans and see the French Quarter,” said Lane Hosmer, development director for Roundabout Theatre Co. “So it’s a lovely organic partnership.”

Direct access to audience

New Orleans & Co. was founded in 1960 and is the ofﬁcial sales and marketing agency for the city Known as the New Orleans Convention and Visitors Bureau until it rebranded in 2018, the organization is funded mostly by public sources, including a local hotel occupancy tax and state appropriations, as well as grants and membership dues. In 2023, it had revenues of

SUIT

Continued from page 1B

Neither side would comment on the lawsuit. Meanwhile, a group of Mandeville residents and a conservation organization have filed a petition to intervene in the Sucette Harbor suit. In their filing Feb. 21, the residents and Orleans Audubon Society oppose the project, saying, among other things, that it will create environmental problems and generate more traffic problems in a neighborhood not designed to handle that many vehicles.

The group initially “want-

groups, which have grown to 14 in total, were all coming together and marching on a new, uniﬁed route.

“We’re all one big bean family, it’s Beanlandia!,” said Joy Nix, a member of Dead Beans, who was marching with her friend Rob Hall.

The bean folk and their krewes all share a common headquarters, Beanlandia at 3300 Royal Street, in the Faubourg Marigny/Bywater, where they held a party and fundraiser ahead of their 2 p.m. parade on Monday The Beanlandia community center premises are fully functional for the ﬁrst time this year, after upgrades to bathrooms and other facilities, Nix said. “It makes sense for us all

nearly $58 million and spent more than $12 million on advertising and marketing, according to an audit by the Louisiana Legislative Auditor

Those expenditures include ad campaigns in traditional media outlets like magazines and billboards and on social media platforms; sponsorships for events like Essence Fest, Sugar Bowl and Aspen Food & Wine; and hosting travel writers and social media inﬂuencers.

Underwriting a Broadway play is a new avenue that will give New Orleans & Co. direct access to an estimated 65,000 theatergoers during the musical’s initial three-month run from April 4 to June 22, Romig said Some of that access will come from the direct exposure theatergoers will have to New Orleans branding on the playbill and signage at the theater Mostly, however, it’s because New Orleans & Co. will raffle off a free trip to the Crescent City For a chance to win, theatergoers

ed a seat at the table during the settlement conference,” but also wants to make sure that its concerns are heard as the lawsuit moves through the courts, said Andrew Wilson, an attorney for the group The Sucette Harbor development was pitched to include apartments for people 55 and older, a hotel and event venue, retail shops and improved marina.

Woodward Harbor and the LSU Health Foundation, which owns part of the land, initially pushed a plan for 201 apartments and an 84-room hotel. That narrowly won the approval of Mandeville’s planning

will scan a QR code that will be displayed in the lobby of the theater New Orleans & Co. will then be able to capture the email addresses of those who enter the contest and market to them directly in the future.

“The theatergoer is a spender,” Romig said. “They use their funds to go to shows, to travel, so this is an audience that we want to reach.”

Natural synergy

Roundabout Theatre Company was founded in 1965 and counts among its board members such wellknown actors as Alec Baldwin and Matthew Broderick, according to its website. It produces familiar classics and lesser-known works at a variety of venues, including its flagship theater on West 42nd Street in Midtown Manhattan, where “Pirates!” will be performed.

New Orleans & Co. is the latest of several corporate and nonproﬁt sponsors that Roundabout has enlisted to help support its produc-

board, but ran into fierce opposition when it came to the City Council.

Opponents said it was too big, would create traffic headaches and was out of character with Mandeville.

Woodward reduced the footprint to 178 apartments, but when the council capped the number of apartments at 90, Woodward said the development couldn’t work ﬁnancially

The council in September 2023 unanimously voted to deny an ordinance allowing Sucette to move forward, prompting Woodward and LSU to ﬁle their lawsuit.

The Sucette Harbor suit is reminiscent of one

to march from our home and on this new unified route,” she said.

tions. Earlier this year, for instance, it secured a sponsorship with language app Duolingo for its performance of an award-winning play about the challenges of learning a new language called “English.”

Hosmer said New Orleans & Co. is a perfect ﬁt to sponsor “Pirates!” because so much of the musical is set in New Orleans. As reimagined by Rupert Holmes, the singer and songwriter best known for his 1978 hit “Escape (The Piña Colada Song),” the new “Pirates!” tells the story of a farcical Gilbert and Sullivan, who come to New Orleans to perform “The Pirates of Penzance.” They realize they do not have a cast so they recruit actual pirates from Lake Pontchartrain to be in the play

“It’s not your grandparents’ ‘Pirates of Penzance,’” Hosmer said. “But it’s a lot of fun and New Orleans is central to the theme.”

Email Stephanie Riegel at stephanie.riegel@ theadvocate.com.

ﬁled against the city after the council shot down the much larger Port Marigny residential-commercial development on a 78-acre plot near the Sucette land. A consent judgment in that suit opened the way for Port Marigny under a new ordinance, but the project was never built.

THOTH

Continued from page 1B

racism, having been carried by soldiers during the Civil War who were fighting for the perpetuation of “Negro slavery” as stated in the Confederate States Constitution. Confederate monuments and symbols were torn down around the country following the 2015 Charleston, South Carolina, church shooting when photos of attacker Dylann Roof surfaced of him posing with the Confederate ﬂag. Lambert said it’s a sym-

bol that contradicts with the values of freedom and diversity that’s at the heart of New Orleans culture.

“We talk about how open and accepting it is and the freedom you feel to be yourself here,” Lambert said. “Then, getting something racist literally and ﬁguratively thrown at you diminishes that sentiment.” In 2019, Thoth officials investigated an incident where someone threw blue and red beads featuring the word Rebel” in front of a Confederate ﬂag. That rider was removed from the krewe.

Last year in Kenner a rider from the Krewe of Isis

reportedly tossed beads displaying the ﬂag of the Confederacy with the words “Southern Pride.” Identical beads were thrown during the Cleopatra parade in 2022.

Email Joni Hess at joni hess@theadvocate.com.

LOTTERY SUNDAY, MARCH 2, 2025

PICK 3: 7-3-5

PICK 4: 2-8-0-7

PICK 5: 7-1-1-0-5 Unofficial notification, keep your tickets.

STAFF PHOTO By SOPHIA GERMER

The Zulu Tramps arrive at Woldenberg Park during Lundi Gras in New Orleans.

STAFF PHOTO By SOPHIA GERMER Crowds gather on Bourbon Street during Lundi Gras in New Orleans.

STAFF PHOTO By CHRIS GRANGER

The krewes of Red Beans Dead Beans and Queer Beans cook up some fun as they parade through the Bywater and Marigny neighborhoods of New Orleans on Monday.

STAFF PHOTO By CHRIS GRANGER

A Krewe of Red Beans patron sports a Taylor Swift bean jacket.

Bourne, Sheila

Crockett, Pearl

Jones, Linda

Merceron, Mary

Pesce, Janet

Saint Pierre Sr.,Allen

Tobin, Kenneth

Jones, Linda Zambrano de Mladenoff, Juana

Crockett, Pearl

Pesce, Janet

Merceron, Mary

Tobin, Kenneth

Bourne, Sheila

Saint Pierre Sr.,Allen

Bourne, Shelia Ann

With profound sadness, we announce the passing of Shelia Ann Bourne, a cherished mother, grand‐mother, sister, and friend, who departed to be with the Lord on February 23, 2025, at the age of 61. Born on January 12, 1964, in New Orleans LA Shelia was a dedicated clerk at Chil‐dren's Hospital and a beloved member of her community. Her unwaver‐ing faith and deep love for Jesus Christ were evident in all aspects of her life guiding her relationships and inspiring those around her. As a devoted mother, Shelia raised her daugh‐ters and granddaughters with love and kindness, in‐stilling in them the values of compassion, honesty, and faith Her unwavering support and gentle spirit will be greatly missed by her family and friends Shelia was an active mem‐ber of Rock of Ages Baptist Church where she partici‐pated in all church activi‐ties, was a dedicated member of the Praise Team, and volunteered wherever she was needed She found joy in serving others and was a source of encouragement and com‐fort to many She is sur‐vived by her two daugh‐ters, Nykia Jonte' Washing‐ton and Tyiese Kimora Har‐ris; three granddaughters, Na'Jai A Triplett, Erin S. Roberts, and Sa'Naa F. William; one brother Ray‐mond Bourne; and a host of nieces, nephews cousins, friends, and ex‐tended family who loved her dearly A Celebration of Life for Shelia Ann Bourne will be held on Thursday, March 6, 2025, at 10:00 AM at Rock of Ages Baptist Church, 2515 Franklin Ave, New Orleans LA 70117. Vis‐itation will begin at 9:00 AM with the Funeral Ser‐vice starting at 10:00 AM. Professional Arrangements Entrusted to Majestic Mor‐tuary Service, Inc (504) 523-5872.

On July 9, 1948, in New Orleans Louisiana, a beau‐tiful soul entered the world. Evangelist Pearl Crockett, daughter of the late Alvin Crockett and Shirley Collins Farrar, was a woman of faith, strength, and unwavering devotion From an early age, her life was a reﬂection of God’s love, and she carried that light with her wherever she went. She dedicated her career to serving the city of New Orleans working at Charity Hospital for 20 years before transitioning into private consulting In recognition of her extraor‐dinary service, Pearl was honored with the A Special Day of Honor proclamation by Mayor Ray Nagin of New Orleans Sis. Crockett leaves to forever cherish her precious memories: one (1) devoted son Steven (Lisa) Frederick IV; one (1) granddaughter Raven Fred‐erick three (3) God chil‐dren; Germaine Thomas, Gloria Calloway and Jarie Thomas Two (2) aunts, Rita Lazard of Marrero, Louisiana and Margarite Banks of New Orleans, Louisiana, one (1) uncle Leonard Banks of New Or‐leans, Louisiana and hosts of cousins, other relatives and friends. She is pre‐ceded in death by her par‐ents Shirley Farrar Collins and Alvin Crockett, grand‐parents Maternal Vera Far‐rar and Paternal uncles (4) brothers Earl “BoBo” and Solomon and Louis Farrar and James Banks; two (2) aunts, Janice Banks Moody and Geraldine Banks Ask‐ins. Relatives and friends of the family also Pastors Ofﬁcers and members of Israelite Baptist Church as well as surrounding churches are all invited to attend Evangelist Crock‐ett's HomeGoing Celebra‐tion on Wednesday, March 5, 2025 at 10:00 am at Is‐raelite Baptist Church, 2100 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., New Orleans LA 70113. In‐terment will follow at Prov‐idence Memorial Park, 8200 Airline Hwy Visitation will begin at 9:00 am in the above-named church To leave condolences, please visit https://www dennism ortuaryservice.com/ obituary/evangelist-pearlcrockett

Jones, Linda McCullough

and son, Perret de‐Lapouyade. She is also sur‐vived by six grandchildren: Courtni, Jade, Andee, Alexa, Cole, Aubri; and eight great grandchildren. She will be laid to rest on Wednesday, March 5, 2025 at the Garden of Memories Cemetery, 4900 Airline Drive Metairie LA 70001 with a Graveside Service at 2:30 pm. While no longer with us, we take comfort in knowing she is now rejoic‐ing in His presence In lieu of ﬂowers the family re‐quests that donations be made in Linda’s honor to the Livestrong Foundation, a non proﬁt organization dedicated to helping indi‐viduals by providing vari‐ous personalized support services to Those navigat‐ing the ravages of cancer, at www livestrong org. On‐line condolences may be offered at www gardeno fmemoriesmetairie.com

Merceron,Mary Drury

Mary Drury Merceron passed away on February 28, 2025, at theage of 86. She is survived by her husband of 66 years, Dale Anthony Merceron. She was devoted to her family and leaves sons Brian Michael and Van Steven, the late Dean Lester, and her grandson, Jordan Taylor Merceron.

Mary was thedaughter of the late Henry Robert Drury and Marie Louise Begue.

She is also survived by her sisters, Shirley Eagan and Catherine Paternostro her brothers Edward, Michael and Dann Drury and the late Henry Drury, Jr., and 10 nieces and nephews.

Mary was employed by the Department of Energy, Strategic Petroleum Reserve for 28 years, retiring in 2017.

Prior to her outside employment Mary established afine dressmaking business and made wedding and ball gowns. Her interest in art included many modes and she produced clothing, jewelry, ceramics and unique décor.

Mary enjoyed traveling to Europenumerous times after retirement.She participated in water aerobics at the Heritage Ochsner Fitness Center and spent time volunteering for Friends of CityPark. She also volunteered for the Jefferson Parish Recreation Department and the New Orleans Track Club at local race events and donated monthly to Covenant House and Tunnels to Towers. She raised and cared for13 dogs over the years at home.

Linda McCullough Jones a resident of Mandeville, LA, passed away in her home on Thursday, Febru‐ary 27, 2025 after a year long battle with lung can‐cer. Linda was a woman of unwavering faith a de‐voted mother and Real Es‐tate broker of over 40 years. Her love for Jesus Christ was the foundation of her life, guiding her every step and shaping the way she loved and cared for others. Linda’s faith was not just something she believed in, it was something she lived A de‐vout Christian, she dedi‐cated herself to worship and found profound joy in spiritual dance, using movement as a form of worship to the Lord She carried the light of Christ in her heart and shared it generously with everyone she encountered. Her love for helping others ex‐tended into her real estate practice where she not only built a successful business but also formed meaningful relationships and impacted the lives of those with whom she worked Linda’s kindness, wisdom and unwavering trust in God made her a source of strength and en‐couragement to all who knew her. Linda was pre‐ceded in death by her par‐ents, John Andrew McCul‐lough and Norma Turnage McCullough, and one sis‐ter, Gail McCullough StCyr She is survived by her daughters, Shelley de‐Lapouyade Beaubouef (Alvin) and Lynelle de‐Lapouyade Brooks (Bob) and son, Perret de‐Lapouyade. She is also sur‐vived by six grandchildren: Courtni, Jade, Andee, Alexa, Cole, Aubri; and eight great grandchildren. She will be laid to rest on Wednesday, March 5, 2025

Friends and family are invited to services on Thursday, March 6, 2025, at Lake Lawn Metairie Funeral Home, 5100 Pontchartrain Blvd New Orleans, LA.Visitation is from 10:00AM to 12:00PM with Mass following at 12:00PM. Burial will follow in Lake Lawn Park Mausoleum.

Janet Crumhorn Pesce passed away peacefully on February 23, 2025, after liv‐ing a courageous life Her perseverance through so many obstacles, the inspi‐ration she was to so many people, and the kindness and love she exuded will never be surpassed. She is survived by her loving hus‐band of 53 years George (Jerry), sons Doug (Kim) and Stephen (Lynne), six grandchildren Alaric, Alli‐son Annie, Will, Rosie and Emily, brother David Crumhorn (Teresa), and numerous nieces, nephews, and cousins She was preceded in death by her parents Claire Mouras Crumhorn and William T Crumhorn, and grand‐daughter Teresa (Tess) Janet was a 1966 graduate of Ursuline Academy where she was a member of the National Honor Soci‐ety, Student Council, De‐bate Team, and the Queen’s Players. She was an accomplished pianist

Janet was a 1966 graduate of Ursuline Academy where she was a member of the National Honor Soci‐ety, Student Council, De‐bate Team, and the Queen’s Players. She was an accomplished pianist and also studied French at Laval University in Quebec in the summer of 1969. She graduated from St. Mary’s Dominican College with a degree in Elementary Edu‐cation. While in college she was a member of the Car‐dinal Honor Society; Delta Epsilon Sigma, National Honor Society; Kappa Delta Pi National Education Honor Society; Kappa Delta Phi, and was named “Who’s Who Among Stu‐dents in American Univer‐sities and Colleges.” Upon graduation in 1970, she re‐ceived the Mother Mary de Ricci Hutchinson Award given to the senior who best exemplified the ideals of the College. In 1989 she was awarded the Domini‐can Torchbearer Award for her life of faith and service. Janet’s career of faith and service began as a much loved first grade teacher at St Philip Neri School and in 1971 she married fellow teacher Jerry Pesce She and Jerry have two sons, Doug and Stephen and six grandchildren. Janet lost her eyesight in 1980 due to complications from child‐hood diabetes. Determined that her children would have a normal home life and childhood she faith‐fully attended all of their swim meets and basketball games and was active at Jesuit High School and St. Philip Neri where she was awarded Woman of the Year 1985-86. Since she could not return to the classroom she decided to pursue teaching others how to live full lives de‐spite their visual disabili‐ties She taught daily living skills at The Lighthouse for the Blind, Jefferson Recre‐ation Department adult classes, and local Assisted Living Residences Janet continued to volunteer in elementary schools, teach‐ing young students how vi‐sually impaired people do things differently, and how to respect and help some‐one who is disabled. In 2014 Janet was the com‐mencement speaker for Ur‐suline’s High School Gradu‐ation Class. She told the class, “Ursuline has pre‐pared you for whatever life presents.” Janet was very active in her parish serving on the Pastoral Council for several years and singing in the choir for over 25 years. In 2020 Janet re‐ceived the Order of St Louis medal from the Arch‐diocese in recognition of her long standing service to the local Church Janet also served on the board of the Archdiocese Commis‐sion for Persons with Dis‐abilities. Janet initiated Masses throughout the Archdiocese in which dis‐abled participants served as hospitality ministers, lectors gift bearers, Eu‐charistic ministers, and cantors In 2009 Janet was cited by the Louisiana House of Representatives as a role model for the vi‐sually impaired and others. In 2014, she was the recipi‐ent of The Daughters of the American Revolution Com‐munity Service Award Janet lived her whole life with meaning and met all of her many challenges with courage persever‐ance and dignity, but most of all with trust and an un‐shakable Faith in her God The family would like to thank all of the doctors who took such good care of Janet through the years Additionally, they would like to thank the doctors nurses, and staff at Ochsner Hospital and Hos‐pice for all of the care and compassion given to Janet and her family during these past weeks. A Visita‐tion will be held on Mon‐day, March 3 2025, at St Philip Neri, 6500 Kawanee Avenue, Metairie, LA 70003 from 11am-1pm, with a fu‐neral Mass beginning at 1pm, and interment there‐after at Greenwood Ceme‐tery 5190 Canal Boulevard New Orleans, LA 70124. In lieu of flowers Masses are preferred

St. Pierre Sr., Allen Joseph

heavenly father on Friday, February 28, 2025 at the age of 95. He was born in Paulina, LA and was a longtime resident of Garyville, LA, where he spent his life caring for his family and friends and the community he called home He gradu‐ated from Leon Godchaux High School in 1948 where he excelled on the basket‐ball court Early in life he was a skilled carpenter by trade while working with his father After being drafted in 1951 at the age of 21, he served his country with honor in the United States Army during the Ko‐rean War from May, 1951 through April, 1953. He started as a construction supervisor and left ranked Corporal Upon completing his military service, he met and later married Audrey Millet in 1954. Allen worked at Shell Oil Refinery in Norco as a welder and re‐tired in 1987 after 33 and a half years while also serv‐ing during some of that time as the Union Presi‐dent He was a very active volunteer in Garyville and other areas of St. John the Baptist Parish. He was elected to the St. John the Baptist Parish Council in 1984 and served many years. He was widely well respected for his integrity, knowledge, expertise, ded‐ication and warm interac‐tions. He served on the Board of Commissioners of the Pontchartrain Levee District from December, 2008 through December, 2024 representing the resi‐dents of St John the Baptist Parish and surrounding parishes Allen was a dedi‐cated and longtime active parishioner and volunteer of St. Hubert Catholic Church where he received the Order of St. Louis Medallion on May 6, 2018 in recognition of his leader‐ship and dedicated service to the church, the parish and throughout the Arch‐diocese of New Orleans He is a member of the Ameri‐can Legion Louisiana Post 0383 serving 37 continuous years, an Honorary mem‐ber of the Knights of Columbus, a Life Member of the Korean War Veterans Association, a Past Com‐manders Club Supporter of the Veterans of Foreign Wars and a Life Member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars since January 1962, having represented Garyville Post 8167, Lutcher Post 5852 and a Member-at-Large for Louisiana. Allen was stead‐fastly and fiercely support‐ive of his fellow citizens during all of his many du‐ties and responsibilities in his various roles, and he was a beloved figure in the community. His greatest passions in life were his family, friends, cooking, dancing and gardening He loved mowing his lawn and working in his yard so much that he had the most manicured yard in town. He never met a stranger and had more friends than you can imagine Allen was the last surviving child of the late Clement Joseph St Pierre and Maria St. Cyr St. Pierre He was also pre‐ceded in death by his lov‐ing wife of 61 beautiful years, Audrey Millet St. Pierre; son, Darren St. Pierre; great-granddaugh‐ter, Macilynn Clement; brothers, Earl, Lois, Elzey Wallace and Leroy St. Pierre; sister, Dolores St Pierre James and numer‐ous nieces and nephews He is survived by his daughters Darlene Vest, Kathleen (Randy) Clement and Suzanne (Joseph) Quinlan son, Allen “A.J.” (Coy) St Pierre, Jr., his grandchildren, step-grand‐children, greatgrandchil‐dren and step-great-grand‐children who affection‐ately call him “PawPaw Allen” and many nieces and nephews. Of all of Allen’s many wonderful personal qualities, one of his greatest attributes was his love and meticulous care for his family His chil‐dren and grandchildren were of extreme impor‐tance to him and he never wavered at the opportunity to help each of them He was a man of integrity, strong faith in God and he had a huge heart. He will be sorely missed by his family and friends and his legacy of compassion, leadership and love will live on in the hearts of all who had the privilege of knowing him Family and friends are warmly invited to gather on Thursday, March 6, 2025 at St. Hubert Catholic Church, 176 An‐thony Monica St., Garyville, LA to honor and celebrate

Kenneth Campbell Tobin died at home, peacefully in the arms of his beloved wife, Poppy Tooker, surrounded by loving family on the 28th of February following abrief valiant battle with ALS. Ken, KennyorKTashe was knownwas anative New Orleanian, born to John PaulTobin andAdele Heaton Tobin on April 17, 1950. His mother, Adele imparted alove for nature in him that continued throughouthis life. Most at home in the wilderness, Kenny was an avid outdoor sportsman who loved hunting andfishing -especially with his lifelong, best friend KenForet. Kenny was anatural salesman whose career began with the Rubenstein Brothers' All American Jeans. He truly exceeded at radio sales, first in New Orleans at B97 before moving on to larger markets in Miami and Dallas. Kenny loved travel and had friends all over the globe. He truly loved unconditionally and always impressed upon his children theimportance of saying goodbye to loved ones. Kenny is survived by his loving wife,Poppy Tooker, his son Kelvin Campbell Tobin (Felicia Bates), daughter, Charlotte Alice Tobin andstepdaughter, Maddy Minter Mouledoux (Lance Fitzhenry). The family would like to thank Denisela DumesmeGilmore, Jenni Doiron, Dr. Stephen Kantrow,MD., hospice nurse Angie Trobaugh, PaulVarisco and the Team Gleason crew especially Liz Chapauton. In lieu of flowers, please contribute to the Gleason Foundation. Family and friends are invited to celebrate Kenneth's life on Wednesday, March 5, 2025, at 1:30pm in front of the family tomb in Metairie Cemetery, 5100 Pontchartrain Blvd., New Orleans.

passed on to our heavenly father on Friday, February 28, 2025 at the age of 95. He was born in Paulina, LA and was a longtime resident of Garyville, LA, where he spent his life caring for his family and friends and the community

Zambrano de Mladenoff, Juana

Pesce, Janet Crumhorn

Tobin, Kenneth Campbell

OUR VIEWS

Mardi Gras defies restraint; it can be no other way

Editor’s note: This editorial, slightly modiﬁed, has appeared during previous Carnival seasons in this newspaper

If Mardi Gras is so great, one might ask as another Fat Tuesday arrives today then why hasn’t it been copied across the land?

Maybe it’s because any effort to duplicate Mardi Gras beyond Louisiana would surely lead to efforts to improve it, making it into something no one would recognize.

The charm of Mardi Gras — and its maddening complication — is its monstrous inefficiency. The parades are longer than any prudent planner would make them. The distribution of beads and other trinkets is random, excessive, profligate — in short, a reveler’s rebuke to any student of logistics. As for the Mardi Gras diet king cakes, cocktails, gumbo and goodnessknows-what-else — suffice it to say that it’s a running revolt against restraint.

One can only imagine how a prudent reformer might reﬁne Mardi Gras if it were attempted in some saner city like Portland, Oregon, say, or Peoria, Illinois. The parades would be shorter, no doubt, more punctual, with an eye toward keeping everyone on schedule. Transplanted to tamer places, a Mardi Gras menu might replace king cake with bran mufﬁns, bourbon with herbal tea, gumbo with tofu.

But the magic of Mardi Gras — the one we know and love is that it transcends the mean arithmetic of means and ends, the arid geometry of the straight line, the grim insistence that hard fact is somehow invariably better than heady fantasy

Yes, Mardi Gras is too much too much noise, too much food, too much togetherness. But like all holidays, it makes a meaning from its heedless plenitude.

Whether it’s the over-the-top feast of Thanksgiving or the overdone celebration of Christmas, most of our holidays indulge excess as a civic creed. It’s our way of afﬁrming abundance our simple faith that life’s fortune, even spent generously, bears the seeds of its own renewal.

Mardi Gras arrives at just the right time each year — after the merriment of yuletide has passed, and a weary world needs a bridge between the cheer of Christmas and the promise of Easter

Though we hesitate to count more than the number of beads we collect each year, we know that the economic impact of Mardi Gras has been put at hundreds of millions for the city of New Orleans alone. We know that celebrations statewide attract millions more to cities and towns around the state.

But Mardi Gras isn’t solely about money Part of the joy for Louisianans is sharing the good times, and they are always good times, with our friends from around the world

So let the good times roll, and Happy Mardi Gras to all

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR ARE WELCOME. HERE ARE OUR GUIDELINES: Letters are published identifying name, occupation and/or title and the writer’s city of residence The Advocate | The Times-Picayune require a street address and phone number for verification purposes, but that information is not published. Letters are not to exceed 300 words. Letters to the Editor,The Advocate, P.O Box 588, Baton Rouge, LA 70821-0588, or email letters@ theadvocate.com.

YOUR VIEWS

Officials are complicit in allowing government

I don’t even know where to begin to describe my distress over how President Donald Trump and his high-ranking appointees have unleashed their nonsense, cruelty and chaos upon the federal government, the American public and the world over the past few weeks.

At the outset, I was absolutely horriﬁed at Trump’s pardons of the Jan. 6 criminals.

My parents both served in World War II, and I know what the U.S. and its allies were faced with and what they accomplished in defeating Hitler and the Axis powers. Even before Trump won the 2024 presidential election, I knew he was capable of repeating Hitler’s reign of terror here in the United States.

I see those pardons as igniting this objective. Republican elected ofﬁcials

chaos

who supported these pardons have forgotten whom they serve. The actions of the Trump administration thus far have been one lit match after another, continuing to push the United States toward that hell.

I have watched our Louisiana (and many other) Republican elected ofﬁcials condone and enable this trajectory, through their actions and inaction, for years. My hope lies with elected ofﬁcials, both Democrat and Republican, who are willing to work from within government to stand up to this frightening onslaught of irresponsible and dangerous governance, and with American voters to elect individuals of good character and integrity who will defend the Constitution and govern seriously and responsibly LIA THOMPSON Prairieville

Cuts to federal workforce a long time coming

The task of cutting government spending is painful and disruptive but necessary In 2024, the U.S. government spent $6.75 trillion, but revenues were only $4.9 trillion, resulting in a deﬁcit of around $1.8 trillion. Present U.S. taxpayers refuse to pay enough taxes for all of the junk programs, but the government has been unable to say no to the programs’ recipients choosing to borrow and have later, even unborn, generations pay for the trash for which their ancestors

refused to pay If the programs are good enough, shouldn’t we pay as we go?

After President Donald Trump’s purging has been completed, the citizens can decide whether or not they want to go further and trim the untouchable entitlements in a further attempt to balance the budget or whether they want to impose further taxes on themselves.

SIDNEY MARCHAND Donaldsonville

Carnival should be about more than consumption

My daughter and I recently had the extraordinary privilege of visiting the city of Pontevedra in Spain. We were struck by many similarities with New Orleans, including the oldstyle Spanish architecture, the Catholic inﬂuence, the emphasis on seafood in the local cuisine, the magnolias and oaks and a vibrant Carnival tradition. We met many wonderful people on this trip, including one man who became a sort of spiritual guide to the region. He told us that many ancient practices are preserved in the Carnival celebrations of Galicia and the Basque country He regards Carnival as a celebration of nature, citing Carnival characters who dance and make noise to wake Mother Earth from her winter sleep. Similar characters are still alive in other parts of northern Spain, and also in Sardinia, Slovenia and Bulgaria, to name a few I confessed these roots can be hard to see in New Orleans. Much of our attention is diverted to gaudy displays of conspicuous consumption. Sustainable throws are great but not nearly enough. My friend in Spain says that given our current ecological crisis, perhaps it’s time to reverse Carnival’s wake-up call. Maybe it’s time to listen to the cries of Earth and wake up humanity BART EVERSON New Orleans

If Ten Commandments are important, why reinstitute death penalty?

TO SEND US A LETTER, SCAN HERE

It was with bewilderment that I read an article in the Feb. 7 edition, where it was reported that our attorney general is arguing that our state should continue to retain prisoners beyond the end of their sentence. I often ﬁnd myself in disagreement with the leaders of our state, but I can at least follow their logic. In this instance, however, I am at a loss. Not only is it unconstitutional and morally wrong to continue such a practice, but practically it incurs an unnecessary cost to the taxpayers. I assume the attorney general has some reason for her opposition, and I call on her to explain why she would spend state time and money in supporting rather than correcting the problem of keeping people locked up after they have served their time DONNA WAKEMAN New Orleans

Our political leaders have made a big issue of the importance of putting the Ten Commandments in every classroom, presumably to inﬂuence our children to have Christian values.

I read recently that they now want to reinstitute the death penalty Does anyone else see the hypocrisy of this? Do our leaders believe Christian values are only appropriate for children, or was posting the Ten Commandments just a political ploy all along just to appear to support Christian values?

RON PERRITT Baton Rouge

New Orleans Forecast

Zambrano de Mladenoff, Juana Francisca

ries tidy, and on occasion, would take her children along to help. Her hard work and dedication en‐sured a promising future for her children. Juana in‐stilled in all of us the direc‐tive to care for each other and to pay forward all blessings received Her positivity and inﬂuence ra‐diated beyond her immedi‐ate family and toward everyone that came into her sphere of inﬂuence

Zambrano de Mladenoff, Juana Francisca

Juana Francisca Zam‐brano de Mladenoff, passed away on Thursday February 27, 2025, at her home in New Orleans at the age of 88. She was sur‐rounded by her family and loved ones. Juana was born in the town of Pe‐spire, Departmento de Choluteca Honduras C.A to the late Bruna and Epi‐fanio Zambrano She was preceded in death by her beloved husband, Carlos Mladenoff, Sr. her son, Mi‐jahel Mladenoff, and daughter-in-law, Linda Si‐lessi-Mladenoff. She is sur‐vived by her children: Car‐los Mladenoff, Jr. (Carin), Marcio Mladenoff, Sr (Mary Ann), Alba Mlade‐noff, Maricenka Mladenoff (David), Reveca Mladenoff, Araly Mladenoff, and Yuri Mladenoff. She was the adoring and doting grand‐mother to Nicholas Mlade‐noff, Carlos Mladenoff III, Marcio Mladenoff, Jr. Sab‐rina Mladenoff and Sasha Mladenoff. Juana immi‐grated to New Orleans, LA in 1958. She attended L.E Raboiun High School simul‐taneously serving as a nanny to the Consulado General de Honduras in New Orleans. During that time, she met the love of her life, Carlos Mladenoff Sr., and built their family of eight children Juana was a devout Catholic and ser‐vant of the Lord. In this order, she considered Faith, Family, Friends and Food (the four major F’s) as the quintessential ingre‐dients for life! Juana was adamant about her chil‐dren having a solid educa‐tional foundation. She and her husband made many sacrifices to provide their children with a Catholic education. Although Eng‐lish was not her first lan‐guage, she was actively in‐volved in the PTA, humbly volunteered to keep the St Alphonsus and St Mary’s Assumption parish recto‐ries tidy, and on occasion, would take her children along to help Her hard work and dedication en‐sured a promising future for her children Juana in‐stilled in all of us the direc‐tive to care for each other and to pay forward all blessings received Her positivity and influence ra‐diated be ond her immedi‐

Juana Francisca Zam‐brano de Mladenoff, passed away on Thursday, February 27, 2025, at her home in New Orleans at the age of 88. She was sur‐rounded by her family and loved ones Juana was born in the town of Pe‐spire, Departmento de Choluteca, Honduras C.A to the late Bruna and Epi‐fanio Zambrano She was preceded in death by her beloved husband, Carlos Mladenoff, Sr., her son, Mi‐jahel Mladenoff, and daughter-in-law, Linda Si‐lessi-Mladenoff. She is sur‐vived by her children: Car‐los Mladenoff, Jr. (Carin) Marcio Mladenoff, Sr. (Mary Ann), Alba Mlade‐noff, Maricenka Mladenoff (David), Reveca Mladenoff, Araly Mladenoff, and Yuri Mladenoff. She was the adoring and doting grand‐mother to Nicholas Mlade‐noff, Carlos Mladenoff III, Marcio Mladenoff, Jr., Sab‐rina Mladenoff and Sasha Mladenoff. Juana immi‐grated to New Orleans, LA in 1958. She attended L.E Raboiun High School simul‐taneously serving as a nanny to the Consulado General de Honduras in New Orleans During that time she met the love of her life, Carlos Mladenoff, Sr and built their family of eight children. Juana was a devout Catholic and ser‐vant of the Lord. In this order, she considered Faith, Family Friends and Food (the four major F’s) as the quintessential ingre‐dients for life! Juana was adamant about her chil‐dren having a solid educa‐tional foundation. She and her husband made many sacrifices to provide their children with a Catholic education Although Eng‐lish was not her first lan‐guage, she was actively in‐volved in the PTA humbly volunteered to keep the St. Alphonsus and St. Mary’s Assumption parish recto‐ries tidy, and on occasion would take her children along to help. Her hard work and dedication en‐sured a promising future for her children. Juana in‐stilled in all of us the direc‐tive to care for each other and to pay forward all blessings received Her positivity and influence ra‐diated beyond her immedi‐ate family and toward everyone that came into her sphere of influence Having a moment to boast, Juana was one of the BEST cooks you could EVER imagine. It was a true privi‐lege to partake in one of her many feasts! She could make corn tortillas by hand and was well known in New Orleans for making the BEST nacatamales in town! Like clockwork, friends would pay a visit around Christmas time to have a cup of coffee and a tamale (labor intensive –the process was written down from beginning to end – over 24 hours!). Our father a mariner, would come home from a long trip, share what he ate in whatever country he vis‐ited, and Mami would du‐plicate it by description alone We are so proud of how she welcomed every‐one, prepared a heartfelt meal made with love and watched how it was en‐joyed Ourselves included you were not going to bed with an empty stomach! Juana re-joined the work force at the Hilton River‐side and Towers New Or‐leans in the stewarding de‐partment of the employee cafeteria. In this often diffi‐cult and thankless job, she treated everyone with the utmost respect. She was revered by her peers and was lovingly known as “Mama”. Pete Fountain was a cafeteria regular and she ensured he always had the freshest piece of strawberry cheesecake! Aside from her strong work ethic and culinary talents she had an innate ability to anticipate the needs of others Through her wis‐dom and guidance she provided counsel, comfort and always steered us in the right direction In addi‐tion to supporting close family and friends through‐out her life, she ministered to unhoused and otherwise vulnerable individuals in the New Orleans commu‐nity. She did this willingly, unconditionally and with‐out judgment Our family welcomes everyone whose life has been touched by Juana to join us in a cele‐bration of her life on Thurs‐day, March 6, 2025. Visita‐tion will be held at St Joseph Catholic Church, 1802 Tulane Ave, New Or‐leans, LA 70112 from 8:30am to 10:00am fol‐lowed by a funeral Mass at 10:00am The graveside service and interment will be in Garden of Memories Cemetery, 4900 Airline Drive in Metairie, LA 70001.

Having a moment to boast, Juana was one of the BEST cooks you could EVER imagine It was a true privi‐lege to partake in one of her many feasts! She could make corn tortillas by hand and was well known in New Orleans for making the BEST nacatamales in town! Like clockwork friends would pay a visit around Christmas time to have a cup of coffee and a tamale (labor intensive –the process was written down from beginning to end – over 24 hours!). Our father, a mariner, would come home from a long trip, share what he ate in whatever country he vis‐ited, and Mami would du‐plicate it by description alone. We are so proud of how she welcomed every‐one, prepared a heartfelt meal made with love and watched how it was en‐joyed. Ourselves included, you were not going to bed with an empty stomach!

Juana re-joined the work force at the Hilton River‐side and Towers New Or‐leans in the stewarding de‐partment of the employee cafeteria. In this often diffi‐cult and thankless job, she treated everyone with the utmost respect She was revered by her peers and was lovingly known as “Mama” Pete Fountain was a cafeteria regular, and she ensured he always had the freshest piece of strawberry cheesecake! Aside from her strong work ethic and culinary talents she had an innate ability to anticipate the needs of others. Through her wis‐dom and guidance, she provided counsel, comfort and always steered us in the right direction. In addi‐tion to supporting close family and friends through‐out her life, she ministered to unhoused and otherwise vulnerable individuals in the New Orleans commu‐nity She did this willingly, unconditionally, and with‐out judgment. Our family welcomes everyone whose life has been touched by Juana to join us in a cele‐bration of her life on Thurs‐day, March 6, 2025. Visita‐tion will be held at St. Joseph Catholic Church, 1802 Tulane Ave, New Or‐leans, LA 70112 from 8:30am to 10:00am, fol‐lowed by a funeral Mass at 10:00am The graveside service and interment will be in Garden of Memories Cemetery 4900 Airline Drive in Metairie, LA 70001 The Mladenoff Family humbly requests that in lieu of flowers donations be made in memory of Juana Francisca Mladenoff to The Rebuild Center which serves as a warm, inviting and dignified respite for the unhoused and those in need The Re‐build Center is located at 1803 Gravier Street New Orleans, LA 70112, (504) 273-5577. The Rebuild Cen‐ter website is http://www stjosephchurch-no.org/stjoseph-rebuild-center Fond memories and ex‐pressions of sympathy may be shared at www Lei tzEaganFuneralHome.com

How to place an Obituary Notice

How to place a Memorial Ad EMAIL: obits@theadvocate.com OR CALL FOR MORE INFORMATION: 225-388-0289

DEATHS continued from

EYES ON PRIZE

Mulkey’s mind on Big Dance as she sits Johnson

Kim Mulkey is playing the long game.

It isn’t as though she has much choice

right now

With one of the LSU women’s basketball team’s brightest stars, Flau’jae Johnson, suffering from shin inﬂammation, Mulkey shut her down for Sunday’s regularseason ﬁnale against Ole Miss. She also plans to keep Johnson tethered to the LSU bench for the duration of this week’s Southeastern Conference Tournament in Greenville, South Carolina.

Mulkey’s decision may have cost her Tigers an 85-77 upset loss to the Rebels. It deﬁnitely reduces LSU’s chances of

BY JIM KLEINPETER

Contributing writer

It wasn’t perfect, but the No. 5 LSU softball team put in another strong weekend while taking four of ﬁve games at the Judi Garman Classic in Fullerton, California, including a takedown of No. 4 UCLA on the ﬁrst day

cutting down the nets in Greenville. And, if the Tigers go one-and-done with a quarterﬁnal loss — likely to an Alabama team that just beat LSU in overtime on Thursday it could cost the Tigers a spot on the No. 2 seed line in the NCAA Tournament. The selection committee will not look favorably on an LSU team on a three-game losing streak.

Still, it looks like this is what Mulkey must do. A healthy Johnson makes for a healthy chance of LSU going on another deep NCAA Tournament run. Without Johnson at or near her best? Well, it could be 2022 all over again for the Tigers.

LSU was the surprise of women’s basketball that season as Mulkey’s ﬁrst team motored toward the end of the season ranked in the top 10 and stood second in the SEC to eventual NCAA champion South Carolina. But point guard Alexis Morris, LSU’s second-leading scorer, suffered an MCL sprain in the Tigers’ second-to-last regular-season

BY TOYLOY BROWN III Staff writer

It happened again. A hunched over Daimion Collins gripped his right arm and gingerly walked to the LSU men’s basketball bench as the Tigers trailed by six with 10 minutes left at Oklahoma on Feb. 15

A block attempt led to a shoulder dislocation, the same one that forced him to miss 27 games last season.

He hurt that same shoulder on Nov 22 against Pittsburgh and missed two games. He reaggravated it before the team’s Jan. 4 game against Va nderbilt, which he played 19 minutes. The latest dislocation was again an anxietyinducing sight.

Collins literally laughed at his pain. He got it ﬁxed, returned to the court two minutes later and scored instantly on a screen-and-roll action.

“It’s become comical at this point to him,” LSU assistant coach Jalen Courtney-Williams said. “He just laughs at it like ‘I’m all right.’ Collins remained in good spirits, ﬁnishing with a career-high 22 points on 8-of-10 shooting to help LSU win 82-79 over Oklahoma.

His best scoring output was secondary to how that performance epitomized part of what makes him special outside of his athletic gifts.

“You talk about toughness, I couldn’t imagine the kind of pain that he could be experiencing in the moment or in the ensuing days,” Courtney-Williams said. “He’s one of the toughest guys I’ve coached.”

Collins, who spent his first two

The Tigers (18-1) are back in action at 6 p.m. Wednesday at home against UL-Monroe and have their ﬁnal nonconference weekend series with the LSU Round Robin, two games each against South Alabama and Minnesota.

BY KOKI RILEY Staff writer

Sydney Berzon won twice last week to improve to 7-0, including a 2-1 win against UCLA when she scattered ﬁve hits, struck out four and walked one. She also tossed her third shutout with a

ä North Dakota St. at LSU, 6:30 P.M.TUESDAy SECN+

“Overall, we played well and saw a lot of good things” LSU coach Beth Torina said. “We had a lot of players step up, Syd Berzon especially She was very prepared in the UCLA game. We had a lot of girls that swung well. Sierra Daniel and Jadyn Laneaux ä ULM at LSU, 6 P.M.WEDNESDAy SECN+

10-0, five-inning win vs. Notre Dame. LSU’s only loss was 6-5 to Cal State Fullerton. Freshman left-handed Jayden Heavener struggled with four walks before exiting in the second inning. She bounced back to fire a two-hit

shutout against Utah the next day

Utah Valley State transfer Daniel Dickinson hit there once. After last weekend, it looks like coach Jay Johnson won’t have to search for an answer anymore. Freshman Derek Curiel made his first appearance in the leadoff spot Wednesday and started playing his best baseball yet. He reached base in five of his six plate appearances against the Patriots, and he finished the weekend by getting on base during 16 of his 24 trips to the plate.

“Hitting in the leadoff spot, my job is to get on base,” Curiel said.

“I got Jared Jones behind me, so

coach Johnson and I talked about not going up there and getting out on one pitch or out in two pitches.

“It’s better for me to work the count, and I have conﬁdence in myself to be able to swing the bat in any count, whether it’s two strikes or one strike.”

Hitting the ball to the opposite field has been a key component of Curiel’s success. His double and single on Wednesday, triple on Friday ﬁrst single on Saturday and double on Sunday were hit the other way “At LSU, we teach a 10-inch plate, and that’s the middle (of the plate) to the other half, and we want the pitcher to try to beat us in,” Curiel said. “If

STAFF PHOTO By MICHAEL JOHNSON LSU forward Daimion Collins finishes a dunk against Alabama State on Nov. 10 at the PMAC.

STAFF PHOTO By HILARy SCHEINUK LSU center fielder Chris Stanfield, left, greets left fielder Derek Curiel at home plate after they both scored against Southern on Feb 18 at Alex Box Stadium. Curiel may

cemented himself as the team’s leadoff hitter after

STAFF PHOTO By MICHAEL JOHNSON

LSU coach Kim Mulkey talks with guard Flau’jae Johnson during an Auburn foul shot on Jan 5 at the Pete Maravich Assembly Center

BROADCAST HIGHLIGHTS

basketball coach Lindsay Gottlieb, center, celebrates with her team after

Angeles. USC won the Big Ten regular-season title with the win.

Southern Cal climbs to No. 2

Highest ranking for Trojans in 39 years; LSU women No. 9

BY DOUG FEINBERG AP basketball writer

Southern California has its best ranking in 39 years after moving up to No. 2 in The Associated Press Top 25 women’s basketball poll on Monday

The Trojans won the Big Ten regular-season title Saturday, beating then-No. 2 UCLA for the second time this year That victory vaulted USC up two spots for its highest appearance in the poll since the team was second on Jan. 5, 1986. USC garnered six firstplace votes from a 31-member national media panel.

“A goal was to come here and bring USC back to what it was at one point,” coach Lindsay Gottlieb said in a phone interview “Recognition of our history and admiration of the history and it’s a neat feeling in the present moment.” Texas remained the top choice after receiving the other 25 ﬁrstplace ballots. The Longhorns beat

Georgia, Mississippi State and Florida last week to wrap up a share of the Southeastern Conference title with South Carolina. The Bruins fell to fourth with UConn right in front of them.

South Carolina, which won a coin ﬂip to get the top seed in the SEC Tournament, was fifth. Notre Dame dropped three places to six after losing to Florida State last week North Carolina State and TCU were seventh and eighth. The Wolfpack shared the ACC regular season crown with Notre Dame while the Horned Frogs won their ﬁrst Big 12 title after beating Baylor on Sunday LSU fell to ninth after the Tigers dropped both of their games, losing to then-No. 20 Alabama in overtime and to Ole Miss. The Tigers also will be without star Flau’jae Johnson for the SEC Tournament as she recovers from shin inflammation. Oklahoma rounded out the top 10.

Ranked Rabbits

South Dakota State entered the poll for the ﬁrst time this season, coming in at No. 25. It’s the ﬁrst time the Jackrabbits are ranked since the preseason poll in 2022. The team went 16-0 in conference play and has gone undefeated in the Summit League three straight years. The Jackrabbits have won 63 straight regular-season conference games and are 81-1 dating to the beginning of the 2020-21 season. The team’s three losses this season are to Duke, Georgia Tech and Texas.

Conference breakdown

The Southeastern Conference has seven ranked teams The ACC, Big Ten and Big 12 each have ﬁve. The Big East has two and the Summit League one.

Games of the week

All four of the major conferences begin their tournaments this week with the championship games on Sunday

Auburn makes it eight straight weeks at No. 1

BY JOHN MARSHALL Associated Press

Auburn and Duke remain atop the AP Top 25. The rest of the poll was a big jumble.

Auburn was the unanimous pick at No. 1 for the second straight week, receiving all 61 votes from a media panel in the poll released on Monday

The Tigers held the top spot for the eighth straight week following lopsided wins over Ole Miss and then-No. 17 Kentucky Duke was No. 2 for the second straight week after blowing out Miami and Florida State despite playing without guard Tyrese Proctor who has a bone bruise in his left knee. No. 3 Houston moved up a spot after beating Texas Tech and Cincinnati, while Tennessee climbed to No. 4 following Jahmai Mashack’s last-second 3-pointer from well beyond halfcourt to beat Alabama 79-76. Florida rounded out the top ﬁve,

dropping two places after losing to Georgia and beating Texas A&M.

No 8 Michigan State joined Auburn and Duke as the only teams to have the same ranking as last week.

Rising Red Storm

St. John’s has pulled off quite a turnaround in its second season under coach Rick Pitino.

The Red Storm (26-4, 17-2 Big East) has not been to the NCAA Tournament since 2019, but are pretty much a lock to end the drought after clinching their ﬁrst Big East regular-season title in 40 years with Saturday’s 71-61 win over Seton Hall.

“We’re just getting started,” Pitino told the Madison Square Garden crowd after the win.

St. John’s also beat Butler last week and moved up a spot in this week’s poll to No 6, its highest ranking reaching No. 5 in 1990-91.

In and out

No teams moved in or out of this

week’s poll.

Rising and falling

No 14 Louisville made the biggest move of the week, climbing ﬁve places after wins over Virginia Tech and Pittsburgh. No. 13 Maryland moved up three places after losing to Michigan State by three on Tre Holloman’s last-second heave from beyond midcourt and beating Penn State. No. 22 Texas A&M had by far the biggest drop, losing 10 places after losing to Vanderbilt and Florida, stretching its losing streak to four straight. No other team dropped more than two places.

Conference watch

The SEC continued its dominance with three of the top ﬁve and eight total in

Johnson retires from Fox Sports’ NFL coverage

Jimmy Johnson has announced his retirement from Fox Sports after being a part of its NFL coverage for 31 years.

The 81-year-old Johnson made the announcement during an appearance on “The Herd With Colin Cowherd.”

He said he had been thinking about retiring for four or five years. He said he would miss the people he’s worked with and called it a great 31-year run.

Johnson worked alongside hosts Curt Menefee and Terry Bradshaw and analysts Howie Long and Michael Strahan.

As a coach, he won consecutive Super Bowls with the Dallas Cowboys and the college football national championship with Miami in 1987.

Bengals place franchise tag on receiver Higgins

CINCINNATI The Cincinnati Bengals have placed the franchise tag on Tee Higgins for a second time, as the team hopes to work out a long-term deal with the star wide receiver

If the Bengals can’t reach a contract with the 26-year-old Higgins before July 15, his salary for the 2025 season would be $26.2 million.

Bengals director of player personnel Duke Tobin reiterated last week at the NFL scouting combine that one of his top priorities is to get a deal done with Higgins. Higgins is the second player to receive a franchise tag, joining Kansas City guard Trey Smith. Teams have until 3 p.m. Tuesday to tag players. Higgins was tied for sixth in the league this past season with 10 touchdown catches. He also had 73 receptions for 911 yards.

Astros manager says Altuve to play in outfield WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — The Houston Astros are planning to play erstwhile second baseman Jose Altuve mostly in left ﬁeld this season. Manager Joe Espada told the Houston Chronicle that’s the plan.

The 2017 AL MVP has played all but two of his 1,767 major league games at second base.

The idea of moving Altuve to left was ﬁrst broached when the team was looking to keep third baseman Alex Bregman, a former LSU standout.

Altuve said at the team’s FanFest in January he would do whatever it takes to keep his longtime teammate Even after Bregman signed with Boston, moving Altuve to the outfield still made sense to the team.

Yankees pitcher Gil starting season on injured list

Yankees right-hander Luis Gil will start the season on the injured list because of a high-grade lat strain in his pitching shoulder that will prevent him from throwing for at least six weeks. Manager Aaron Boone says “it’s at least a six-week no throw We know that for sure.” Boone said the Yankees hope Gil will return this season.

The 26-year-old Gil cut short a bullpen session Friday He was 15-7 with a 3.50 ERA in 29 starts last year striking out 171 and walking 77 in 1512⁄3 innings.

He was projected to be part of a starting rotation that includes Gerrit Cole, Max Fried, Carlos Rodón and Clarke Schmidt.

Source says ACC, Fla. St., Clemson reach settlement

A person familiar with the situation says the Atlantic Coast Conference, Clemson and Florida State have reached a proposed settlement that would end their legal ﬁght and change the league’s revenue-distribution model.

The person spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity Monday because neither the league nor the schools have publicly addressed their settlement.

The proposed agreement requires approval from the league and the schools. Trustees at the two schools have scheduled meetings for Tuesday

The ACC’s Board of Directors made up of university presidents and chancellors will also have a call Tuesday on the settlement. The upside could be $15 million or more for top-earning schools, could also result in a decline of about $7 million for others, the person told the AP

ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTO By MARK J. TERRILL

Southern California women’s

they defeated UCLA on Saturday in Los

LSU to ‘celebrate’

10 senior gymnasts

BY SCOTT RABALAIS

Staff writer

LSU gymnast Sierra Ballard probably spoke for her fellow seniors when she talked about the ﬁnal home meet of her career Friday against Georgia.

“I’m trying to hold it together,” Ballard said Monday, “but the mindset is the same: Approach it as every other week. When it’s done, I’ll let the tears fall.”

There could be plenty of tears inside the Pete Maravich Assembly Center on Friday as 10 seniors say their goodbyes.

Taking their ﬁnal bows will be fourth-year seniors Aleah Finnegan, Alexis Jeffrey, KJ Johnson, Tori Tatum and Kathryn Weilbacher; fifth-year seniors Ballard, Haleigh Bryant Olivia Dunne and Chase Brock (injured); and sixth-year senior Alyona Shchennikova

LSU coach Jay Clark doesn’t want sentimentality to overshadow an important meet

“You don’t want it to take over the narrative,” he said “Seniors do that to themselves enough. In reality, we have six more weeks of this.

“Nothing is ending at all. It’s the last time for them in front of these fans, but I remind them no one is dying and we don’t need to eulo-

SOFTBALL

Continued from page 1C

had big weekends A lot of people did exactly what we’ve been asking them to do.” Daniel had six hits in 11 at-bats with six RBIs. She drove in the decisive run with a two-out single in the sixth inning against UCLA after Tori Edwards had broken a scoreless tie with a base hit. Daniel also had two hits and two RBIs against Cal State Fullerton. In a rare display of power, the Tigers hit three home runs in the finale, a 9-1 victory against Weber State Daniel hit the first home run of her career a two-run shot. Danieca Coffey had a grand slam and five total RBIs, and Maci Bergeron hit her fourth homer Overall, LSU had a productive weekend in its first experience this season away from Tiger Park.

“It was interesting. There were moments when I thought, ‘This feels weird,’ ” Torina said. “It’s always good to go on the road in a different environment, a little more uncomfortable than in Tiger Park.

gize our seniors. Let’s make it a party and celebrate all of their accomplishments already and push forward to accomplish even more.”

First vault is set for 7:30 p.m The meet will be shown on a streaming basis on SECNetwork+.

Tigers improve NQS

LSU stayed at No. 2 in this week’s national rankings but closed the gap on No. 1 Oklahoma.

The Tigers improved their NQS (National Qualifying Score) from 197.540 to 197.710 thanks to their 198.125-195.475 win Friday over George Washington at the Raising Cane’s River Center Oklahoma, which won 197.925196.900 at Auburn, is now at 197.915. UCLA (197.525) is third, followed by Florida (197.480) and Utah (197.465).

Georgia is 10th at 197.065.

LSU’s score Friday tied two 198.125s by Florida for the best score by any team in 2025. It doesn’t currently count for LSU in the NQS formula teams take their top six scores, including three road marks, discard the top score and average the remaining five. But it does allow the Tigers to count the score from their

198.050-197.675 win Feb. 14 against Oklahoma.

NQS will determine LSU’s seeding in the SEC and NCAA championships As for the SEC regular-season championship, Oklahoma is 6-1 with one SEC meet remaining March 14 at Georgia. After hosting Georgia on Friday, 5-1 LSU goes to Auburn on March 14.

Going for 100

Bryant won the all-around and vault titles in the Podium Challenge, giving her 99 individual titles for her career

One more win would allow her to join Ashleigh Clare-Kearney Thigpen (114 wins) and April Burkholder (108) as the only gymnasts in program history with 100 titles.

Bryant, whose season started slowly because of an elbow injury, has ﬁve wins in 2025. Freshman Kailin Chio leads the Tigers with 16. Fast company

After trying to hire Clark away from LSU last year, Georgia is led by two ﬁrstyear coaches: Cecile Canqueteau-Landi and Ryan Roberts Canqueteau-Landi coached Team USA to gold in the 2024 Paris Olympics and is Simone Biles’ former personal coach.

LSU

by Penn State on Feb 21 at Tiger Park. Daniel’s bat sprung to life during a weekend road trip in California.

BASEBALL

Continued from page 1C

smash up another way.” Offensive explosion

For an 11-inning stretch the previous weekend, LSU couldn’t score a run off of Omaha.

But in Texas, the Tigers had at least 11 hits in every game, including 17 against Nebraska. And they did it against better competition.

“Any park is a good park for us to hit in,” sophomore Steven Milam said.

So why has LSU suddenly started smacking the ball around like it’s 2023?

For one, the conditions it was playing in were ideal for offense. The weather was warmer than it was in Baton Rouge, and the wind in Frisco allowed a few balls to travel farther than they would have otherwise.

Additionally, the batter’s eye in center field at Globe Life Park and Rider’s Field may have made a difference. Curiel noted on Wednesday how the black wall in center ﬁeld at Globe Life helped LSU see the ball better out of Dallas Baptist pitchers’ hands. The green wall in center at Rider’s Field is also a solid backdrop and isn’t the mesh see-through material that makes up the batter’s eye at Alex Box Stadium.

Bullpen thoughts

After a nearly perfect ﬁrst two weeks, the LSU bullpen started showing cracks in Texas.

LSU relievers allowed nine earned runs in 162/3 innings after surrendering just six earned runs through the ﬁrst eight games. They walked 15 batters and only struck out 14.

But so far in 2025, Johnson has yet to have his best bullpen at his disposal.

Junior right-hander Gavin Guidry hasn’t pitched yet, in part due to a midbody injury that kept him out the last two weekends. Juniorcollege transfer and lefthander Conner Ware has

ON DECK

WHO: North Dakota State (1-9) at LSU (11-1)

WHEN: 6:30 p.m.Tuesday

WHERE: Alex Box Stadium

ONLINE: SEC Network+

RADIO: WDGL-FM, 98.1 (Baton Rouge); WWL-AM, 870 (New Orleans); KLWB-FM, 103.7 (Lafayette)

RANKINGS: LSU is No. 1 by D1Baseball; NDSU is not ranked

PROBABLE STARTERS: LSU — TBA; NDSU — TBA

WHAT TO WATCH FOR: LSU is preparing to play its second consecutive ﬁve-game week.The Tigers nearly ran out of bullets on the mound last week, surrendering eight runs to Sam Houston State on Sunday. North Dakota State’s lone win came two Sundays ago against Texas Rio Grande Valley. The Bison were swept by Alabama last weekend. Koki Riley

been tasked with starting midweek games. Once conference play begins, he’ll almost certainly be a big part of the Tigers’ pitching plans.

Johnson also has been limited in his ability to use talented freshman righthander William Schmidt in relief. He only threw one inning over the weekend in part because he threw 60 pitches in a start Monday Johnson said after Sunday’s game that the Tigers were running out of arms.

Seven of their 15 walks and four of the nine runs the relievers allowed came against Sam Houston State.

“We kind of tapped out with a good amount of guys,” Johnson said.

“There’s a lot of guys that were just scratched off, not available today.”

Flashing leather

Once again, LSU was fabulous in the ﬁeld. The Tigers had more highlight-worthy plays than errors, committing only two Dickinson had an errant throw Sunday and Jones had an uncharacteristic drop at ﬁrst base Wednesday

The Tigers’ most memorable play was Dickinson’s ﬂip to Milam in the sixth inning of Saturday’s game. It was a moment that perfectly encapsulated how Milam’s move to shortstop has transformed the inﬁeld defense.

“Nobody’s playing shortstop better on the planet

right now than this guy,” Johnson said Saturday of Milam. “There’s the fancy play with the flip and the throw, but his ability to pick the right hop, go get it (and) catch a short hop right on time with the clock has been spectacular.”

Third time’s not a charm

Kade Anderson has been a strikeout machine through three starts.

The sophomore left-hander leads the Tigers with 26 punch-outs in 152/3 innings. He struck out 10 batters on Friday against Kansas State, including nine through ﬁve innings. Clearly, the stuff and command are there for him to be an excellent top of the rotation arm, but Anderson has had some problems going through opposing orders a third time. After surrendering two runs on two walks and two singles to Omaha in the sixth inning the previous week, Anderson allowed a pair of solo home runs to Kansas State in the sixth Friday He still ﬁnished Friday’s start allowing just three hits in 51/3 innings. He only has a 2.30 ERA. But for Anderson to take the next step in his development, getting through six or seven innings and pitching better as the game goes along will be key. Email Koki Riley at Koki. Riley@theadvocate.com.

The Warhawks top pitcher is Dakota Lake with a 6-2 record and 1.37 ERA.

“They have a ton of short game and speed we have to defend,” Torina said. “They present some different challenges than we’ve seen this year Even more so like SLU, bunts and speed players.”

“(Daniel) has worked really hard to add the swing piece to her game. She’s doing a good job of using all of her tools and making the most of her opportunity.” With UL-Monroe LSU faces a similar opponent to Southeastern Louisiana. The Warhawks (14-7) have won 12 consecutive games using slap hitting and speed as their main offensive force. Left ﬁelder Megan Brown leads the team with a .469 batting average while center ﬁelder Brooklin Lippert is hitting .444 with 14 stolen bases. Second baseman Morgan Brown is batting .415 with four homers and 27 RBIs.

STAFF PHOTO By MICHAEL JOHNSON

second baseman Sierra Daniel tracks a shallow pop ﬂy

STAFF FILE PHOTO By MICHAEL JOHNSON

LSU gymnast Aleah Finnegan waves to the crowd during introductions on Friday at the Raising Cane’s River Center. Also pictured are, from left to right, seniors Olivia Dunne, Tori Tatum, Alyona Shchennikova and Chase Brock.

Passing game coordinator

Scott Linehan, center, works with receivers during an LSU spring practice

March 7, 2020. The Saints are hiring Linehan for a role during the 2025 season.

Moore adds a mentor of his to Saints staff

BY MATTHEW PARAS Staff writer

Kellen Moore is adding one of his mentors to his coaching staff.

The New Orleans Saints are in the process of hiring Scott Linehan, a source with knowledge of the situation conﬁrmed.

Linehan, an offensive analyst for the University of Montana, was Moore’s offensive coordinator with the Detroit Lions when the former Boise State quarterback began his career in the NFL. He then played a role in bringing Moore to Dallas as a player and then as a coach when Moore eventually hung up his cleats at 28 years old. Linehan could serve as a senior

LSU MEN

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seasons at Kentucky, will return to Rupp Arena for the ﬁrst time since transferring as LSU (14-13, 3-13 SEC) faces No 19 Kentucky (19-10, 8-8) at 6 p.m. Tuesday in Lexington, Kentucky

Courtney-Williams, who primarily helps the LSU post players, said Collins typically stays in the moment. The redshirt junior who last appeared in Rupp Arena on March 1, 2023, doesn’t get too swept up in emotion. But this matchup is different. It’s on familiar turf and in front of a fanbase that knew him as a freshman and sophomore

“He hadn’t talked much about going back in Rupp, but I’m sure there’s some emotion that comes with him,” Courtney-Williams said. Kentucky fans once rooted for the former McDonald’s All-American who struggled to emerge in a rotation loaded with other ﬁvestar prospects. They will now witness a 22-year-old who is playing his best basketball.

The 6-foot-9, 200-pound Collins is averaging 8.6 points, 4.4 rebounds, 1.6 blocks and is shooting 59% from the ﬁeld in 21 minutes per game. He is ﬁfth in block percentage (7.4%) and fourth in two-point percentage (67.9%) in the Southeastern Conference. He is still a human pogo-stick for blocks and dunk People remain in awe of his ability in practice, and LSU coach Matt McMahon has more than once described him as a “once-in-ageneration athlete.”

But most remarkable is the joy Collins displays because he’s ﬁnally on the court.

In his 27 games this season, he has played 107 more minutes than he has in his previous three seasons combined in 58 games.

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game against Alabama. Morris sat out the season ﬁnale at Tennessee, which LSU managed to win 57-54, and then the SEC Tournament, where the Tigers were bounced 78-63 in the quarterﬁnals by Ken-

tucky LSU still got to host NCAA ﬁrstand second-round games as a regional No. 3 seed, but with Morris limited the Tigers were ripe for a fall. They had to rally from 10 points down in the ﬁrst round to beat Jackson State 83-77 but

Saints pick up three defensive assistants

BY ZACH EWING Staff writer

The New Orleans Saints continued to ﬁll out their coaching staff Monday, as they are expected to hire veteran defensive assistant Grady Brown, a source conﬁrmed. The Saints also are expected to hire Jay Rodgers and Robert Blanton.

Brown spent the past four seasons as the Pittsburgh Steelers defensive backs coach and interviewed this offseason to be the defensive coordinator for the Atlanta Falcons.

Under Brown, the Steelers were third in the NFL with 17 interceptions this past season and tied for the league lead with 20 picks in 2022.

The Steelers announced earlier this month that they weren’t renewing Brown’s contract. Most of Brown’s coaching career has been spent in the college ranks, with the ﬁnal year coming in Louisiana as the McNeese State defensive coordinator in 2020. Before that, he was defensive backs

coach at South Carolina from 2012-15 under head coach Steve Spurrier

Rodgers most recently served as the Falcons defensive line coach. He also coached the D-line and was the run game coordinator from 2021-23 under Brandon Staley the Saints new defensive coordinator, with the Los Angeles Chargers.

Like both Staley and Saints head coach Kellen Moore, Rodgers is a former quarterback. He played quarterback for Indiana from 1996-98.

Blanton comes to New Orleans from Miami (Ohio), where he was the defensive pass game coordinator and safeties coach He played safety at Notre Dame and with the Minnesota Vikings.

Blanton is the latest defensive assistant the Saints have hired from the college ranks, joining Bo Davis from LSU, Terry Joseph from Texas and Peter Sirmon from Cal.

All of the assistants’ exact roles with New Orleans are to be determined.

offensive analyst with a speciality of in-game management, a source said, but his title and role are still being determined.

Linehan, 61, hasn’t been in the NFL since 2018 when he was the Dallas Cowboys offensive coordinator That year Moore broke into the coaching profession when he became the team’s quarterbacks coach Moore then replaced Linehan a year later as offensive coordinator

“Scott meant a lot to me,” Moore said last month in the week leading up to the Super Bowl.

When Moore suffered a seasonending ankle injury in 2016, Linehan and coach Jason Garrett allowed Moore to assist then-rookie Dak Prescott and sit in on meet-

ings to help with the game plan. That allowed Moore to see “the game from the other side of it,” he said.

Since exiting the NFL, Linehan had been in the college ranks. He served as LSU’s pass game coordinator in 2020, spent the next three years with Missouri and joined Montana in 2024.

Linehan also gives Moore another former head coach to lean on during his ﬁrst year Linehan coached the St. Louis Rams from 2006-08. Saints defensive coordinator Brandon Staley also has previous head coaching experience with the Los Angeles Chargers.

Email Matthew Paras at matt. paras@theadvocate.com

Daimion Collins walks off the court after a win over Mississippi Valley State on Dec. 29 at the PMAC.

Collins appreciates every second.

“You see that smile of his more and more,” Courtney-Williams said. “I think that just speaks to how much fun he’s having in the position he’s found himself in. As a competitor, it’s frustrating to not be in a position to compete and help your team the way you feel like you can And experiencing injuries on top of that, it could put you in a different mental space.”

Collins’ mind hasn’t been this free in a basketball sense since the days he averaged averaged 35 points and six blocks as a high school senior in Atlanta, Texas.

He is now competing in arguably the greatest college basketball conference ever and has the freedom to use both his natural gifts and skills that he’s worked on.

When Courtney-Williams joined the LSU staff and met Collins in April, he noticed his quiet nature and impressive wingspan even with his right arm still in a sling after shoulder surgery Most notable to the eight-year college assistant coach was Collins’ desire to learn and help the team.

trailed most of the second-round game against Ohio State and were eliminated 79-64. Morris scored a total of 11 points in the two games. Johnson last played Thursday at Alabama. The earliest LSU would open the NCAA Tournament is March 21. That would give her three weeks to get right for “the playoffs,” as Mulkey refers to the tournament. Given the opponent and game ﬂow, the Tigers might even be able to get by that ﬁrstround game using Johnson sparingly Eventually, LSU will need her Forward Aneesah Morrow has been a double-double machine, mitigating the loss of Angel Re-

Collins was eager for workouts and ﬁlm room breakdowns. These were the steps to not only unlock his game but also rediscover it Before this season, he had played more than 20 minutes in a game three times during his career He’s quintupled that to 15 games during this campaign.

“He a baller,” said Cam Carter, LSU’s leading scorer “Tough mentally, physically, a dog. I’m so glad to have him on our team for real.” Collins’ return to Rupp will be a game he’ll want to win for LSU, but an underlying significance does exist.

It’s that a young man who stayed determined through adversity gets to reintroduce himself to his ﬁrst college home.

“He’s been through a ton, within the sport, the way he’s decided to navigate those things is really admirable and impressive,” Courtney-Williams said. “He’s ﬁgured out some things that people don’t ﬁgure out until they’re well into their 30s or 40s.”

Email Toyloy Brown III at toyloy.brown@theadvocate.com

ese’s scoring and rebounding. Sophomore Mikaylah Williams has morphed into a Magic Johnson-like do-everything player, going from shooting guard to bringing the ball up court to playing small forward in spots. But Johnson is the Tigers’ “huge spark,” as Morrow put it during Sunday’s postgame news conference. She embodies LSU’s fast-break culture and can turn a game with a long-armed steal a Eurostep drive to the basket and her pure emotion.

If Johnson can return at her best — a fairly large “if” at this moment LSU has a nucleus in her, Morrow and Williams that ev-

Mulkey not taking risks for SEC Tournament

BY REED DARCEY Staff writer

Kim Mulkey’s attitude toward conference tournaments informed her decision to hold Flau’jae Johnson out of the one the LSU women’s basketball team will travel to this week. That choice, of course, diminished the No. 9 Tigers’ chances of winning the 2025 Southeastern Conference Tournament. But Mulkey’s playing it safe. Johnson’s shin inflammation, Mulkey said Sunday after an 85-77 loss to Ole Miss, needs time to subside before LSU ﬁnds itself in NCAA Tournament games.

“I’ve always had a hard time with conference tournaments,” Mulkey said. “I really don’t understand, if you’re a top seed, how they benefit you. I’ve never understood that, and that’s even way back before I got to LSU.”

Mulkey’s top priority? Win enough games to play the ﬁrst two rounds of the NCAA Tournament inside the Pete Maravich Assembly Center To earn that advantage, LSU just needs to prove to the selection committee that it’s one of the best 16 teams in the country — the group of squads that are given top-four regional seeds.

The Tigers were a No. 3 seed in each of Mulkey’s ﬁrst three seasons in charge, and they’ve likely already done enough this season to merit a similar position in the bracket — with or without a win in the SEC Tournament.

The challenge now becomes something harder to quantify LSU never has lost more than two games in a row since Mulkey took over but if it drops its ﬁrst SEC Tournament game — set to tip off at 7:30 p.m. Friday — then it’ll begin the NCAA Tournament on the heels of a three-game losing skid and four losses in its previous six contests.

That possibility is new territory for the Tigers, who struggled to close out their game against Ole Miss on Sunday and suffered a rare loss at home. The Rebels outscored them 54-33 in the second half. LSU coughed up a season-high 23 possessions, including 14 across the third and fourth quarters, and lost the offensive rebounding battle by six boards. As a result, Ole Miss earned 17 more ﬁeld-goal attempts.

Aneesah Morrow and Mikaylah Williams combined to score 53 points on 55% shooting.

Kailyn Gilbert was the only

ery other team in the nation would envy Still, Johnson doesn’t cover all of the Tigers’ blemishes. Their point guard situation is barely adequate split between Shayeann Day-Wilson and Last-Tear Poa. Contributions from forwards Sa’Myah Smith, Jersey Wolfenbarger and Aalyah Del Rosario are erratic as well. And yet, Flau’jae performing as Flau’jae — the basketball star, not the rap artist gives LSU a shot at another national title. The Tigers picked a good year for some uncertainty in the women’s game, a year without a lead-pipe national championship favorite. UConn is the current betting choice; Texas

other contributor who scored in double ﬁgures, and she saw only two minutes of run in the fourth quarter In the second half, Tigers not named Morrow or Williams chipped in only nine points on 4-of-10 shooting — not enough to hang with an Ole Miss team that converted 51% of its field goals and 42% of its 3-point tries across the third and fourth quarters. “I think we just need to defend,” Williams said. “Flau’jae brought a defensive mentality or defensive presence to the ﬂoor — defending, rebounding, all that. So, we just need to bow our necks to be able to guard the people in front of us.” Mulkey took a similar precaution at the same time last season with Williams. Then a freshman, Williams sat out LSU’s regular-season finale against Kentucky and missed the start of the SEC Tournament. Mulkey said she was nursing plantar fasciitis in her foot and that the team decided to shelve her as a precaution to ensure she wouldn’t aggravate the injury before the NCAA Tournament.

Without Williams, the Tigers picked up a 21-point win over the Wildcats, a 30-point victory over Auburn and an eight-point win over Ole Miss. She returned for the SEC Tournament title game against South Carolina but came off the bench and scored only two points in 23 minutes of action. LSU lost 79-72 before reaching the Elite Eight of the NCAA Tournament. At the time, however the Tigers had won eight straight games, and Williams was averaging 12.1 points per game while shooting 43% from the ﬁeld and 29% from 3-point range. The SEC was also weaker It put only two teams (South Carolina and LSU) into the Associated Press Top 25 poll by the time the regular season wrapped up.

This season, seven SEC teams are ranked, Johnson is scoring 17.1 ppg, and LSU has lost three of its last ﬁve games. It could ﬁnd itself in a rematch with one of the four teams it lost to as soon as Friday But Johnson will not play in that game, and that’s a reality Mulkey can live with.

“I think conference tournaments maybe make money for people, I don’t know,” Mulkey said. “I think conference tournaments are good for Cinderellas, but how many Cinderellas do you really have in the women’s game?

“So we’ll go, and we’ll compete and do the best we can.”

looks like the No. 1 overall seed; and South Carolina is South Carolina. But USC, UCLA, Notre Dame and LSU are also in that mix. Any of those seven could be the last team standing in Tampa, Florida, on April 6 and no one would be a bit surprised. That’s the tack Mulkey is taking. She risked defeat against Ole Miss and is in effect punting on the SEC Tournament to keep her eyes on the biggest prize. One that requires Johnson be as healthy as she can be to get through the

STAFF PHOTO By MICHAEL JOHNSON

LSU forward

THE VARSITY ZONE

‘Amazing’ times for son of hoops legend

Randy Livingston Jr. leads Newman to regional-round playoff win

BY CHRISTOPHER DABE Staff writer

Randy Livingston Jr has enjoyed the past two basketball seasons with his father as the head coach.

of 7 from the free-throw line and made a 3-pointer as he scored 16 points after halftimme.

A 6-foot-2 point guard, Livingston affected the game in other ways when he wasn’t scoring.

ished learning from his father “because he knows what it takes to get to the pros and be good in college,” he said. “I just kind of listen and follow him,” Livingston said. “And lead by example.”

Livingston Jr

The Newman junior transferred into the school and helped the Greenies to a state championship last season — the third in a row for the school. He now has his team one win away from getting back to the state tournament.

“It’s been amazing,” Livingston said about playing for his father, Randy Livingston, a former LSU standout and NBA veteran who played on three Newman state championship teams in the early 1990s and has his retired jersey No. 50 displayed in the school’s home gymnasium.

The leading player on a team that advanced Monday to the state quarterﬁnals, Livingston scored 23 points to help fourth-seeded Newman defeat No. 20 Pope John Paul II 60-43 in an LHSAA Division III select regional round game at Newman’s Palestra. Limited to three baskets as the focus of a box-and-one defense in the ﬁrst half, Livingston was 7

“I think he can lead and give the other guys conﬁdence,” said the elder Livingston, now in his sixth season as head coach at his alma mater “Just make the easy play.”

Some of those easy plays came in the third quarter, when Newman senior Payton Foster sank all three of his 3-pointers and ﬁnished with 11 points.

Those 3s helped Newman (206) turn a one-point halftime lead into a 45-37 advantage after three quarters. The Greenies, who made 11 3-pointers in the game, led by 20 points in the fourth quarter

The 6-5 Foster said teams that play a box-and-one are “taking R.J. away because the other team thinks that we can’t score, so we just have to prove to them that we can score.”

Among the other 3-point shooters, senior Sachin Dasa made three as junior A.J. Yunusah sophomore C.J. Encalarde and sophomore Carter Farnsworth each made one. Livingston made two. Livingston, who transferred from a school in Florida, has rel-

PJP II (15-13) held a pair of onepoint leads late in the second quarter and early in the third Senior Andrew Hoff had a team-high 20 points and eight rebounds. Senior Nathan Babin had 12 points and seven rebounds.

PJP II coach Jay Carlin said Newman made an adjustment late in the second quarter that gave Livingston and Foster more scoring chances.

“I’m a little disappointed on our end that (Livingston) and (Foster) were able to get as much as they did in the second half,” Carlin said.

“Our kids played hard, proud of our effort. We told them, ‘Hey, we want to give ourselves a chance to win a game in the fourth quarter and have a chance to win.’ A onepoint game at half and right there in the third quarter they extended to seven, eight.”

Newman will play a quarterﬁnal against the winner between No. 5 Rosepine and No 12 Lafayette Christian. Those teams will play on Wednesday The quarterﬁnal will be Friday or Saturday, Livingston said.

Thomas Jefferson rallies behind Stevenson to beat De La Salle

BY CHRISTOPHER DABE Staff writer

Rashad Stevenson has been the top basketball player in his district for the past two seasons.

During that time, the 6-foot-4 senior from Thomas Jefferson has waited for his chance to show that he could be something more.

“He is legit going to play at the next level,” Thomas Jefferson coach William Ureta said.

“I hope more schools get a hold of who he is and the player he is.” Those colleges should notice Stevenson after his 31 points and 13 rebounds helped the No 10 Jaguars overcome a 21-point deficit and defeat No.

7 De La Salle 73-69 in overtime in an LHSAA Division III select regional-round playoff game

Monday Thomas Jefferson (22-8) twice went ahead by four points in overtime when Stevenson made two free throws and then scored on a driving layup with less than 30 seconds remaining.

He also made a 3-pointer that tied the score at 55-all in the fourth quarter And he completed

a three-point play with 14.1 seconds left that put Thomas Jefferson ahead by two points.

De La Salle sophomore Chase Barker tied the score with a driving layup before Thomas Jefferson called a timeout with 2.4 seconds to play The game went to overtime when a three-quarters court shot hit a support beam above the ﬂoor

The win advanced Thomas Jefferson to the quarterﬁnals for the ﬁrst time in Ureta’s 16 seasons as head coach.

“It’s our time,” said Ureta, whose team will play the winner between No. 2 Dunham and No. 15 GEO Next Generation. “We’ve had some pretty good teams. This is by far my best team for the grit that they show.”

Thomas Jefferson made six 3-pointers during a run that turned a 49-28 deﬁcit in the third quarter into a 60-55 advantage with about 4 minutes left in regulation Senior Talen Page made three 3-pointers and completed a three-point play during that scoring run. He ﬁnished with 17 points.

Bryce Wilkerson, a 2,000-yard rusher for the football team, had 12 points and ﬁve rebounds.

Chance Collins came off the bench and made three 3-pointers.

“When I rely on my team, that’s

when I play at my best,” Stevenson said.

“They hit some huge shots — Chase, Talen. They made some great plays. We played together well.”

Ureta described Stevenson as a two-time district player of the year selection “with really good body control.

“He can shoot the 3 He can shoot the midrange — his midrange really took off this year He’ll do fadeaways He’ll score in the block, in transition, wherever.”

De La Salle (17-10) took an early lead as senior Antonio Scott scored 18 of his 30 points in the first quarter He made three 3-pointers in the ﬁrst quarter

Junior Devin Barbarin made a 3-pointer that put De La Salle ahead 49-28.

Thomas Jefferson scored 18 consecutive points to get within four points of the lead, before the tight ﬁnish.

“Give all the credit to Thomas Jefferson,” De La Salle coach Chris Perrone said. “They hit shots. They made stops.

“They have a very good player, No. 5 (Stevenson). They’re very good.”

Contact Christopher Dabe at cdabe@theadvocate.com

BASKETBALL REPORT

Rodgers, Garrett create some buzz during combine

BY ROB MAADDI AP pro football writer

INDIANAPOLIS Matthew Stafford chose to stay in Los Angeles. Deebo Samuel was sent to Washington. Many NFL players will be on the move when free agency begins next week and the foundation for a lot of transactions was built at the scouting combine last week. While 329 college prospects gathered in Indianapolis to showcase their skills, talk to teams and undergo medical evaluations, front ofﬁce executives had plenty of conversations about players on their rosters and others they plan to pursue either through free agency or trade.

There was a ton of buzz about several star players, including Aaron Rodgers, Russell Wilson and Myles Garrett.

Rodgers will become a free agent after the New York Jets release him. Jets general manager Darren Mougey and coach Aaron Glenn addressed the decision and insisted the franchise’s goal was to win now despite moving on from a four-time NFL MVP who had a disappointing two-year stint in New York.

Garrett, the 2023 AP Defensive Player of the Year asked the Cleveland Browns for a trade last month. Browns general manager Andrew Berry and coach Kevin Stefanski insisted the team has no interest in dealing one of the league’s best edge rushers.

Several teams who need a quarterback are discussing the 41-yearold Rodgers, Wilson, Sam Darnold and Justin Fields. The New York Giants and Las Vegas Raiders pursued a potential deal for Stafford and had to shift their focus after he worked out a new contract with the Rams.

Rodgers has already said he’d like to play for a team that has a chance to win and he’d prefer warm weather That would rule out the Giants but there’s mutual interest between both sides two people with knowledge of the conversations told The Associated Press.

The Raiders would be an option

for Rodgers if coaches believe he could fit into offensive coordinator Chip Kelly’s system. A team ofﬁcial told the AP that evaluation hasn’t been made yet. The person, speaking on condition of anonymity because the conversations are private, also said a reunion between Wilson and new Raiders coach Pete Carroll is unlikely Darnold or Fields might be better ﬁts for Las Vegas, which might select a quarterback with the sixth overall pick in the draft.

Some teams are still uncertain about Darnold, who had a breakout season with the Minnesota Vikings. Darnold led the Vikings to 14 wins but struggled in the ﬁnal two games with the No. 1 seed on the line and then in a wild-card playoff game. The Tennessee Titans, who own the No. 1 overall pick in the draft, need a starting quarterback. So do the Browns at No. 2 and Giants at No. 3.

The Jets, who pick seventh, said they’d be comfortable with Tyrod Taylor but should seek another veteran and are expected to draft a quarterback in the early rounds. The Pittsburgh Steelers will try to retain Wilson or Fields or seek a veteran. Rodgers and Darnold are possibilities.

If the Browns decide to grant Garrett his request and field offers, the two teams who battled in the NFC championship game could end up ﬁghting for his services.

The Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles aren’t afraid to make a big splash. General manager Howie Roseman signed Saquon Barkley last year and he’s a master dealmaker

The Commanders already added Samuel and only gave up a fifthround pick so they have an opportunity to pursue Garrett.

Some big-name receivers could join Samuel on the move, though former LSU standout Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins aren’t expected to be among them. The Cincinnati Bengals made it clear they plan to keep Joe Burrow’s top playmakers.

ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE PHOTO By ADAM HUNGER

New york Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers reacts after throwing a touchdown pass against the Miami Dolphins on Jan. 5 in East Rutherford, N.J

Stevenson

NEW VIEW TO-DO

The Rex court will watch the parade from a new spot this year, sporting a rainbow of shades

BY VICTOR ANDREWS Staff writer

When Rex, the king of Carnival, majestically rolls from his den on South Claiborne Avenue and turns down Napoleon Avenue, the ruler of the day will get to see his queen and her court much sooner than in years past.

Miss Tatum Lady Reiss, who later in the evening will shimmer in gold, will be waiting in the 1800 block of the imperially named thoroughfare in front of Pascal’s Manale to greet Rex, Mr Edward Howell Crosby The new location marks a change for the historic parade, and the queen, the daughter of Mr and Mrs. James Joseph Reiss III, will have a prime post for viewing the pageantry of the day For the day, her majesty will style a cream boucle suit with a pleated skirt and ﬁtted jacket Crystal ﬂower buttons adorn the front and a thin belt highlights the silhouette. A wool felt bowler-shaped chapeau by Yvonne La Fleur accented with feathers and netting, completes the monarch’s attire.

Soft blue is the shade for Miss Carolyn Taylor Bienvenu, fashioned by Suzanne Perron St. Paul into a shawl-collared jacket with silver buttons, ﬂounced skirt and frayed trim. The light blue straw bowler hat is accented with a bowknot

Miss Flora Elizabeth French will style a Kelly green peplum jacket and pencil skirt with gold ﬂower button design with braided trim by St. Paul. Her taupe velvet hat is framed in black netting forming a bow around her head and face.

Wearing a St. Paul-designed royal blue boucle suit will be Miss Charlotte Anne Galloway, boasting vintage iridescent buttons and navy accents. A two-toned red and blue straw saucer hat by Maria Etkind has a red and blue vintage braid bow Pretty in pink, Miss Madison Elizabeth Hales wears a Perla-designed tweed suit with ﬁtted jacket and open stand collar, with an A-line skirt Her sweet pea pink straw La Fleurdesigned hat has ribbon, silk roses and velvet leaves Miss May Heidingsfelder Manning sports red wool tweed, with gold buttons and a fringe detail and gold buttons on the pockets. A red straw hat with artistic design on top caps the look. A boucle suit in lavender by St. Paul is the option for Miss Victoria Livaudais “Livy” Nieset. The rick rack trim in purple and pink is matched with lilac grosgrain ribbon. A lilac straw

THE TIMES-PICAyUNE ARCHIVES

The Duke and Duchess of Windsor Edward and his bride Wallis Simpson, bowed to Rex and the Queen of Carnival at the Rex ball in New Orleans in 1950.

Grand encounter

When the Duke and Duchess of Windsor met Mardi Gras royalty, it was a historic moment

BY JOHN POPE Contributing writer

He bowed. She curtsied. New Orleans swooned. That happened 75 Fat Tuesdays ago, when a man who had been genuine royalty — Edward VIII, king of England and Wallis Warﬁeld Simpson, the American-born divorcée for whom he had renounced the throne, paid homage to make-believe royalty

That moment, which received worldwide coverage, was the high point of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor’s participation in New Orleans’ signature celebration on Feb. 21, 1950. Their crowded day included two parades, a kiss for the duke from a clown, a mint-julep party and a gala dinner at New Orleans’ oldest restaurant.

They were aware of the history of the situation. Here he was, a former honestto-God king going along tongue-in-cheek with the fantasy kings on their thrones.”

CHARLES L.‘PIE’ DUFOUR, newspaperman and Carnival chronicler

From the moment the visit was announced, social circles were abuzz with this all-important question:

Would the storied couple accede to Carnival protocol when they met Rex, the king of Carnival, and Comus?

The answer would come at the end of a long, eventful day that began shortly after 7 a.m. with the arrival of the couple’s private railroad car, which contained what one eyewitness said were “Godknows-how-many trunks.” A day of pomp, formality

The first stop was the St. Charles Hotel, where the couple chatted with reporters in their suite. Then it was on to City Hall (now Gallier Hall) to see the Rex parade, receive the keys to the city from Mayor deLesseps S. “Chep” Morrison and watch the revelers cavort. They seemed to have a good time even though their quotes were less

ä See ROYALTY, page 2D

Try these bright new ﬂowers for landscape color

BY NORMAN WINTER Tribune News Service (TNS)

Last year was an eye-opening year for me, when it comes to Jamesbrittenia. You might be asking, “Who is Jamesbrittenia?” I still struggle with it too. Jamesbrittenia is a genus with about 83 species of plants, mostly from South Africa, Sudan and Egypt. James Briton, for whom the plant was named in 1807, was the keeper of botany at the British Museum of Natural History So, the plant that first caught my eye a couple of years ago when I grew it came with a couple of shots of excitement. The first came courtesy of the Young’s Plant Farm Annual Garden Tour in Auburn, Alabama. The second one and perhaps the most exciting one came from Andrea Owens Schnapp, a master gardener from Florida’s Walton County It’s not just any old Jamesbrittenia but the new and growing Safari series. A plant called Safari Dawn just sounds perfect for a plant from South Africa. Shoot, it sounds like a movie. There are two other selections in the series: Safari Sky and Safari Dusk, which made its debut last year Jamesbrittenia finds itself in the Scrophulariaceae family and has a common name of South African phlox There is no relationship to the phlox, other than the likeness of the little blooms. The plants reach about 12 inches tall with a spread of 2 feet. In the South those numbers may be more. They make an ideal filler, and in my hanging baskets they certainly could be classified as spillers too. As seen at the Young’s Plant Farm Annual Garden Tour, they are magical component plants in designer recipes like one called Surfin Safari. Surfin Safari features Safari Dawn Jamesbrittenia, Superbells Double Amber calibrachoa and Supertunia Royal Magenta petunia. The color mix is simply amazing and reminiscent of a display of fine jewels. Then there was another large container mix featuring the new Safari Dusk Jamesbrittenia, with Goldilocks Rocks bidens and Superbells Cherry Red calibrachoa. You might never consider partnering cherry red and lavender rose together, but these two will steal your heart.

Safari Dawn is a rose with yellow center while the Safari Dusk is lavender with a hint of rose but stands out as being different with little whiskers like a pansy Safari Sky reminds me of lavender blue with a white center with a dot of orange. The strongest shout out may go to Owens Schnapp, in Walton County, Florida. Her planter with Safari Dusk Jamesbrittenia, ColorBlaze Lime Time coleus, Ladybird Sunglow Texas primrose, White Cora Cascade

See FLOWERS, page 2D

ä See COURT, page 2D

Proteus parade culminates with glittering Mardi Gras ball

The Krewe of Proteus celebrated their 143rd anniversary, the oldest nighttime parading krewe in New Orleans, offering a glimpse into the fabled pageantry of the Golden Age of Carnival.

The 11th captain and his many-hued lieutenants escorted the music-ﬁlled mystic krewe into another magical Lundi Gras night. The wagons that carry this parade date back to the 19th century: the era of ﬂambeau-illuminated spectacles drawn by mules through the cobblestone streets of New Orleans. These aged carriages made their journey once more featuring the parade’s theme, “Tableaux Roulants.”

Since man ﬁrst took to the seas, there have been outlaws, using the wildness of the open waters to live life by their own rules. With the theme this year, “Seafaring Scoundrels,” Proteus sought to share the lives and lore of these maritime adventurers, ﬁlled with battles, ghosts, and innumerable dangers of the deep.

Reigning over the evenings’ festivities as queen was Miss Marianne Pratt Villere, daughter of Mr and Mrs. St. Denis Julien Villere III. Maids to her majesty included Misses Teresa Mallard Brewer daughter of Mr and Mrs. Craig Wren Brewer; Annabelle Baldwin

Brown, daughter of Mr and Mrs. Lawrence Baldwin Brown; Abigail Hartsﬁeld Chaffe, daughter of Mr and Mrs David Blackshear Hamilton Chaffe IV; Elizabeth Shaw Feirn, daughter and stepdaughter of Mr and Mrs. Gregory Charles Feirn and daughter of Ms. Amy Shaw Feirn; Sarah Elizabeth Fitzpatrick, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Brian Christopher Fitzpatrick; Celia Louise Funderburk, daughter of Mr and Mrs. Joel Malone Funderburk; Celia Shane Hardin, daughter of Mr and Mrs. Jeffery Simms Hardin; Mallette Amie Havens, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. John Prentiss Havens; Mary Grace Jenkins, daughter of Mr and Mrs. Richard Scott Jenkins; and May Heidingsfelder Manning, daughter of Mr and Mrs. Cooper Archibald Manning.

TODAY IN HISTORY

By The Associated Press

Today is Tuesday, March 4, the 63rd day of 2025. There are 302 days left in the year

Today in history

On March 4, 1865, President Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated for a second term of ofﬁce. With the end of the Civil War in sight, and just six weeks before his assassination, Lincoln declared:

“With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the fight as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in to bind up the nation’s wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan — to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.”

On this date:

In 1789, the Constitution of the United States went into effect as

FLOWERS

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vinca and a Summer Wave trailing torenia was stunning.

Also in the court were Misses Morgan Elizabeth Nalty, daughter of Mr Morgan Shaw Nalty and Ms. Jill Knight Nalty; Charlotte Heyward Parrino, daughter of Dr and Mrs. Patrick Eugene Parrino; Tatum Lady Reiss, daughter of Mr and Mrs. James Joseph Reiss III; Elizabeth Talbot Rogers, daughter of Mr and Mrs. James Ted Rogers III; Ella Smith Schneidau, daughter of Mr and Mrs. Marc Hall Schneidau; Eugenie Gardiner Selser daughter of Mr and Mrs. John Michael Selser; Emma Royals Sin-

COURT

the ﬁrst Federal Congress met in New York In 1933, Franklin D. Roosevelt was inaugurated for his ﬁrst term as president; he was the last U.S. president to be inaugurated on this date. In his inaugural speech, Roosevelt stated, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” In 1987, President Ronald Reagan addressed the nation on the Iran-Contra affair, acknowledging that his overtures to Iran had “deteriorated” into an arms-forhostages deal.

Today’s birthdays: Film director Adrian Lyne is 84. Author James Ellroy is 77. Musician-producer Emilio Estefan is 72. Actor Catherine O’Hara is 71. Actor Mykelti Williamson is 68. Actor Patricia Heaton is 67. Sen. Tina Smith, DMinn., is 67. Actor Steven Weber is 64. Rock musician Jason Newsted is 62. Author Khaled Hosseini is 60. Author Dav Pilkey is 59. Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla. is 57.

gley, daughter of Mr and Mrs. Patrick Shannon Singley; Sarah Butler Sumrall, daughter of Dr and Mrs. William David Sumrall III; and Patricia Diane Taylor, daughter of Mr and Mrs. John Frank Taylor III. Pages were Masters Ryland Poynter Schwing, son of Mr and Mrs. Robert Holmes Schwing; and Meyer Henry Thompson, son of Mr and Mrs. Todd Carrere Thompson.

After the queen and court were presented, Proteus could be seen in his misty, undersea world. Assum-

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saucer hat by Etkind is trimmed with vintage purple ﬂowers.

Flattering fuscia is the visual ﬂavor for Miss Elizabeth Talbot Rogers’ St. Paul-designed suit, with a ﬂounced skirt and jacket with jewel neck. Blush rose buttons and gold detailing highlight the look. Pink straw with an upturned brim and round crown by Etkind is her hat of choice.

ing mortal form, he stood in front of a giant pink seashell surrounded by fishnet, treasure chests, giant sea horses, fish of every description and a hippocampus flanking him on either side. These half-horse and half-fish creatures have become the royal scribes. As the orchestra played “Over the Waves,” Proteus greeted his subjects as the waves splashed, the vortex of a giant whirlpool loomed increasingly larger and all the creatures of the sea swam happily about. Following the undersea tableau, the curtain parted to reveal the monarch, captain, lieutenants, pages and characters from the tableau.

The captain then escorted the queen around the ballroom and presented her The maids were then presented to their majesties. The captain also presented Mrs. Robert Joseph Strumm Jr., who as Anne Kathleen Carriere, reigned as queen in 1975. The monarchs then led a grand march of the court around the ballroom. The general chairman of the ball was Mr Gary Hyder Brewster Assisting as vice-chairmen were Messrs. William Ryan Acomb, Horace Mark Adams, Walter Francis Becker Jr Alfred Whitney Brown III, John Menge Eastman, Michael Kevin Fitzpatrick, Louis McDaniel Freeman Jr., James Favrot Geary, Stacey Wayne Goff, William Joseph Goliwas Jr., William Hugh Hines, Michael Wilkins Kearney, Devereux Parker Moring Jr., Blair Francis Scanlon Jr., William Lomax Treadway III, Robert James Whann IV and Drs. Harry Simms Hardin IV and Charles Emile Heidingsfelder

ROYALTY

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than sparkling. “I had no idea that Mardi Gras was like this,” he said “It’s much more exciting than I expected.” The duchess’ take: “It’s fantastic, fabulous and such fun. Among those with them on the balcony was Pete Herman, a former bantamweight champion (and New Orleans native) whom the duke had met in 1921, when he was the Prince of Wales. The couple stayed long enough to enjoy sandwiches and Champagne, greet Rex Reuben H Brown and see the title ﬂoat. Then it was off to the Boston Club’s reviewing stand on Canal Street to see the rest of that year’s procession, the ﬁrst in which tractors pulled the floats instead of mules The parade theme was “Adventures in Slumberland.”

Best-dressed, the simple way

The duchess, a fixture on bestdressed lists, wore a navy silk Dior dress and a sable stole. In talking to reporters, she had one word of advice for classy dressing: simplicity

After catching and dodging beads, lunching and carrying on, most revelers would want to head home for a nap.

Not this couple. They headed to the French Quarter home of the novelist Frances Parkinson Keyes

All three selections in the Safari series have won awards, from Florida to Michigan State. Fertilize containers that you water daily though the long growing season with a dilute water-soluble mix every two to three weeks.

The fact that it was rocking in mid-summer was another testament to the Safari Jamesbrittenia. Andrea and Proven Winners recommend doing a late summer trim like many of us do with Supertunias to stimulate new growth and blooms through fall.

for a mint-julep party It was appropriate, John Geiser III wrote in his history of that memorable Mardi Gras, because the duchess’ ﬁrst cousin, Leila Montague Barnett, had taught Keyes how to make the drink most people associate with the Kentucky Derby

Even though the Windsors might have been regarded as paragons of social correctness, Geiser wrote that they committed a minor faux pas: They showed up earlier than expected Lemon ice for the royalty

To provide some refreshment for herself and her regal guests while waiting for others to show up, Keyes sent her houseman, Carroll D. Fuller, around the corner to Angelo Brocato’s ice-cream parlor for lemon ice, which they enjoyed on the back gallery They were lucky: It was sunny, and the temperature was in the 70s.

After that midafternoon refreshment, the couple headed off to prepare for the showcase events of the evening: dinner at Antoine’s and the Rex and Comus balls.

Hewing to her emphasis on simplicity, the duchess wore a mauve satin Balenciaga gown and a bib necklace of amethysts and diamonds. The duke wore white tie and tails that had to be airlifted in from New York City at the last moment because he had been told that the dinner jacket he had packed just wouldn’t do for Carnival’s

Miss Marianne Pratt Villere is a ray of sunshine in a yellow St Paul double-breasted suit with sheer organza lace and center-back ﬂounce skirt. A rakish asymmetrical yellow hat is accented with teal and yellow feathers in delicate swirls. Mrs. Crosby, Katie, will toast her husband Rex in a green silk organza suit by Katie Johnson of Royal Design House in a raised metallic copper and blush ﬂoral jacquard. The sleeveless dress has a lattice detail at the hem and a cropped jacket with asymmetrical shawl collar Her Erin Routh-Smith boater hat of blush sinamay sports gardenias with a silk band that matches the suit. For her daughter’s big day, Mrs. Reiss III, Erica, will be festive in a fuscia boucle suit with gold buttons. A pink wool felt bowler with a straw bow, is accented with deeper shades of pink feathers.

Dukes of the realm who will be escorts at the imperial reception in the evening will also be in the stands. They are Messrs. Michael

biggest night, said Dr. Stephen W. Hales, the Rex organization’s historian emeritus. The pair were two of 16 diners in Antoine’s Rex Room. Among the others were Dr Alton Ochsner, Rex 1948 and co-founder of the medical institution bearing his name; his wife, Isabel Lockwood Ochsner; Lester F. Alexander, Rex 1949; and the author Harnett T. Kane. The menu, inscribed to the couple by Antoine’s proprietor Roy Alciatore, featured oysters Rockefeller; turtle soup with sherry; a dish dubbed South African Guinea squab à la Windsor, served with soufflé potatoes; a salad; baked Alaska; and café brûlot.

‘How wonderfully gracious’

The couple, especially the duchess, impressed their fellow diners “I just remember Mother saying how wonderfully gracious she was,” said Dr John Ochsner, whose parents were at the party

During the dinner, Alciatore led the duke through an alley to Royal Street to see the Comus parade, whose route at the time included the French Quarter, and to toast its masked leader, who holds a goblet instead of a scepter

From there, it was off to Municipal Auditorium for the Rex and Comus balls, which were held in separate ballrooms in the vast arena. John G. Weinmann, a Rex duke that year, remembered run-

Quirk Walshe III, Adam Duke Wirth, Thomas Hughes Saer, Charles Claiborne LeBourgeois III, John Middleton Polk Huger, Timothy Semmes Favrot Jr., Clifford Pipes Fitz-Hugh, Frank Hampton Gomila and William Gold Gottsegen. Also enjoying the procession from the new location will be Mmes. Christian Trousdale Brown, Andrew Bell Wisdom, Thomas Dugan Westfeldt II, Louis Lumaghi Frierson, Roswell King Milling, Gayle Marie Benson, Michael Livaudais LeBourgeois, Herbert Wood Van Horn, Paul Albert Bienvenu III, James Ted Rogers, St. Denis Julien Villere III, William Rudolph Galloway John Fenner French, Cooper Archibald Manning, James Robert Nieset, Stephen Benjamin Hales, Richard Scott Jenkins, Edouard James Kock III, Michael Quirk Walshe Jr Adam R. Wirth, Robert Hayes Saer, Charles Claiborne LeBourgeois Jr., Timothy Semmes Favrot, Clark Pipes Fitz-Hugh, Moylan Feild Gomila, John Menge Eastman, Ludovico F. Feoli and Edmund England Redd. Watching from the stands will also be Mmes. Marshall Ballard III, Jason Travis Briggs, James Edward Herring Jr., Steve Michael Myers, James Joseph Reiss Jr., Allain Charles Andry III, Allain Charles Andry IV Michael Becker Andry, Johnson Kelly Duncan, Joseph Storey Charbonnet, Edgar A. G. Bright III, Alfred Whitney Brown III, William H. Langenstein III, Jefferson Glenny Parker, Murray A. Calhoun, Law-

ning into the duchess backstage. She was looking for an iron and an ironing board because her stole was wrinkled. That took him aback.

“An iron? At the auditorium?” he said. “She didn’t wear it.”

When the couple’s moments in the spotlight came, the eyes of the city’s social elite were on them as they were presented to the makebelieve monarchs, first at the Comus ball and then at the Rex soiree. The duke bowed from the waist, and the duchess sank to the ﬂoor in a curtsy Cheers and midnight dancing

“They were aware of the history of the situation,” said Charles L. “Pie” Dufour, a newspaperman and Carnival chronicler “Here he was, a former honest-to-God king going along tongue-in-cheek with the fantasy kings on their thrones.”

“This spontaneous gesture brought down the house,” Rose Kahn wrote in The New Orleans States. “With opera glasses focused on the couple, the audience cheered.”

The monarchs didn’t rise to greet their guests. Even though that set tongues wagging, Rex protocol decreed that they do nothing more than acknowledge them with a wave of their scepters, said Mary Brooks Soulé Weiss, the 1950 queen of Carnival, in a 1986 interview

The couple returned to the Comus ball, where the duchess took

rence Noel Johnson Jr., Gregory Charles Feirn, Richard Bullard Montgomery IV, Robert Sandoz Boh, Stephen Wilson Hales, Michael Wermuth Kearney, John P. “Jack” Laborde, William Hugh Hines, Herschel Lee Abbott, John Edward Koerner III, Ronald James French, Richard West Freeman Jr., Robert H. Boh. Also on hand for the royal review will be Mmes. Caroline Monsted Brady Craig Wren Brewer Lawrence Baldwin Brown, David Blackshear Chaffe IV, Catherine Drennan, Amy Shaw Feirn, Jill Knight Nalty, William David Sumrall III, Robert Sandoz Boh, Stephen Wilson Hales, Michael Wermuth Kearney, John P. “Jack” Laborde, William Hugh Hines, Herschel Lee Abbott, John Edward Koerner III, Ronald James French, Richard West Freeman Jr and Robert H. Boh. Viewing the street pageant will also be Misses Mary Grace Jenkins, Grace Simpson Brady, Teresa Mallard Brewer, Annabelle Baldwin Brown, Abigail Hartsﬁeld Chaffe, Elizabeth Wilder Drennan, Elizabeth Shaw Feirn, Morgan Elizabeth Nalty, Sarah Butler Sumrall, Deborah Helene Aschaffenburg and Sara Elizabeth Jenkins. In attendance will also be Messrs. Peyton Reynolds Davis, Christian Gibbs Hooper Jr., William Blossman, William Lyons Cook Rankin Say Payne, Wilson Bonner Engelhardt, John Stafford Charbonnet, and Davidson Penn McCay Email Victor Andrews at vandrews@theadvocate.com.

several turns around the ﬂoor with krewe members, wearing a beribboned Rex medallion called a ducal. They stayed until midnight, when the courts met to signify the end of Carnival. Kahn said that a guest told the duchess, “You have captivated New Orleans,” to which the duchess replied, “New Orleans has captivated us.”

Mementos of the day

The duke died in 1972. The duchess died in 1986. Mementos of their evening were put up for sale in a massive 1998 auction of the couple’s possessions.

The menu, which was part of a handful of documents from parties that the couple gave or attended, went for $2,875, including a 15% commission. A pair of ducals that together cost about $20 in 1950 fetched $3,737.50, including the commission.

Although Sotheby’s policy forbids identifying purchasers, a representative of the New York City auction gallery said that neither winning bid came from a New Orleanian.

One memento of that momentous Mardi Gras remains in New Orleans. A photograph of the duke and duchess paying homage to Carnival monarchs hangs outside the Rex Room.

Email John Pope at pinckelopes@gmail.com.

Marianne Pratt Villere, queen of Proteus 2025

PIscEs (Feb. 20-March 20) Simplify your life. If someone asks for too much, say no; if offered too little, ask for more. Upfront communication is your best path forward.

ARIEs (March 21-April 19) Make today about caring and sharing. Lift others up, and they will reciprocate. Choose peace and love over anger and discord. Look for alternatives that satisfy your soul and accommodate loved ones' wishes.

tAuRus (April 20-May 20) Envision what you want, develop a plan and execute your intentions Turn your thoughts into something concrete and put a dent in your to-do list. Stop thinking about what you want, and begin your journey.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20) Tone down your plans to fit your budget and abilities. Gauge your time and effort carefully. Your success depends on accuracy, attention to detail and your ability to deliver.

cANcER (June 21-July 22) Haste makes waste. Slow down, nurture what's important to you and change only what's necessary. Channel your energy and passion into something meaningful.

LEo (July 23-Aug. 22) Resolve issues in a civil fashion. If you want to be an honorable leader, act like one. Treat everyone, even your rivals, with dignity. Tact will be necessary.

VIRGo (Aug. 23-sept 22) A change of scenery will help you put your life in

perspective Distance yourself from uncertainty, aggravation and temptation; you'll recognize the best path forward.

LIBRA (sept. 23-oct. 23) Live, learn, love and explore what life has to offer Socializing, sharing information and meeting new people will lead to personal growth, positive change and opportunities.

scoRPIo (oct. 24-Nov. 22) Put your best foot forward. Change is within reach if you follow your passion. Get the ball rolling by sharing your innovative ideas and plans.

sAGIttARIus (Nov. 23-Dec. 21) Think before you act. Take everyone and everything into account before you make a move. Don't spend money on things you don't need or can't afford. Salt away some cash if you can. cAPRIcoRN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19) Make changes to your living space that can help you save money. Updating your home, downsizing to make your life easier and exploring other possibilities will pay off

AQuARIus (Jan. 20-Feb. 19) Spend more time learning about something you want to pursue. Choose a healthy lifestyle that will protect you from injury or illness. Be ready to do something interesting.

FAMILY CIrCUS

Celebrity Cipher cryptograms are created from quotations by famous people, past and present. Each letter in the cipher stands for another.

toDAy's cLuE: X EQuALs c

CeLebrItY CIpher

For better or For WorSe

SALLY Forth

beetLe bAILeY

Mother GooSe And GrIMM

SherMAn’S LAGoon

Sudoku

InstructIons: sudoku is a number-placing puzzle based on a 9x9 grid with several given numbers. The object is to place the numbers 1 to 9 in the empty squares so that each row, each column and each 3x3 box contains the same number only once. The difficulty level of the sudoku increases from monday to sunday.

Yesterday’s Puzzle Answer

THe wiZard oF id

BLondie

BaBY BLueS

Hi and LoiS

CurTiS

By PHILLIP ALDER Bridge

Benjamin Franklin said, “An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.”

At the bridge table, we try to use the knowledge gleaned from the bidding and the play (as it progresses) to make informed decisions. How should the play go in this three-no-trump contract after West leads the spade queen? What is the key piece of knowledge declarer wants and East must keep hidden?

South starts with seven top tricks: two spades, one heart, three diamonds and one club. He could attack either hearts or clubs, but the minor suit offers much better chances for three tricks.

Declarer ducks the first trick, takes the second spade with his king, plays a diamond to dummy’s queen, and leads a club to his nine West wins this with say, the queen (he should vary his play in this situation) and continues with another spade to dummy’s ace.

Now comes dummy’s last club. What happens next?

If Eastcarelessly plays his eight,South should put up his ace, dropping West’s king and collecting11 tricks. Whyshould he drop the king?

Given that East is known to have the club 10 from the first round of the suit, when East plays the club eight second, he started with 10-8-5 or K-10-8-5. In the second case, the contract is unmakable. However,onthesecondroundofclubs, Eastshouldfollowtheexcellentprinciple of playing the card he is known to hold If he puts up the 10, declarer will place him with K-10-5, finesse his club jack, and go down three. © 2025 by nEa, inc., dist. By andrews mcmeel syndication

wuzzles

Each Wuzzle is a word riddle which creates a disguised word, phrase, name, place, saying, etc. For example: nOOn gOOD = gOOD aFTErnOOn

Previous answers:

word game

INstRuctIoNs: 1. Words must be of four or more letters. 2. Words that acquire four letters by the addition of “s,” such as “bats” or “dies,” are not allowed. 3. additional words made by adding a “d” or an “s” may not be used. 4. proper nouns, slang words, or vulgar or sexually explicit words are not allowed.

toDAy’s WoRD — WIDGEoN: WIJ-in: Any of several freshwater ducks.

Average mark 18 words

Time limit 25 minutes

Can you find 23 or more words in WIDGEON?

yEstERDAy’s WoRD — APHEsIs

aphis apish apse apsis ashes pass passe phase hasp heap hiss sash sepia shape shea shies ship spies

today’s thought

“Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as you see the day approaching.” Hebrews 10:25

loCKhorNs

marmaduKe

Bizarro

hagar the horriBle

Pearls Before swiNe

garfield

B.C.

PiCKles

hidato

mallard fillmore

dIrectIons: make a 2- to 7-letter word from the letters in each row. add points of each word, using scoring directions at right. Finally, 7-letter words get 50-point bonus. “Blanks” used as any letter have no point value. all the words are in the Official sCraBBlE® players Dictionary, 5th Edition.

Puzzle Answer

ken ken

InstructIons: 1 Each row and each column must contain the numbers 1 thorugh 4 (easy) or 1 through 6 (challenging) without repeating. 2 The numbers within the heavily outlined boxes, called cages, must combine using the given operation (in any order) to produce the target numbers in the top-left corners. 3 Freebies: Fill in the single-box cages with the number in the top-left corner. HErE is a