After pulling off a 60-59 upset win at home against Minnesota last week, the Utah women’s basketball team wasn’t able to tack on another win in its second road game of the preseason, losing to UCLA 69-33 on Saturday.
The loss marked just the second time the Utes have fallen to the Bruins in series history and the first time in 20 games that senior forward Kalee Whipple hasn’t scored in double-digits.
Starting out in a 16-0 hole in the JHG Jam, Utah rallied with an 11-0 run, cutting the deficit to five with 10 minutes left in the first half, but couldn’t maintain its momentum as the Bruins answered with an 8-0 run of their own.
“We just struggled early, and it was a bad tone to set,” said head coach Elaine Elliott. “We struggled with pressure. Everyone took their turn. Our offensive execution was not there in any shape or form.”
In last week’s win over the Gophers, Elliott said a major component of Utah’s success was outrebounding Minnesota 46-34. With more talented and aggressive teams down the line in Utah’s preseason schedule, Elliott said her team would have to continue to crash the boards in order to be successful. The Utes were unable to do so Saturday, overpowered 42-33 by the Bruins on the boards for the night.
Utah headed into the locker room at halftime down 33-17, with six of its points coming from Whipple and four from sophomore center Mandy Munns. Both Whipple and Munns were held scoreless in the second half.
Senior forward Halie Sawyer led the Utes with seven rebounds to go along with six points in Utah’s loss.
Delivering a balanced team attack, the Bruins ended the night with all but one athlete putting points on the scoreboard. Darxia Morris and Markel Walker led UCLA in scoring with 10 points each, and Walker also led the team with seven rebounds.
The Utes shot just 24 percent from the floor and only 52.2 percent from the charity stripe, dropping to 1-2 in the preseason.
Utah will have a week to improve on its offense before traveling back to California to take on Stanford the day after Thanksgiving.