UCLA Women Upset Washington

It took the UCLA women’s basketball team only two minutes on Friday night to show it had recovered from last week’s two-point loss to USC.

In that span, UCLA made four trips down the floor and scored four times. Washington turned the ball over once and came up dry in its first three possessions.

It previewed what was to come as the Bruins ended a three-game losing streak when they upset the No. 13-ranked Huskies, 91-60, at Pauley Pavilion before a crowd of 531. It was the most one-sided victory for UCLA since the conference went to 10 teams in the 1986-87 season.

There was another major breakthrough for the Bruins. Washington (12-5, 4-3) hadn’t lost to UCLA (10-6, 3-3) since March of 1985, winning 11 consecutive games since then.

UCLA guard Rehema Stephens wasn’t about to let the streak continue. Make that both losing streaks. “It’s something we’ve carried with us,” said Stephens, who had 21 points, nine rebounds and seven assists.

“We thought it was going to be a lot closer than what it was. The way we jumped out on them at the start of the game, I could see they came out a little flat.”

The Huskies didn’t hit their stride, with the exception of a 12-2 run shortly before halftime that cut UCLA’s lead to 46-35. But the Bruins started quickly again by outscoring the Huskies, 6-2, in the first 2:30 of the second half.

Washington Coach Chris Gobrecht was succinct after her team lost their third in a row. “We were out to lunch,” she said.

UCLA Coach Billie Moore said her team wasn’t demoralized when it came back to practice Monday after the USC loss.

“We just came back and tried to refocus,” she said.

Stephens concurred. “What helped us was the four-day break. We had to really go hard in practice,” she said. “Today, we got really psyched up. I think we’re the best team in the Pac-10 by far. But we’ve just been missing it.”

The Bruins’ inside play improved drastically with Natalie Williams scoring 18 points, reserve Amy Jalewalia getting 20 and Lynn Kamrath seven.