It didn’t take coach Kathy Olivier long to figure out the cause of her team’s loss Wednesday night at Pepperdine.
“You’re not going to beat anyone if you allow 91 points,” Olivier said in a phone interview after the game.
The Bruins (3-2) fell 91-79 to the Waves (3-2) at Firestone Fieldhouse in Malibu, allowing more points than they have in any of their previous games this season.
Despite the final score, the game was close throughout.
UCLA was down just three points, 71-68, with 4:39 remaining before the Waves scored seven quick points in the span of a minute and never looked back.
The most disheartening part of the loss for Olivier was the number of times her team sent Pepperdine to the free-throw line.
The Waves shot 35 free throws and made 30 of them.
“On the road you need to adjust to the referees,” Olivier said. “We need to learn from this, our awareness needs to kick in quicker.”
The Bruins like to play an aggressive style and usually employ a man-to-man defensive style. On Wednesday night the Bruins were repeatedly called for touch fouls.
Olivier decided to switch things up with a 2-3 zone in the first half. But the Bruins weren’t able to defend the perimeter as well in the zone and the Waves used their long-range shooting to control the game.
Pepperdine was led by senior guard Daphanie Kennedy, who finished the game with 27 points.
Freshman Regina Rogers stepped up for UCLA with 12 points and 16 rebounds for her first career double-double.
“Rogers is a very talented young lady,” Olivier said. “She does a lot of positive things and she was really crashing the boards tonight. She has to keep her balance and put in those easy buckets because she can hit a lot of and-1s if she does.”
Two other Bruins finished in double figures. Senior Lindsey Pluimer had 15 points and redshirt junior Tierra Henderson had 15 points, a career high.
The performances made it a tough loss for the Bruins.
Just two days earlier the team also lost a heartbreaker to No. 3 Maryland in a game they were in a position to win in the second half.
“I thought we had regrouped,” Olivier said. “But we missed so many easy shots in the first half, and in the second half it just got away from us.”
The Bruins started three freshmen in the game, Rogers at forward, and Doreena Campbell and Darxia Morris at guard.
But it may not have been the inexperience that hurt the Bruins most.
It may have been the sheer number of players the Bruins used and the fact that the coaching staff is still searching for the right combination of players to use at the end of close games.
“We’re still learning where we want people in crunch time,” Olivier said. “We play so many different combinations.”
NEVADA-BOUND: The team will be on the road again this weekend as it travels to Reno, Nev., to play in the Nugget Classic.
In the first round the Bruins will play an experienced Idaho State team Saturday that reached the NCAA tournament last season.
On Sunday the Bruins will play either Southern or Nevada.