Michael VoepelApr 5, 2026, 05:50 PM ET
Close Michael Voepel is a senior writer who covers the WNBA, women’s college basketball and other college sports. Voepel began covering women’s basketball in 1984, and has been with ESPN since 1996.Multiple Authors
PHOENIX — WHEN UCLA looks back at the weekend it made history, one image will stand out: Lauren Betts racing down the court, turning to face a driving Madison Booker, and jumping with her arm extended high.
Betts’ rejection in the national semifinals against Texas on Friday — one ESPN broadcaster Ryan Ruocco described as “a block for the ages” — sealed the Bruins’ place in their first NCAA title game. Sunday afternoon, they clinched the title with a 79-51 victory against South Carolina.
Sunday’s game wasn’t even close, a Bruins domination from start to finish. UCLA’s seniors scored all 130 points in the Final Four run, and the starters began to exit the title game with more than three minutes left, beginning with Betts and guard Kiki Rice. Gabriela Jaquez, who grew up in Southern California and dreamed since childhood of playing for UCLA, hit a 3-pointer with 2:55 left and then went to the bench to begin the celebration and wipe away some happy tears.
For years, UCLA was a successful team that kept falling short of the biggest stage. From 2016 to 2024, the Bruins stalled six times in either the Sweet 16 or Elite Eight. UCLA kept having good seasons that didn’t quite make it to great.
This year, finally, all the pieces came together, with seven seniors, four of whom didn’t start their college careers at UCLA but have lifted the program to the sport’s pinnacle. As her game-saving block on Friday showed, Betts — the 6-foot-7 center who transferred to UCLA from Stanford before the 2023-24 season — was the critical part that fit in perfectly.
“This program has changed my life in the best way possible,” Betts said entering Sunday’s title game. “I’m forever grateful for UCLA. It’s the best decision I ever made.”
But Betts isn’t the only newly crowned champion who took a roundabout path to Westwood.
Forward Angela Dugalic started at Oregon. Charlisse Leger-Walker began at Washington State and fellow guard Gianna Kneepkens at Utah. Another of this year’s seniors, Megan Grant, didn’t need to transfer because she was already at UCLA — playing softball. She joined the hoops program this season, with the softball staff’s blessing, to bring an infectious attitude of joy to the basketball squad.
“My responsibility [is] placing the brick that we have in the perfect position,” UCLA coach Cori Close said of leading the Bruins’ step-by-step construction over the past 15 seasons. “We’re not just trying to build a wall.”
Instead, Close built a championship team. In the fifth women’s Final Four with all four No. 1 seeds advancing, the Bruins were the best No. 1, finishing 37-1 and defeating the three-time champion Gamecocks for the title. Jaquez (21 points, 10 rebounds) and Betts (14 and 11) led the way in a game that UCLA never trailed.
“We’ve helped each other throughout our toughest times, built each other back up,” Betts said. “For me, it’s not really about the wins and the losses, it’s about this entire journey that we’ve had together.”
Rice came to UCLA in 2022 as the No. 2 recruit in the country, at the same time that the No. 1 recruit, Betts, was headed to Stanford. They thought they would be rivals in the Pac-12. They ended their college careers as teammates, winning conference and national championships.
“It’s really, really cool to be able to play in Pauley Pavilion,” Rice said, “and be able to look around every time we step on that court and see all the jerseys that are retired and the national championship banners. To add to that legacy means a lot.”
WHEN BETTS LEFT Stanford in 2023 after one year, her confidence had been shattered. She was still struggling during her first season with the Bruins but took a mental health break that allowed her to reset both her life and her basketball career.
“The biggest thing that I’ve learned in these past three seasons at UCLA is for me just to always believe in what I’m capable of doing and to surround myself with good people,” Betts said.
“Regardless of what I do on the court, that doesn’t take away from my value as a person. I have people who love me regardless of how many points I score.”
“I’m forever grateful for UCLA,” Betts said before the title game. “It’s the best decision I ever made.” Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn ImagesThat peace of mind has helped Betts reach her potential on the court. A first-team All-American and the Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year the past two seasons, Betts was also the Big Ten Player of the Year this season. She is expected to be a high first-round pick in the WNBA draft on April 13, and Rice, Jaquez, Leger-Walker, Kneepkens and Dugalic also could be selected.
Betts’ block against Booker in Friday’s semifinals exemplified the type of highlight reel, high-impact play she makes look almost routine. Had Betts’ timing been off, the Longhorns could have had a three-point play and a tie game. Instead, Betts got the block, grabbed the ball and passed it to Rice, who was eager to get fouled and go to the line to seal the victory with free throws.
“She’s one of the best defenders I’ve seen,” Leger-Walker said of Betts. “When she does something like that, it’s such a momentum shift. We rely on her so much for things like that, and she’s consistent with it.”
It also felt like a symbolic moment: officially exorcising the demons of last year’s semifinal, when UCLA lost 85-51 to UConn, a bleak ending to what had been one of the season’s best stories. Betts was the lone Bruin to score in double figures with 26 points.
But the players say that they got motivation when last season’s long-awaited Final Four trip didn’t go as they had hoped. Leger-Walker was with the Bruins then, although she sat out that season rehabbing a knee injury that she had suffered in January 2024 while with Washington State. Kneepkens was watching the 2025 Final Four from afar, knowing she was ready to transfer from Utah.
“I hoped then to be in this position,” Kneepkens said.
Rice and Jaquez, the two remaining Bruins from a coveted five-player freshman class in the fall of 2022, also stayed out of belief that they could reach this pinnacle.
“This was always the plan coming to UCLA for me and Kiki as freshmen: get to the Final Four, win the national championship,” said Jaquez, whose brother, Jaime Jr., played for the Bruins’ men’s team and is now with the NBA’s Miami Heat.
“I never thought to transfer. Some people asked me, ‘Why did you stay?’ I said, ‘Why would I leave?’ I love UCLA.'”
“It goes to show the strong relationship that they have with Cori,” South Carolina coach Dawn Staley said of Jaquez and Rice. “It means they are the cornerstones of their rise to this level. There’s nothing stronger than having that trust and that loyalty to stay with the program you were with.”
CLOSE, A CALIFORNIA native who played at UC Santa Barbara, was a UCLA assistant in the early 1990s and got to know legendary UCLA men’s coach John Wooden, who won 10 NCAA titles. He died the year before she returned to take over the UCLA women in 2011 after being an assistant at Florida State.
His philosophies always resonated with her. It’s easy to imagine Wooden loving Close’s Bruins, who has now delivered a second national championship to the UCLA women’s program.
“Cori is an unbelievable coach and representative for our game,” said Hall of Famer and former Bruin Ann Meyers Drysdale. Joe Camporeale-Imagn ImagesThe first was in 1978, before women’s basketball was governed by the NCAA. Led by Hall of Famer Ann Meyers Drysdale, the Bruins went 27-3 and captured the AIAW championship with a 90-74 win over Maryland. The NCAA era didn’t begin until 1982.
These Bruins are very intentional about acknowledging their hoops ancestors.
“It’s an opportunity for us to bring that light to them and to say, ‘We see you, we appreciate you. You’re a part of why we’re here,'” Close said. “Several of the women on that team are here in the building, they’re season-ticket holders of ours.”
Meyers Drysdale, who has long been affiliated with the Phoenix Suns and Mercury, was in the arena for the Bruins’ games this weekend.
“Just so proud to see this team play their best when their best was needed,” Meyers Drysdale told ESPN on Sunday. “Cori is an unbelievable coach and representative for our game — her preparation and getting these young women to believe, sacrifice, and their unselfishness for each other. Cori has built a wonderful foundation. So proud of them all.”
UCLA women’s basketball will always have the pioneers of 1978 to revere. Now the program’s greatness is officially up to date.
Betts drew laughter trying to explain one of her favorite sayings from Close.
“Rings will collect dust and — what’s it called? – banners. Banners will — whatever. The memories you create … uh, something like that. She says it all the time,” Betts said, smiling. “It’s a beautiful message, but I hear it a lot.”
Close later provided the actual quote: “Banners hang in gyms and rings collect dust, but who you become and who you impact you get to keep forever.”
True, but UCLA now has an NCAA championship banner and rings to keep forever, too.
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