| Women’s Basketball |
|---|
| Minnesota — 56 |
| UCLA — 80 |
You can NOT make this up.
This team is without a doubt one of the best UCLA women’s basketball teams in UCLA’s history.
On Friday night, the No. 1 Bruins women’s basketball team (34-1, 18-0 Big Ten) crushed the University of Minnesota (24-9, 13-5 Big Ten) at the Golden 1 Center in Sacramento, advancing to the Elite Eight contest for the second year in a row.
The Bruins started off with a strong first quarter that saw them outscore Minnesota 18-10. The Bruins struck first with a layup by graduate guard Charlisse Leger-Walker, followed by a jump shot by senior center Lauren Betts with an assist by senior guard Kiki Rice.
While the Bruins were better than Minnesota in the first quarter, they missed several opportunities to score — most notably, freshman forward Sienna Betts missed both of her free throws, and the Bruins as a team went 8-17 in field goal attempts. The Bruins also almost went three minutes without scoring—a testament to how challenging Minnesota’s defense was in the first quarter.
The Bruins offense also faltered heavily in the second quarter, where they were outscored by Minnesota 19-16.
However’ the Bruins’ elite defense was able to keep them in the game and prevent Minnesota from taking the lead.
Coach Cori Close commented on the offensive struggles in a postgame interview, stating that “They didn’t let missed shots affect our commitment to the defensive end of the floor — we found another way to be 1-0, so we get another chance to go 1-0.”
But after halftime, the Bruins decided that they had had enough of the offensive mishaps, and outscored Minnesota with a combined 46 points to their 27, with their most dominant outing being during the fourth quarter.
During the third quarter, the Bruins started off strong with two layups by senior guard Gabriela Jaquez and one by Rice, with the first two of these layups being assisted by Leger-Walker, and the third being assisted by Rice.
At the end of the third quarter, the first 3-pointer shot was scored by the Bruins, in a shocking fashion. Assisted by Jaquez, freshman guard Lena Bilić, who rarely even scores, hit a 3-point from deep.
The first 3-pointer of the game wasn’t from Betts or Rice—but from Bilić, in a moment that she will likely remember for the rest of her career.
In the fourth quarter, the Bruins absolutely dominated, shooting 10-18 in field goal attempts, going 3-7 in 3-point attempts and going 4-5 in free throws.
Jaquez, Betts and Rice shone bright yet again in the fourth, where Rice hit a 3-pointer and two layups, Betts made a layup and two free throws, and Jaquez hit a towering jump shot and made a free throw.
By the end of this dominant quarter, the Bruins had won the game 80-56.
Close, although pleased with how the Bruins had won against Minnesota, attributed much of the success of today’s game to playing Big Ten opponents like Minnesota in the conference: “Part of the way we were able to play today is the way they got us ready.”
The Bruins have emphasized that they will not stop here—they are looking to have a deep run in March.
Betts, in a postgame interview, stated that “We’re going to make things hard for them—I think we did that, and it creates opportunities for us to play in transitions.”
The Bruins now turn their attention to facing Duke at the Elite Eight contest on Sunday, March 29 at 12 p.m. PST.
