BIG TEN CONFERENCE WOMEN'S BASKETBALL TOURNAMENT

March 9, 2025

Cori Close

Lauren Betts

Kiki Rice

Londynn Jones

Gainbridge Fieldhouse

UCLA Bruins

Postgame Press Conference

UCLA - 72, USC - 67

THE MODERATOR: We are going to welcome the Big Ten Tournament champions UCLA Bruins to the press conference. Coach Cori Close, Lauren Betts, Londynn Jones, and Kiki Rice.

Coach, if you would make an opening statement.

CORI CLOSE: Thankful. Thankful and humbled to watch them persevere, to grow, to find ways to win, to be committed to selflessness. Just so grateful.

I just was praying this morning. I was like I just want to see them be the best version of themselves for each other, and that's what I got to see today is them just find a way, in unpredictable ways -- I just told them in the locker room, if you had told me we were going to turn the ball over 24 times and get outrebounded by 11 and still win, I would have told you you're crazy.

This group just said we'll find a way. There was no panic. They had great poise, and they did it with defense. We had nine kills in the game, and that's a huge thing. Kills are three stops in a row, and that was the difference in the game.

I just really want to say thank you to all the people who helped us get here. My staff, incredible, selfless, hard working, mission minded, incredible. Then just all the people, just for me personally that I wouldn't be sitting in this chair without.

There was someone when I was a sophomore in high school, Julie Plank, she was a coach at Stanford at the time. I went to camp, and everyone told me I was too short and too slow. She pulled me aside after camp and said, "You can do this," and she was here tonight, and I got to hug her and say thank you.

So just to humbly say "thank you" to the alumni, to all the people that came before us, I'm just full of gratitude.

Q. Comeback win over your rival after losing twice this season, for any of the players, take me through how you're feeling right now.

LAUREN BETTS: I'm kind of speechless right now. Not going to lie. Just speechless.

KIKI RICE: Excited and I'm proud of this group and how we fought today. It hasn't been easy. I thought we came out ready to play. Just really proud of everyone.

Q. Kiki and Londynn, what did you guys do in that third quarter? You both are playing with three and four fouls. You guys were down 13 at the beginning of the quarter. What changed for you at that point?

LONDYNN JONES: For me, it was just being smart. I know my team needed me, and I'm going to try to show up in any way I can, whether it's four fouls or one. It was important for me to just contain, keep in front, and communicate as much as I could to those around me.

KIKI RICE: I think it was just rebounding. We made a really big emphasis on rebounding, getting those 50-50 balls. Even though they ended up outrebounding us, we still found a way in the second half to turn it up and hustle and fight. I think what's we lacked the first two times we played them, and that's what we brought in the second half today when we came back and won.

Q. Lauren, you finished the game by 17 points. 13 of your points came in the second half alone. What do you think it was that helped spark you and helped you get into your flow in the game?

LAUREN BETTS: I think just taking advantage of my matchup and honestly doing whatever the team needed me to do in that moment. I think that I just was trying my best to get deep seals and just putting myself in the best position to score. I knew that I wasn't going to get calls, but I think it was the mentality that I had going into the second half that I was going to keep being aggressive.

Kiki spoke to me in the locker room as well, just reminding me that I'm not going to get calls, but I just have to keep playing hard, and the outcome will speak for itself.

Q. Lauren, this week you've won defensive Player of the Year action you've made First Team All Conference. Today you won the Big Ten Championship and Most Outstanding Player. What do these accolades mean for your confidence going into the NCAA Tournament?

LAUREN BETTS: It's great, but to be honest, they don't mean much to me. What means most is this win that this team had. I know the amount of work that went into it, and this team means everything to me.

Yeah, it's great, but I think honestly the confidence that this team has winning that game going into March Madness is a lot.

Q. Lauren, I'm wondering if you could just speak to the ability of this team to put a stamp on, in this first year of the Big Ten, the other teams knew the caliber of team you guys were. Obviously that makes you a target. What do you think sort of message that sends, or what kind of accomplishment is that?

LAUREN BETTS: Yeah, this is a really talented team. We knew we were coming into an amazing conference, and we never doubted that. We put in a lot of work all preseason, and we had the confidence that we were going to win this tournament and no one was going to deny us from that.

I think that just the work that was done in the dark just showed today. Like I said, these are amazing teams, but I think we were just the better team today, and there was a lot of work that went into it.

Q. Getting this win, how does it kind of fuel your mindset going into the NCAA Tournament? Does it put you in a good place mentally, do you think? For anybody that wants to answer?

LONDYNN JONES: Yeah, I think it puts us in a great place. We're going to honestly take our time. We still have a lot of work to do. So just going back and preparing for what's to come next and leaning on each other.

Yes, this does build confidence, so we know what we can do. We always believed what we can do, but it was just a matter of showing it. We did that tonight with a lot of heart, and we gave it all we had out there for 40 minutes, and that's the most important thing. It was going to be super important to continue that.

Q. Lauren, you anchored the defense with four blocks that game. Coach was talking about how important the defense was, especially in the second half. Could you just kind of lead us through what was working out there and what your defensive mentality was out there.

LAUREN BETTS: I think it was just making myself a little bit uncomfortable. Obviously playing on the perimeter is something that a lot of 6'7" posts don't like to do, but I think that's what the team needed from me in that moment. When JuJu was coming off the screens, just pushing myself to get up higher and get her in an uncomfortable situation.

Honestly I think the team did a good job finding next players, denying next passes. It was really a team effort. Yes, the blocks were there, but it was just every single person coming in with that mindset, like we are going to get this stop.

Q. Coach, you kind of alluded to it, but this feels like kind of a long time coming for you. You talked about being grateful and humbled and all that, but just do you feel overwhelmed by the emotion of this when you went up on that ladder and snipped the net down? What does it feel like?

CORI CLOSE: I think there's definitely a sense of -- it's really meaningful to watch their faces and just the pure joy of conquering hard things.

But honestly, the number one thing that I have tried to stay committed to is this is not about me. This is about serving young people through basketball and helping them become who they want to become and impact who they want to impact. It's just really not about me.

I'm thrilled that they got rewarded for their hard work. There's so many things definitely going through my head, but what it does for me is not one of them.

Q. What I want to ask you about is Gardiner. Four straight times down the floor, SC led by six points, four straight times down the floor she got the rebound. Tell me how important she is. If I had a game ball, I'd give it to her.

CORI CLOSE: I think there's a lot of game balls to go around, so many selfless things. What I loved so much about that, is people talked about her three in the first half but our challenge to her was we need you to defend and rebound better. That is going to put you in a situation to give you what we know is such an elite skill of hers and what she can do for us on the offensive end.

To watch her be the one that turned the tide with the rebounding, I just was so proud of her.

Then we were trying to go offense-defense with her, and even putting her on defense, and I was thinking, man, who would have thought we'd be thinking like that? But she earned that, and I'm really proud of her.

Q. You said yesterday that one of the most disappointing things about last week is that you lost the toughness battle. When they went up by 13, what were you thinking, and what was it like to watch your players dig themselves out of that?

CORI CLOSE: Well, we lost it the first two quarters, let's be honest. It's pretty evident. Every ball on the ground, they got to first. Every rebound got taken out of our hands. We didn't win the toughness battle in those first two quarters.

I really wondered what their eyes were going to look like when I went into the locker room at halftime, and they were poised and determined. They knew they had not played their best, and they didn't do the things we needed to do, but they still believed they could turn it.

I just said, look, here's where it lies. You know, if we don't win the toughness battle and the possessions battle and we don't get stops, we're not -- how bad do you want to win? What does this mean to you? They're like, we got you, Coach. We're going to get this thing done.

So to hold them to 9 points in the third and 13 in the fourth, I guess I can believe them.

Q. The strength and depth of this league is unquestioned, we've seen that the last five days.

CORI CLOSE: Absolutely.

Q. Rightly or wrongly, a league is often judged a lot by March, and it's been a long time for the Big Ten. How important is it that someone from this league, particularly as strong as it is now, win a National Championship?

CORI CLOSE: I think it helps everybody, right? If we want to be a league that is about elite and championships and setting the standard of excellence, that's going to push -- that's going to be the rising tide that lifts all boats, right?

It's something we all need to shoot for. I also think that we need to -- one of the things I'm really proud of in being a part of this league is that we are lifting each other up. We are making each other better. It doesn't make us any less competitive on game night.

But I think we want to do something special as a conference, and I think that when that happens -- I don't think it's a matter of if, it's a matter of when that happens -- I think that there will be a collective celebration because we want to hold ourselves to championship standards.

Q. Coach Gottlieb was saying earlier that she thought the winner of this game should be the No. 1 overall seed. I wonder if you had any thoughts on that, and would that be meaningful?

CORI CLOSE: I would agree with her. I think that both teams were -- obviously USC is an excellent team, and they are -- they've handed it to us twice, but the fact that they are our only two losses, we were No. 1 in the country for, I think, 13 weeks. They have really, I think, shown the steadiness and the quality of their wins and how they have grown and changed. They're an excellent team. They are a championship caliber team.

I remember the very first time we played at their place, Lindsay said, I'm really hoping we're going to get to do this four times. I think that it would mean a lot for us both to be No. 1 seeds. I think you have to prove yourself, right? Your play has to back that up, and I hope we do get a chance to do it in Tampa on a fourth time.

Q. Numbers of the night, field-goal percentage, 3-point shooting, free-throw percentage, all over 50 percent. As physical a game this was, just your thoughts on how your girls stayed together and succeeded and shot as well as they did.

CORI CLOSE: It's been really physical every time we've played. It's going to be more physical in March. That's just the way the game shifts a little bit. So you've got to be ready to fight through that.

I think Kiki, you heard from Lauren, Kiki reminding her of that. You're going to get fouls, it doesn't matter. Find a way. I think that's really what we have to do is commit to being the more physical team. We always say the tougher, more together team wins. I do think we stayed really together tonight through the adversity, through all the different ups and downs.

You're going to have to do that to make a late run in March.

Q. Given how you won this game, winning the toughness, beating your rival, all those things you talked about yesterday, how important is it to have this in the last game to prepare you for the next week in March?

CORI CLOSE: I think it's interesting, as good as we've been, we're not as confident as you would think. I think they earned some more confidence tonight. I think you want your team hungry and edgy going into the NCAA Tournament, but also really confident. I think our team earned some confidence tonight, and I think that's going to go a long way.

Q. I think you only fouled JuJu two free-throws in the second half after eight in the first. How big of a difference did that make?

CORI CLOSE: Huge.

Q. She wasn't able to get to the line on a day her shot wasn't falling to help the rally.

CORI CLOSE: What Lauren said is right, it's absolutely a team effort. I thought her rotation -- but not just hers. I thought Timea Gardiner had some great rotations in helping. I thought she really used her basketball IQ tonight.

The other part about that usually when you really commit to getting it out of JuJu's hands and defend her without fouling, she finds Kiki Iriafen. I thought our defense on her may have been the most important thing. Let's be honest, JuJu still got 29.

But when you look at the games in which they have had to make surges, even last night against Michigan, Kiki is such a huge part of them. And I thought our rotations to make things hard for her and then to keep her off the boards in the fourth quarter, that was pivotal.

This league doesn't do what it does without you guys bringing exposure and telling the stories. Thank you very much, and thanks to my mom back there too.