The Bruins ran with the No. 2 team in the country for three quarters, but fell short down the stretch.
For the second time this season, a top-two team outlasted the Bruins down the stretch.
No. 8 UCLA women’s basketball (14-3, 3-2 Pac-12) fell to No. 2 Stanford (17-1, 5-0) by a score of 72-59 on Friday night, making it two losses in three games for the Bruins. The result came just over a month after UCLA came up short of an upset against No. 1 South Carolina in Columbia, and this contest had a similar progression, only at Pauley Pavilion.
The Bruins were competitive for three quarters, and were close at the start of the fourth. Their shots stopped falling in the fourth, however, and they lost their chance at besting one of the best teams in the country as a result.
A pair of early 3-pointers by forward Emily Bessoir gave UCLA a four-point lead two-and-a-half minutes into the game. After point guard Gina Conti got a 3 of her own to fall, Stanford answered with two triples to retake the lead.
The Bruins and Cardinal were only separated by more than three points for 23 seconds in the opening frame, and back-to-back 3-pointers by guard Charisma Osborne early in the second put the blue and gold up five.
Stanford battled back with a 9-0 run to go up five, but forward Gabriela Jaquez cut that short with another big 3-pointer. Guard Cameron Brown’s pair of free throws with 2:11 left on the clock were the final points scored by either team in the half, and the game was tied at 32-32 heading into the break.
The Cardinal came through with another 9-0 run early in the third, though, and the Bruins never took another lead.
When Stanford’s lead finally reached double digits, forward Lina Sontag hit a 3-pointer to start UCLA’s slow crawl back into it. While they never had a run greater than 4-0, the Bruins did keep chipping away at the lead until they were only down 51-49 heading into the final quarter.
The fourth quarter was all Stanford, though, as they opened things up on a 15-0 run. UCLA didn’t get a single shot to fall until Conti hit a 3 with 1:52 left on the clock, but they never got within single digits again.
Osborne and Conti each dropped 13, while Bessoir scored 10. All other Bruins combined to shoot 30.8% from the field, and Bessoir was the only player in the lineup who recorded more than four rebounds.
UCLA got outscored by 14 in the paint and 11 off turnovers, and they lost the rebounding battle 48-31.
The four star freshmen who had stood out so far this season – Jaquez, Kiki Rice, Londynn Jones and Christeen Iwuala – had just 14 points between them.
The Bruins have a chance to get back on the right track Sunday against Cal, with that game scheduled to tip off at 12 p.m. at Pauley Pavilion.
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