Alexander: The No. 1 UCLA women keep rolling, but the standards are high
LOS ANGELES – The standards do not change, even as UCLA’s women’s basketball Bruins continue to stack victories and remain the hunted.
They will be No. 1 in the AP poll for the 10th straight week – a record for a Big Ten team – after Sunday’s 79-53 conference victory over Minnesota, a tight game that turned into a rout thanks to a 20-6 Bruins run inside the final 7:06.
But no, the bar hasn’t been raised. It was always high.
This is what coach Cori Close said during a halftime interview over Pauley Pavilion’s loudspeakers, with her team holding a 33-28 lead: “We’re not playing with connectedness defensively. We’re not playing with connectedness and purpose offensively. … We’ve got to get out of our feelings and toughen up.”
Rest assured, the Bruins figured it out. Lauren Betts was swarmed by multiple defenders on most possessions – “Double teams? Try triple and quadruple teams,” Close said – but the 6-7 junior ended up with 11 assists along with six points and six rebounds. Finnish freshman Alina Aarnisalo scored 15 points, Kiki Rice 14 and Londynn Jones 13 – including a crowd-pleasing sequence when she had the ball stripped from her by Amaya Battle, chased after Battle and stole it back, then came back the other way and knocked down a jumper from the corner of the key.
“We talk a lot about our talent being the floor and our character being the ceiling,” Close said. “And two of the character traits that I think are most important for this team is a consistent selflessness and a consistent work ethic that is beyond our opponents. We obviously have a lot of talent pieces, but can we have those character traits be really solid?”
They seem to be, and maybe an indication could have been seen in the Mo Ostin Basketball Center, UCLA’s practice facility, for those up early enough to check it out. Close noted that a good number of players were in the gym at 7:45 Sunday morning, on a game day, shooting and working and preparing.
“Kiki Rice’s elite work ethic has created a culture in our program that you feel left out if you’re not doing the extra work,” Close said. “And that started with what she has brought to our team. And now it’s like every single person comes. And it’s not driven by the coaches. It is driven by the players.”
Rice said it’s “just become a habit for everyone on our team. Everyone’s in there, 12 o’clock game, whatever, super early, rolling in there at 7 a.m. and starting our workouts.
“And I think it’s a testament to just the character and the group that we have that everyone wants to do whatever it takes to be their best selves for this team, and I think it’s definitely been a huge area of growth from like my freshman year to now … Every day before and after practice, there’s someone shooting, so it’s great to see.”
Close noted the other day that she wasn’t hired to win something in January or February. In other words, the goal remains to be the last team standing in April. The Nov. 24 victory over South Carolina at Pauley Pavilion boosted the Bruins into the No. 1 spot and got the nation’s attention, but when I asked Close if that lofty ranking had raised the bar in terms of what she expected in terms of the team’s culture, standards and work ethic, she said no.
“I think that the standard was already there because we already wanted to have championship standards,” she said. “So those were already laid out for us. You know, we study in the off-season every year, what are the Final Four teams doing that maybe we’re not yet. And then what are the gaps that we need to close?”
Here is one example. UCLA has three of the top 25 rebounders in the Big Ten in Betts (9.9 per game going into Sunday, which was third in the conference and 25th nationally), 6-4 junior Janiah Barker (6.8, 21st in the Big Ten) and Angela Dugalić (6.0, tied for 25th in the conference). And the Bruins as a team are fourth nationally in rebounds per game (45.4) and first in rebounding margin (16.3) and top the Big Ten in both categories. Sunday they had a 36-31 edge over the Gophers.
It’s not enough.
“People can say statistically where we are in the Big Ten, but we go by percentages of our misses,” Close said. “Percentages of our misses on offense, we try to get 40 percent or better. And on defense, we’re trying to get 70 percent or better, 75% actually. We’ve been in the 60s the last three games in a row.
“And I told (the players), ‘Do you guys want to run or not?’ And they said, ‘Yeah, we want to play in transition. We didn’t like grinding it out and have them be able to set their defense and double team.’ (So) get more rebounds. When you get more defensive rebounds, you earn the right to play in transition that way. And so I don’t think that we’ve changed the standards. It takes what it takes to be a championship team, and it’s just a matter of what kinds of habits we’re willing to earn.”
Interesting phrasing. On teams I’ve been around – and teams I was on, as a very modestly talented high school JV player long, long ago – the question “Do you want to run” usually meant that not shaping up quickly on the practice floor meant running sprints, and lots of them.
Maybe she’s used it in that sense, too, given that she noted her biggest challenge coaching this team is “creating a sense of discomfort when we are below the standard, when the game doesn’t provide that discomfort.”
But that voluntary extra work in the gym sends this message: The players care, mightily, about meeting that standard. With that attitude, and a team that has both great ambition and the wherewithal to achieve its goals, such admonishment shouldn’t be necessary that often.
jalexander@scng.com