{"id":461389,"date":"2025-12-21T03:27:16","date_gmt":"2025-12-21T03:27:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/461389\/"},"modified":"2025-12-21T03:27:16","modified_gmt":"2025-12-21T03:27:16","slug":"gabriela-jaquez-and-ucla-women-dominate-in-win-over-long-beach-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/461389\/","title":{"rendered":"Gabriela Jaquez and UCLA women dominate in win over Long Beach State"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

UCLA<\/a> women\u2019s basketball coach Cori Close<\/a> could not have imagined a better way for her team to wrap up nonconference play than Saturday afternoon\u2019s 106-44 trouncing<\/a> of Long Beach State at Pauley Pavilion.<\/p>\n

Coming off Tuesday\u2019s 115-28 triumph over Cal Poly San Luis Obispo \u2014 UCLA\u2019s largest margin of victory during the NCAA era \u2014 the Bruins picked up where they left off, leading wire-to-wire for their fifth consecutive win since suffering their lone loss to Texas on Nov. 26.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re growing … we had a couple of lapses today and we\u2019re not there yet, but we\u2019re heading in the right direction,\u201d Close said. \u201cI love the selflessness of this team.\u201d<\/p>\n

Senior guard Gabriela Jaquez<\/a> led the way with 17 points and made five of six three-point shots. Angela Dugalic added 13 points while Gianna Kneepkens had 10 points and 10 rebounds. All 11 Bruins who played scored at least one basket.<\/p>\n

\"UCLA <\/p>\n

UCLA forward Sienna Betts, top, and Long Beach State forward Kennan Ka dive for the ball during the Bruins\u2019 win Saturday.<\/p>\n

(Jessie Alcheh \/ Associated Press)<\/p>\n

Playing their last game in Westwood until Jan. 3, when they will host crosstown rival USC, the Bruins (11-1 overall, 1-0 in Big Ten) looked every bit like the No. 4 team in the country, improving to 6-0 at home. They are ranked fourth in both the Associated Press and coaches polls behind Connecticut, Texas and South Carolina.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m really proud of our nonconference schedule. Not many local teams are willing to play us, so I want to compliment Long Beach State,\u201d Close said. \u201cOur starting guards [Charlisse Leger-Walker and Kiki Rice] combined for 17 assists and one turnover. We have depth and balance and that\u2019s a great luxury to have.\u201d <\/p>\n

Jaquez scored nine of the Bruins\u2019 first 12 points. She opened the scoring with a three-pointer from the top of the key and added triples on back-to-back possessions to increase the margin to eight points. Her fourth three-pointer, from the right corner, extended the lead to 21-5.<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

Sienna Betts\u2019 jumper in the lane put UCLA up by 19 at the end of the first quarter. The sophomore finished with 14 points and senior Lauren Betts<\/a> added 17. The sisters\u2019 parents, Michelle and Andy, played volleyball and basketball, respectively, for Long Beach State. Sienna wears her mom\u2019s No. 16 while Lauren dons her dad\u2019s No. 51.<\/p>\n

Rice\u2019s steal and layup made it 46-18 with 3:28 left in the first half and Leger-Walker\u2019s tip-in at the buzzer gave the Bruins a 34-point advantage at halftime. Rice had a complete game, contributing 15 points, nine rebounds, seven assists, four steals and one block.<\/p>\n

The result continued the Bruins\u2019 recent dominance against the Beach. UCLA has won six straight head-to-head meetings, including a 51-point blowout in the schools\u2019 previous matchup last December, when Close became the all-time winningest coach in program history by earning her 297th victory to surpass Billie Moore (296-181). Long Beach State has not beaten the Bruins since 1987 under Joan Bonvicini, who posted a 16-1 record versus UCLA in her 12 seasons at the Beach from 1979 to 1991.<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

The Bruins\u2019 primary focus on defense was slowing down sophomore guard JaQuoia Jones-Brown, who entered Saturday averaging 17.2 points per game. She scored 10 of the Beach\u2019s 11 points in the first quarter but was held scoreless the rest of the way. She has scored in double figures in nine of 10 games. Guard Christy Reynoso added six points for Beach (0-10 overall, 0-2 in Big West).<\/p>\n

The Bruins travel to Columbus on Dec. 28 to face No. 21 Ohio State (9-1).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"UCLA women\u2019s basketball coach Cori Close could not have imagined a better way for her team to wrap…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":461390,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5123],"tags":[32072,1582,276,154448,93430,2961,210527,210525,224,5337,471,210528,449,24566,93425,114810,3007,358,173092,210526],"class_list":{"0":"post-461389","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-bruins","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-california","11":"tag-complete-game","12":"tag-kiki-rice","13":"tag-la","14":"tag-large-margin","15":"tag-long-beach-state","16":"tag-los-angeles","17":"tag-losangeles","18":"tag-no","19":"tag-nonconference-play","20":"tag-point","21":"tag-rebound","22":"tag-sienna-betts","23":"tag-steal","24":"tag-team","25":"tag-texas","26":"tag-ucla-woman","27":"tag-well-way"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115755434546217474","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461389","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=461389"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461389\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/461390"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=461389"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=461389"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=461389"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}