“I just didn’t understand how that could happen,” Betts said. “It just riles me up. It’s not getting mad at any individual. It was a team loss. I think, for me, it was how can I be better going into next year, and how can I push this team so we can get there again?”
Somewhere in all of those replays, the Bruins’ star center let it all go. The rage that followed the 85-52 thrashing by UConn faded into the work done to prepare for the next tournament run.
With another season of experience and a successful start to the NCAA Tournament behind them, the UCLA women’s basketball team (35-1) has earned another shot in the Final Four against fellow No. 1 seed Texas (35-3), which crushed No. 2 seed Michigan, 77-41, on Monday night in Fort Worth.
And this time, the Bruins are determined not to get blinded by the big stage.
“That was just a new scene for us,” graduate forward Angela Dugalić said. “Flashing lights – I keep saying that – but it truly was just a new scene for us. This year we have the approach of, this is a job. This is a business trip, at the end of the day. And we have a job to do. And that’s to win a national championship.”
UCLA faced a step up in competition in the Sweet 16 and Elite Eight against Minnesota and Duke, respectively. The Golden Gophers took away the Bruins’ 3-point shooting, and the Blue Devils’ well-executed defense held them to their lowest-scoring first quarter of the season.
Duke held a 10-point advantage for most of the second quarter and, in a rare occasion, UCLA trailed at halftime.
And yet, after a season of dominance that includes a 29-game winning streak, the Bruins showed that they are still capable of digging deep to get themselves out of a hole.
The locker room environment is fertile for comebacks, according to players. Dugalić said during the press conference that followed the Duke game that they are comfortable giving each other feedback at halftime without any fear of hurting feelings or egos.
“I’d be like OK, what have you guys talked about, what have we covered here,” head coach Cori Close said of the halftime locker room scene. “And then I had like two or three things that I thought were important, but I first listened. I think when you have a mature group and when your culture is pretty intact in terms of the values, it’s better for me to be quick to listen and slow to speak.”
The depth that UCLA has developed could continue to work in its favor.
Betts reigns supreme in the paint, making layups and rebounds look easy. Kiki Rice dominates with her ball-handling and midrange shot, while Gianna Kneepkens and Gabriela Jaquez have the ability to stretch the floor with their shooting.
Charlisse Leger-Walker’s basketball intelligence allows her to feed them the ball, and Dugalić can do almost anything off the bench, whether it’s creating mismatches in the post or scoring from just about anywhere on the court.
She recorded a double-double against Minnesota and had 15 points on 7-for-13 shooting, six rebounds and four assists against Duke.
“Angela was in a zone,” Close said after the Duke game. “I needed to use my timeouts to rest her and shorten the subbing rotation, because I could just see it in her eyes. She just had a presence about her and a confidence that our team was really feeding off of. I thought it was just important to ride that home.”
Texas was the only team to beat UCLA all season, taking the Bruins down, 76-75, in the Players Era Women’s Championship in late November.
It will be business as usual for UCLA. Now that the frustration from last season’s Final Four is gone, the Bruins can move forward.
“We know what it takes to be successful at that level,” Rice said. “We know the habits and the kind of basketball that you need to play in order to win at that stage. We’ve really worked hard in building those, so we have complete confidence in ourselves that look – this is a new group. This is going to be a different outcome.”
