PHOENIX — UCLA’s bid to play for its first NCAA Division I women’s basketball championship came to a harsh end last season with a blowout loss in the national semifinals to the University of Connecticut, and the Huskies went on to beat South Carolina in the title matchup and push their record haul of crowns to a dozen.
Now the Bruins are back, along with the rest of last year’s Final Four teams, and hope to have better luck in the desert. Standing in the way is Texas, the only team to beat them in what has otherwise been a dominating season.
“For us, it’s just coming out ready to go,” UCLA guard Gabriela Jaquez said Thursday. “The main thing is being ready to play, coming out to get every loose ball, play as a team, just playing like we know how to play.”
The Longhorns (35-3) and the Bruins (35-1) are set for a 9:30 p.m. Eastern tipoff Friday at the Mortgage Matchup Center in Phoenix, following the opening pairing of South Carolina (35-3) and UConn (38-0) at 7. Both games will be televised by ESPN, and the winners advance to the title matchup at 3:30 p.m. Sunday on ABC.
Coach Cori Close’s Bruins spent most of the season pushing around opponents, winning by an average of 20.9 points per game (to rank fifth nationally) on their way to a program record for wins. The Longhorns were the bullies, though, when the teams met Nov. 26 at the Players Era Championship in Las Vegas.
Texas used its physical guards to rush the Bruins into a string of turnovers as the Longhorns built a 20-point halftime lead, then staved off UCLA’s late charge to win 76-65. UCLA also had a hard time getting the ball to All-America center Lauren Betts, who had a season-low eight points on just eight shots.
“Coming out with a certain level of aggression is important, and I’m going to make sure I do that,” Betts said.
UCLA rebounded to beat Duke by 30 the next day, kicking off a program-record streak of 28 straight wins that included four double-digit wins in the NCAA tournament.
The Longhorns kept rolling, opening the season with 18 straight wins before consecutive setbacks at LSU when the Tigers were ranked fifth and at South Carolina when the Gamecocks were ranked fourth. The losses frustrated Texas coach Vic Schaefer, but his irritation peaked a month later with a 16-point loss at Vanderbilt that had him saying his team was “soft” and “had no heart.”
The Longhorns responded by dominating against every team they face after that, winning 12 straight games by an average of 26.5 points. That included a 17-point win over South Carolina in the Southeastern Conference tournament title game and four straight NCAA tourney blowouts in which they allowed an average of 49.4 points per game.
Texas, in the Final Four for the fifth time, is seeking its first national championship since going undefeated in 1986.
“Right now, they’re playing as good as any team I’ve ever had,” said Schaefer, in his fifth season at Texas after a successful run at Mississippi State from 2012-20.
He is the only coach in NCAA Division I history to lead two women’s programs to multiple Final Fours, with the Bulldogs reaching the national title game in 2017 and 2018.
A huge factor Friday will be whether UCLA can handle the defensive pressure. The Longhorns hounded the Big Ten’s Bruins into 20 turnovers into Las Vegas, converting those into 18 points.
UCLA had similar problems taking care of the call against Duke last weekend in the Elite Eight, turning it over 12 times to trail at halftime for the second time this season. The Bruins rallied from the eight-point deficit to win 70-58, but they finished with 18 turnovers.
The Longhorns have big, physical guards who put constant pressure on ballhandlers, a big reason they have forced an average of 22 turnovers per game.
Another key will be the performance of the teams’ two first-team AP All-Americans.
Betts averaged 18.5 points and 7.6 rebounds while shooting 60.1% from the field this season to be named an All-American again a year after becoming the program’s first. She’s the fourth player in NCAA history with at least 600 points, 300 rebounds, 100 assists and 70 blocks in a season.
Meanwhile for Texas, junior Madison Booker has the size of a forward at 6-foot-1, but the skills of a guard, making her a brutal matchup for any opposing team.
Booker has per-game averages of 19.3 points on 51.6% shooting, 6.1 rebounds and 3.8 assists, and she leads the team with 83 steals. She’s the only player in NCAA women’s basketball history with at least 1,500 points, 900 assists, 600 rebounds and 350 steals.
UCLA owns a record 11 NCAA Division basketball titles on the men’s side. UCLA did win the 1978 national championship in the Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women’s Division I tournament; women’s basketball didn’t become a championship event for the NCAA until the 1981-82 season.