Lauren Betts buried her face in a towel at the end of the UCLA bench. The Bruins center breathed deeply, lifted her head and wiped her tears.
She doesn’t want to go out like this.
“Coming back next year, I think I’m just going to continue to grow as a leader,” Betts said after UCLA’s historic season ended with an 85-51 loss to Connecticut in the national semifinal Friday, “and remind everybody what that standard is and show that with urgency every single day.”
UCLA broke ground with the program’s first NCAA Final Four appearance. The Bruins set a single-season program record with 34 wins. They claimed their first conference tournament title since 2006.
Yet the disappointment of the worst Final Four loss in NCAA tournament history has motivated them to push further toward UCLA’s first national championship since 1978.
“Really unusual to be in this position at the Final Four and have zero seniors in your locker room,” head coach Cori Close said, “and to have an opportunity to come back stronger, more connected, learning from this experience and be better the next time.”
Read more:UCLA's run to the Final Four ends in record rout by UConn: 'We got our butts beat'
Every player on UCLA’s roster has eligibility to return, including Betts, a draft-eligible junior who already expressed her desire to play with her younger sister Sienna. A stretch 6-foot-4 wing, Sienna is set to join the Bruins after being named the most valuable player of the McDonald’s All-American game this month.
“She's a way better shooter than I am,” Lauren said. “To be honest, I feel like for her being younger, I think she is a little bit smarter than I am, too. She's genuinely one of the smartest basketball players I've ever been around.”
The Bruins have also signed guard Lena Bilic to reach the NCAA scholarship limit of 15. Playing for Croatia’s ZKK Tresnjevka 2009 in the country’s top league, the 6-foot-3 guard averaged 15.4 points, six rebounds, 1.8 assists and 1.7 steals per game.
With Sienna’s addition, the Bruins have stockpiled talent at the four position, where Angela Dugalic, Timea Gardiner and Janiah Barker split time this season. Dugalic, a graduate student who has one year of eligibility remaining because of a knee injury in 2022, started 63 games in the last two seasons. She said she has not made a decision ...
