Los Angeles, CA – UCLA for the second time this week put on another offensive clinic with Seniors Gabriela Jaquez and Lauren Betts scoring 17 points apiece to lead the No. 4 UCLA against winless Long Beach State, 106-44 on Saturday at Pauley Pavillion to follow up their largest victory margin on Tuesday night against Cal-Poly.
“I just wanted to say as we go into this holiday season and we talk about basketball, in the end it’s putting an orange thing in an orange thing,” UCLA Head Coach Cori Close said. “And the reality is that it allows us to be able to be a part of people’s lives at a meaningful level. And I just want to say that I’m humbled to be a part of that. And I just needed to mention that we’re really lucky to be a part of being a blessing to other people and I’m very thankful to have a team that adopts that kind of vision.”
Senior Guard Kiki Rice continues to follow such vision on and off the court with seven assists to go along 15 points, nine rebounds for the Lady Bruins. Senior Transfer Gianna Kneepkens had a double-double with 10 points and 10 rebounds as one of six Bruins in double figures. Jaquez tied her career high with five 3-pointers with four of them coming in the first quarter.
“I mentioned earlier in the season, I just know what my I want my shot to feel like and yeah, they have confidence in me and my teammates set me up,” Jaquez said. “I mean, it’s really hard to guard all of us on the court, so they create open shots for me.”
JaQuoia Jones-Brown rallied 10 points to lead Long Beach while a couple of her star teammates, Khylee-Jade Pepe and Judit Oliva Fernandez, found themselves in foul trouble. The Beach had 20 turnovers and loss just about every statistical category.
UCLA led 29-11 in the opening period and closed the second with a 20-5 run, increasing the margin to 57-23 at halftime.
“I think that our coaches have been doing a great job of holding the standard and we continue to talk about that, but that’s just coming in every day ready to work,” Jaquez said. “I think that we took it and applied it in the games and making sure we’re maintaining our focus even though we’re up by how many points, but continuing to challenge ourselves…going into this break, we’ll enjoy it and then come back and have some tough matchups ahead, but we’re going to continue to take in the hard coaching because we know that’s what we need.”
The Bruins (11-1) held the Beach (0-10) to eight points in the third while pushing their lead to 78-31, capped by Jaquez’s fifth 3-pointer. UCLA defense continues to remain consistent while outscoring the Beach 28-13. Dual-athlete and crowd favorite Megan Grant recorded another basket in a game for the season.
“The two areas that we’re focusing in terms of growth right now are limiting three-point attempts by our teammates or by our opponents and in defensive rebound percentage,” Coach Close said. “The reality is when we’ve played teams like you know South Carolina, Oklahoma, Texas, UConn, Duke that are really strong offensive rebounding teams, those are the ones that when we rebound well and that we defend and get stops. When we don’t rebound well, we have a harder time.”
UCLA freshman and younger sister of senior star center Lauren Betts, Sienna Betts didn’t have a hard time reaching double digits in her second game,scoring a season high 14 points in 15 minutes. After being out for the Bruins first 10 games due to a lower left leg injury in preseason practice, she has adapted quickly and smoothly thus far in her season debut.
“I think I’m like just a player that can like mesh well with other people. Like I feel like I go off of other people’s skills pretty well,” Sienna said. “I mean I’m still only two games in so I got to show some of it but I just hope to continue to be able to you know go farther out but also just maintain my post skills because that’s just as important even more.”
The Betts sisters showed off their chemistry tonight, setting each other up on multiple plays to score. In addition, this game provided another opportunity for the Lady Bruins to clear their bench and display their depth, with every active player tallying points.
“I’m just really grateful to like play the game like basketball, Sienna said. “And you don’t realize how much you appreciate it until it’s gone. So it just makes me super excited to be here with my teammates and be able to play with such amazing women and players. I’m just really really excited to just continue this season with everyone.”
This is UCLA’s third margin of victory over 50 points this season with two of them coming this week. Last season, when these two teams matched up a year ago around the same time this month, UCLA won by 32. This season with Coach Close raising the standard for her team as a result scoring margins have increased against non-conference opponents along with defense intensity.
“It’s not just that I pride myself on our defense. It’s that the last five out of six national champions were the number one defense in the country and we are the number one offense right now, but we are the 14th best defensive team,” Coach Close said. “And we need to continue to raise the level of our defense and, you know, compete with ourselves to get better every day. And that’s got to be the biggest competition that we have is our commitment to the defensive end.”
UCLA will take a basketball break before traveling to play No. 21 Ohio State on Dec. 28 in its second Big Ten game of the season.