Last month, the UCLA women’s basketball team caused a rupture in the Pac-10 standings by beating then-No. 2 Stanford by 13 points.
This time around, the tables were turned as the Bruins (11-11, 6-5 Pac-10) fell to the No. 7 Cardinals (19-3, 9-2 Pac-10) by the same margin, 75-62 on Saturday.
The Bruins got off to a strong start and led the game for most of the first half until the seventh minute. At halftime, Stanford led by nine points, 33-24.
Early in the second half, the Bruins pulled within five points at 33-28, but that was the closest they would come to catching up.
With the help of a 23-3 run, Stanford put the game out of reach for UCLA. Stanford is known to have a strong home-team advantage, and the Bruins were aware of the Cardinal’s capability of going on scoring streaks. During that span, UCLA called two timeouts to try to slow the pace.
“Their team goes on runs at home, and we know that,” coach Kathy Olivier said. “It was really to just try to stop the bleeding and do whatever I could.”
Olivier received a technical foul during Stanford’s run. Olivier said she felt that the game was being officiated unfairly.
“The game was a little lopsided and I was just pointing that out and the officials didn’t like that,” Olivier said.
“K.O. was frustrated with the foul call and the foul count,” senior forward Lindsey Pluimer said. “I think the refs were just kind of overwhelmed.”
After Stanford’s senior guard Candice Wiggins made two free throws for the technical foul, the Bruins regrouped and fought hard to shorten the Cardinal’s lead but were unable to fully catch up.
“Stanford, they do their job and go on runs at home, and they had some good ups today,” Pluimer said. “I thought we did a good job staying with it.”
Stanford took full advantage of their two biggest offensive weapons: Wiggins and freshman forward Kayla Pederson. Wiggins and Pederson combined for 59 of Stanford’s 75 points.
In the win over Stanford earlier this season, a key to stopping the Cardinal was shutting down Pederson. In that game, UCLA held Pederson to only two points. On Saturday, Pederson made up for her previous poor performance by finishing with 28 points and 10 rebounds.
“We did such a good job on her the first time,” Olivier said. “She was 0-8 in Pauley. We knew that she was going to do some things, and she really crashed our boards hard, and that really hurt us.”
Pluimer finished with 16 points and six rebounds. Sophomore guard Erica Tukiainen contributed 11 points.
UCLA is looking ahead to the rest of the Pac-10 schedule. After falling to two top 10 teams on the road this weekend, the Bruins welcome the chance to play five of their last seven games at home.
“The biggest thing is to keep our heads up,” Olivier said. “We have five games coming up in Pauley and we have one road trip to finish out the Pac-10 season.
“These seven games are big.”
ALEXANDER OUT WITH CONCUSSION: On Saturday, the Bruins played without sophomore center Moniquee Alexander, who suffered a concussion during Thursday’s game against California. Alexander was elbowed in the jaw and was held from playing on Saturday. She will be re-evaluated this week to determine if she will be ready to reenter action against Washington State on Friday.