Nebraska ends UCLA’s season

Reporting from Minneapolis

The first stretch without a field goal for the UCLA women’s basketball team lasted 6 1/2 minutes. The next drought saw 5:40 vanish from the clock without a basket. And capping it off were 10 consecutive offensive possessions early in the second half that didn’t produce a field goal.

Throw in a technical foul for having six players on the court and allowing a team to shoot 55% from the field and the Bruins saw their season end with an 83-70 loss to top-seeded Nebraska in the second round of the NCAA tournament.

While UCLA showed great improvement this season, winning its most games since 1999 and equaling its best Pacific 10 Conference record in school history, the eighth-seeded Bruins did not close the season the way they had hoped.

The Bruins (25-9) got off to a fast start against the Cornhuskers and were within one point of early in the second half, but there was too much foul trouble, too many offensive woes and too little defense to advance to the NCAA regional semifinals for the first time since 1999.

“Nebraska’s a well-balanced team,” UCLA Coach Nikki Caldwell said. “They can shoot the three ball and score in the paint. You can’t give up both of them.”

Yet that’s what happened — especially in the second half. When Markel Walker threw a perfect no-look pass to a cutting Jasmine Dixon for an easy layup with 19:08 to play, the Bruins were within one, 35-34, and the idea of securing their first marquee victory of the season in five tries wasn’t totally farfetched.

But the next 10 offensive possessions produced seven missed shots, three turnovers and a pair of free throws. By the time Rebekah Gardner ended the slide with an 18-footer with 12:45 to play, UCLA trailed, 54-38.

“We started jump-shooting the basketball,” Caldwell said. “This team has to understand that we have to pound the ball inside. And our ball security wasn’t there either. We had too many turnovers [18], which led to too many easy opportunities for them.”

If it wasn’t over then, it was four minutes later. After the Bruins closed within 10, 57-47, with nine minutes to play, Nebraska’s Dominique Kelley scored seven of her game-high 22 points in succession and the Cornhuskers quickly led by 19 points.

Nebraska (32-1), which also got 18 points and 14 rebounds from star forward Kelsey Griffin, shot 65.2% in the second half.

While the Bruins weren’t pleased with this performance, the returning players know that the future is promising. UCLA’s top four scorers all return. While Walker and Dixon attract much of the attention, Darxia Morris and Doreena Campbell led the Bruins against Nebraska with 15 points each.

“I’m super excited,” said Dixon, who finished with 13 points. “I don’t see us declining, I see us going forward. Hopefully next year we’ll go further in the tournament.”

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