The UCLA women’s basketball team just was not meant to
bring home a victory over the University of Georgia last Friday
night.
They did try ““ with 30 seconds left, UCLA was only
trailing by three points ““ but they didn’t quite
succeed as Georgia was up 91-83 at the buzzer.
The fact that Georgia sophomore Kara Braxton added a career-high
30 points to the board didn’t help the Bruins’
chances.
Nor did the Georgia home crowd of nearly 3,000 fans, eager to
see their Bulldogs defeat a Pac-10 school after losses to both
Arizona and Arizona State.
Nor did a first half that saw the Bruins (4-2) miss chances to
score that they should have made.
“We came out a little flat and missed some easy shots and
came down on ourselves,” said UCLA head coach Katy
Olivier.
Although a similar situation occurred at Pauley Pavilion last
Wednesday against St. Mary’s, the Bruins came back on fire in
the second half with freshman guard Nikki Blue scoring an amazing
24 points.
At Georgia, even freshman forward Julia Pitts’ 20-point
addition to the scoreboard couldn’t push UCLA ahead.
The younger Bruins seemed again to dominate offensively, as
freshman guards Lisa Willis and Blue contributed 12 and 11 points,
respectively. All of Willis’ points came from three-pointers,
once more an exhibition of one of her strengths.
The older players’ scoring was lower than expected, with
senior guard Michelle Greco and junior Gennifer Arranaga adding 12
and 10 points, respectively. Greco entered the game averaging 18.2
points per contest.
“We feed off our old (players) and Greco wasn’t
doing what she normally does,” Olivier said. “They
mixed it up a lot defensively ““ they pressed us early and I
think that threw off any kind of rhythm we had.”
The Bruin defense has been working on strategy since its game
against St. Mary’s on Dec. 3, when they should have had a
stronger presence on the court.
“We need to prevent them from getting the ball,”
Willis said. “If (Greco) doesn’t get the ball
she’ll take herself out of the game.”
The second half the Bruins were stealing more and anticipating
rather than reacting, according to Olivier.
“We were more active and took more chances,” said
Olivier. “We did the right things.”
The Bruins must be tired from their whirlwind beginning games,
because Georgia was their third weekend road trip in three weeks.
The previous two weekends found the Bruins playing two-game
tournaments, first in Hawaii and last weekend in Las Vegas.
“Georgia seemed to be much more comfortable at
home,” Olivier said. “They picked it up a level and
played hard ““ and we kept fighting and stayed together and
I’m really proud of the girls for doing that.”
UCLA takes to the road again this week when they play at
Pepperdine Saturday at 5 p.m.