Los Angeles’ two Pac-12 women’s basketball teams have carved out new identities for themselves in the regular season.
UCLA and USC enter the Pac-12 Tournament with similar seedings – the Bruins are fifth and the Trojans are sixth. The tournament starts Wednesday at Michelob ULTRA Arena in Las Vegas, providing both SoCal teams with the chance to show how far they’ve come.
A strong UCLA freshman group will make its Pac-12 Tournament debut at noon Wednesday against Arizona State.
Kiki Rice and Londynn Jones, who were part of one of the best freshman recruiting classes in the nation this season, have played in all 30 games this season. They were named to the Pac-12 All-Freshman Team on Tuesday.
“As freshmen, we’ve been preparing throughout the entire season,” Rice said after UCLA’s latest win over Washington. “These games are going to be a bigger stage, one and done, a lot’s on the line. But I think we’ve all put in the work this entire season to trust our body of work.”
Jones held the highest three-point percentage (37.4%) on the team, making 43 of 115 shots, and was the third-leading scorer with 9.2 points per game. Rice was second in scoring at 11.3 ppg and assists at 2.9 per game while third in rebounding with 4.7 per game.
Senior Charisma Osborne leads the Bruins (22-8, 11-7 in Pac-12) in most statistical categories, and was named All-Pac-12 for the third season Tuesday.
She’s seventh in the Pac-12 in scoring at 15.3 ppg and plays roughly 33 minutes each game. Osborne has overcome myriad challenges in her college career, from injury to playing through the COVID-19 pandemic, which has only served to enhance her leadership skills.
“We had so many consistent leaders, in Charisma, especially, who (the freshmen) could just look at her for an example of how to do everything,” Rice said. “Not every team has that.”
The Bruins beat Arizona State 82-63 in early February in their only matchup of the season. The 12th-seeded Sun Devils…
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