UCLA women’s basketball must beat Duke to reach Final Four

SACRAMENTO – Cori Close hasn’t seen many shots – much less game-winners – like it.

The ball circling the rim, one revolution and then another, before finally falling through the net after the buzzer.

“Wow,” Close said Saturday, a day after Duke’s Ashlon Jackson made the shot of a lifetime to beat LSU in the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament. “What a great moment. She’ll never forget that.”

When it comes to facing those Blue Devils on Sunday in the Elite Eight, Close is hoping for some familiarity from her top-seeded UCLA women’s basketball team.

The Bruins smashed Duke by 30 points when the teams met in November. That was part of a terrible start for the Blue Devils in which they lost six of their first nine games, including a 16-point setback against LSU.

But as third-seeded Duke showed with its breathless 87-85 victory over the second-seeded Tigers on Friday night inside the Golden 1 Center, things can change this time of year.

“We sort of told our team, look, these are two completely different teams,” Close said. “And even though we played in November, credit to them, they have just done a marvelous job with their team and how they’re playing right now and the connectivity that they’re playing with. They’re just playing with great effort and great connectivity.

“And I think we’re a lot different and better, too. So it’s going to be a matter of who can play to their identity best.”

UCLA hasn’t put together a strong start-to-finish game in this NCAA Tournament.

The Bruins (34-1) struggled early against Cal Baptist and late against Oklahoma State before experiencing another slow start against Minnesota on Friday in the Sweet 16.

Duke (27-8) built a late double-digit lead against LSU and looked like it was going to prevail with relative ease before nearly faltering. It took Jackson’s heroic shot after faking an LSU defender out of the way to keep the Blue Devils’ season alive.

“I thought Flau’jae [Johnson] really contested and really tried to chase her off the line,” Close said, referring to the Tigers guard, “and for [Jackson] to have the composure and sidestep that and have it go in – our players were going crazy. Compliment to them.”

Close said she sees a team that has grown in its confidence while winning 24 of its last 26 games, including an Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament championship.

“Nobody gave that to them, in my opinion,” Close said of the Blue Devils. “I’m obviously not in their practices every day. But credit to their staff. It’s not easy to do in those really rocky beginning moments to just fight for a little bit more belief and a little bit more skill improvement and a little bit more tactical efficiency.

“I have a lot of respect. As a leadership group, that’s really difficult. And as young people, it’s really difficult to stay the course. [Leadership guru] Jon Gordon works a lot with our team. He talks about high state of mind, low state of mind. And most people miss out on high state of mind because they jump ship when they’re in the low state, right before it’s about to come back up.

“And I give them a lot of credit for what they’ve earned because they stayed the course.”

Perhaps the scariest thing for the Blue Devils to consider about this rematch is that the Bruins will have both Lauren and Sienna Betts after the sisters missed the first meeting with injuries.

“Totally different team,” Duke coach Kara Lawson said of UCLA at full strength. “Without both of them, they kicked our butt. And it wasn’t close. And so we’re mindful of how much better we have to play just to be in the game. And we’re focused on putting together a game plan against one of the best teams in the country.”