UCLA women advance to Sweet 16
Seniors secure second straight trip to Sweet 16 in their final game at Pauley Pavilion.
The Bruins’ women’s basketball team cruised past Creighton, 86-64, on Monday to advance in the NCAA tournament. Above, UCLA’s Kennedy Burke pressures Creighton’s Olivia Elger during the game at Pauley Pavilion.
UCLA 86, CREIGHTON 64
It was Senior Night on Monday at Pauley Pavilion.
Playing the last home game of their college careers, Dominique Billings, Jordin Canada and Kelli Hayes combined for 23 first-half points as the UCLA women’s basketball team cruised past Creighton 86-64 in the second round of the NCAA tournament.
The third-seeded Bruins (26-7) advanced to the Sweet 16 for the third straight year, a first in program history, and will face second-seeded Texas in the semifinals of the Kansas City Regional on Friday at 6 p.m. PDT.
“It was special leaving the game for the last time with Mo and Kelli and the crowd cheering,” Canada said. “Thinking about what we’ve built here, why I came here ... it all came back to me. To get a win in my last home game
here ever is awesome.”
UCLA is one victory away from its second Elite Eight appearance. The first came in 1999.
“I’m so proud of our players for sustaining their identity and focus for 40 minutes against a really good team,” coach Cori Close said. “Our seniors have set a new standard for UCLA and when we finally took them out, I felt like a proud parent.”
The game was more onesided than the teams’ other meeting this season, when the Bruins pulled away in the second half to prevail 7263 at the South Point Thanksgiving Shootout in Las Vegas. This time UCLA shot 57.6% from the field over the first two quarters to forge a 17-point lead.
“We knew we had to dictate better tonight,” Canada said. “We saw there were a lot of upsets earlier in the day and we wanted to make sure that’s not going to be us.”
After Creighton forward Audrey Faber opened the scoring with a three-pointer, UCLA went on a 13-0 run. Hayes and Lajahna Drummer hit jumpers, Billings made a bank shot and a layup, Kennedy Burke made a three-pointer and Canada made a fadeaway jumper following a timeout.
“UCLA was terrific tonight,” coach Jim Flanery said. “They defended us well, they were sharp offensively, they forced the pace and they pressed more than I expected. We play Marquette and DePaul and those are super up-tempo teams so we’re used to it, but we needed to do better from a communication and physicality standpoint. In retrospect maybe we should’ve played more man-on-man from the beginning.”
Creighton (19-13), which finished fourth in the Big East Conference and was seeded 11th, upset sixthseeded Iowa 76-70 in the first round Saturday, but trailed by as many as 28 points in the second half against the Bruins.
“Offensively, they made everything hard for us,” said Faber, who had a team-high 20 points. “I didn’t do much differently to be honest, I just take what they give me.”
Billings finished with 15 points and nine rebounds, Hayes had four points and Canada, a McDonald’s AllAmerican at Los Angeles Windward, had 21 points, eight assists and five steals, and was subbed out to a standing ovation with 1 minute 57 seconds left.
Japreece Dean scored 16 points, Kennedy Burke had 11 and Drummer had 10 for the Bruins, who are 19-1 when scoring at least 70 points and won for the 15th time in 18 games. UCLA is 8-1 all-time against Big East teams.
“I admire our seniors so much and they’ve been great leaders,” said Dean, who didn’t play the first time against Creighton. “I’m a point guard also, so Jordin especially I’ve learned a lot from.”