Dawn Staley and South Carolina really celebrated their national championship with Ring Pops and “Ring Us” shirts, and in our opinion, that’s the only way to do it.
On Monday, South Carolina got the chance to continue relishing in its historic run last season. The Gamecocks reflected on an undefeated record and a national championship in the only way you should — with complete shenanigans.
Those antics included Ring Pops (because why not?!) and custom shirts that said “Ring Us” for the whole team. Pretty sweet, right? However, that’s not nearly as awesome as the team’s actual rings. South Carolina received two pieces of totally iced-out jewelry for winning the SEC Championship and their national title.
The UCLA Bruins’ success against #1 South Carolina can’t be broken down to just one reason, the commanding win to end the Gamecocks’ 43-game win streak required many facets of the Bruins’ game to be top-tier but head coach Cori Close was able to diagnose the win with just six words.
Betts had far from her best scoring performance on Sunday, finishing with just 11 points but her impact far outweighed the 11 points, piling up 14 rebounds and four blocks. An area where Betts has improved in her second season as a Bruin is playmaking. She had four assists in Sunday’s win, with her season average sitting at 3.4 per game, up from only 0.9 last year.
While Close gave the blunt statement about Betts immediately after the Bruins’ 77-62 win on Sunday, she also expressed her respect for South Carolina head coach Dawn Staley.
“First of all they have set the standard,” Close said. “Such a respect for Dawn Staley, and her whole entire staff and team but we believed that we would win. We always say that it begins before it begins and we do the work mentally and we prepared really well.”
Now the Bruins are the #1 team in the country, taking the throne from the Gamecocks this week before returning to action on Friday at the Rainbow Wahine Showdown in Hawaii against UT Martin.
The Bruins are now 5-0 on the season following their Sweet 16 loss to LSU in March Madness last season. Betts alongside junior guard Kiki Rice and the rest of the talented Bruins squad have set their goals a little higher this year.
“We worked our butts off all week,” Betts said following UCLA’s first-ever win against the #1 team in the country. “I’m just so happy, so proud of all of the work we put in. We really earned this.”
The Gamecocks limited Betts to just eight field goal attempts, as she hit five of them to score 11 points in the win. She was still able to impact the game, with a season-high 14 rebounds, four blocks and four assists.
“I’m surrounded by amazing teammates and we play so selfless and whenever their number is called, they’re just ready to go,” Betts said. “I’m just so proud of this team.”
Now for the first time in school history the Bruins are the top team in the country as they enter the Rainbow Wahine Showdown tournament in Hawaii this weekend where UCLA will face UT Martin, Fresno State and Hawaii.
South Carolina’s head coach Dawn Staley left Sunday’s game against UCLA with a loss for the first time in 44 games, but Staley did take notice of the “great atmosphere” at Pauley Pavilion on Sunday.
“It was a great game, great atmosphere and great opportunity for UCLA to knock us off,” Staley said in the postgame press conference following the Bruins’ 77-62 win. “I thought we did a good job on Betts but we got killed by everybody else.”
As a team, UCLA shot 47% from the field and drilled ten threes while shooting 48% from deep in an efficient outing for the Bruins against the reigning national champion Gamecocks.
“They hit open looks, contested looks,” Staley said of the Bruins. “They had it going on on both sides of the basketball.”
It was the first time that UCLA head coach Cori Close had ever defeated Staley, it was also the first time in school history that the Bruins defeated South Carolina, bumping UCLA to 1-4 all-time against the Gamecocks.
“We knew we were going to play a really good UCLA team, didn’t anticipate them shooting the way they shot the basketball,” Staley said. “It was beautiful basketball by UCLA. Beautiful. On both sides, I’m on the opposite side of it but you can’t help but to love up on it because it was fluid.”
The energy was all positive for the UCLA Bruins for their postgame press conference on Sunday after their 77-62 win over the defending champs and #1 team in the country, South Carolina.
Bruins’ head coach Cori Close showed respect to the Gamecocks’ program and their legendary head coach Dawn Staley, saying that she’s “set the tone of what women’s basketball excellence should be” with South Carolina dominating the sport over the past decade.
“I thought they were taking shots that they didn’t want to have to take on a pretty consistent basis,” Close said postgame after the Bruins held South Carolina to 36% shooting in the game. “We knew that if we could force them into running halfcourt offense we’d have a really good chance.”
South Carolina amazingly only scored one fastbreak point in the game and scored just 11 points off of UCLA’s 17 turnovers. Even with one of most impressive wins in recent program history, Close still acknowledged that this isn’t March quite yet.
“It’s November 24th. Am I proud of our team? Yes but this is just the beginning,” Close said. “We just can’t get tired of doing things right.”
Sunday’s win was the first time in program history that the Bruins have defeated an AP #1 team in the country, with the Bruins doing so in convincing fashion.
“We all want the same thing at the end of the day,” junior center Lauren Betts said of the team. “It doesn’t matter who’s scoring the most points, at the end of the day we all just want to win.”
On Sunday, South Carolina’s 43-game win streak came tumbling down, and the murmurs will start about whether this is the “end of an era” for head coach Dawn Staley and her squad. However, let’s not do that.
Watching UCLA steamroll South Carolina, it’s pretty easy to have a knee-jerk reaction and say, “Pack it up, Gamecocks. You’re done.” But, if you’ve been paying attention, this was inevitable. From the team’s season opener against Michigan until now, South Carolina has been skating along.
The Gamecocks escaped multiple matchups despite substandard shooting and being bullied by buckets from all over the court. Most teams didn’t have enough to compete with the Gamecocks down the stretch of games, and South Carolina’s signature pesky defense usually saved them. However, UCLA was different. As Dawn Staley said after Sunday’s shellacking, “We ran into a buzz saw today.”
However, I would be more concerned if this was March. It’s November, and the team has played just six games with a tweaked roster.
It must be considered that South Carolina is still working through the loss of former center Kamilla Cardoso and how to replace her defensive presence, ability to rebound, and paint production. You can’t readily recreate 6-foot-seven with 14 points, 10 rebounds and two blocks per game. Sania Feagin and Chloe Kitts are stellar, but they aren’t Cardoso.
Also, while South Carolina’s shooting woes have also extended across the team, plaguing standouts like Raven Johnson and Te-Hina Paopao (and fans are starting to question what’s also happening with MiLaysia Fulwiley), this is Dawn Staley we’re talking about. She’s one of the best coaches in college basketball and the queen of adjustments. Staley will figure it out.
If she doesn’t, I’ll happily be wrong. Feel free to yell and scream at me for my horrid analysis. But this isn’t concerning…yet.
The UCLA women’s basketball put the country on notice, defeating the #1 South Carolina Gamecocks 77-62 at home on Sunday.
The sold out crowd at Pauley Pavilion was engaged all night, with UCLA never trailing in the win, a signature victory for Cori Close’s program. South Carolina entered Sunday’s game winners of 43 in a row, including an undefeated season last year that ended with a national title.
UCLA took a 43-22 lead into halftime, taking an early first quarter lead and never looking back. UCLA didn’t allow a South Carolina basket in the game’s first five minutes, holding the Gamecocks for the first half of the first quarter. A three by junior guard Londynn Jones gave the Bruins a 15-2 lead with 2:36 to play in the opening quarter.
Junior guard Kiki Rice was a full-go for UCLA for the first time all season, with Rice scoring 11 points on 5-11 shooting in 28 minutes. It was a modest scoring night for junior center Lauren Betts, finishing with 11 points, 14 rebounds and four blocks while playing 37 minutes. Jones led the Bruins with 15 points, as UCLA had five players with double figures.
South Carolina shot the three ball well, going 8-12 from deep but just 29.6% on two point shots. The Gamecocks would win the second half 40-34 but after the dominant first half by the Bruins, it was too late.
The #5 Bruins are due to climb in the rankings after doing what no other women’s college basketball team has done since April of 2023, beat the South Carolina Gamecocks.
The defending champion and #1 team in the country, South Carolina Gamecocks visiting Pauley Pavilion and the #5 ranked Bruins this Sunday won’t be the only heavyweight battle this weekend in women’s college basketball, with #3 USC hosting #6 Notre Dame in what could be a preview of what’s to come in the NCAA Tournament in March.
“It’s going to be an unbelievable atmosphere,” Close said of the top-five matchup against the Gamecocks. “I love it that the day before Notre Dame to play USC. It’s like Final Four-level basketball in November, in LA. How awesome is that?”
Close and the Bruins will certainly have their hands full on Sunday, with the Gamecocks having won 43 games in a row entering Sunday’s game. The last loss for South Carolina came in the Final Four back in 2023 against Caitlin Clark and the Iowa Hawkeyes, where Clark needed 41 points to hold off South Carolina 77-73.
It will be quite the collection of talent in Los Angeles this weekend, with both schools welcoming top-ten opponents with the Crosstown Showdown between the Bruins’ and the Trojans’ football teams right in between the two basketball games.
Dawn Staley and the South Carolina women’s basketball team put the women’s college basketball world on notice Saturday.
Staley and her crew were “in the building,” as the kids say, for College GameDay shenanigans and to be honored on the field ahead of a wild matchup with LSU. While chatting with the GameDay staff, Staley talked about the upcoming season and some of her team’s goals, including running it back with the national championship trophy.
Despite losing a pivotal player in the team’s starting lineup, like Kamilla Cardoso, to the WNBA, Staley says the goal remains the same. With the help of guard Raven Johnson, here’s what she told fans and anyone watching the broadcast (See the clip below and the 1:15 mark of the YouTube video):
“[I’m] excited for this group, for this team to — what do we call it, Raven? — the repeat tour. Let’s go! Let’s go!”
The UCLA Bruins women’s basketball team is easily a top-10 program heading into the 2024-2025 season. Now, the Bruins are hosting the defending national champion South Carolina Gamecocks in a massive showdown, as the UCLA X account posted.
The game will take place on Sunday, November 24, and there is a chance both teams could be ranked in the top-5 by that point.
These two teams have met recently with UCLA going to South Carolina in 2022 and then them facing off in the Sweet 16 in 2023, both games that were won by the Gamecocks.
It should be a packed house at Pauley Pavilion in November as Dawn Staley and the defending champs come to town, and it should be a good testament to how good Cori Close’s team will be.
The 𝙙𝙚𝙛𝙚𝙣𝙙𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙣𝙖𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣𝙖𝙡 𝙘𝙝𝙖𝙢𝙥𝙨 are coming to town in November 👀
The only way to secure a seat today is to purchase season tickets, which are on sale now!
