Cal Poly women’s basketball took on No. 1 UCLA at Pauley Pavilion on Monday, resulting in a 69-35 loss.
Although the Mustangs lacked offensive production, their defensive effort kept the Bruins at 69 points, their lowest total of the season since the opening game against Louisville.
After losing 90-35 against No. 3 USC earlier this season, Cal Poly played more competitively against UCLA. The Bruins played without their starting center, Lauren Betts, who leads the team in points and rebounds.
“I thought they were the more scrappy team tonight,” UCLA head coach Cori Close said.
Senior guard Annika Shah exemplified this scrappiness, drawing two charges against the Bruins. Cal Poly forced 17 total turnovers on the Bruins.
Close also respected the Cal Poly offense’s set plays, forcing many switches and making players communicate more on defense.
Despite Betts’s absence in this game, the Mustangs were still undersized. Cal Poly was blocked eight times and made many more shots out of desperation, shooting 25.9% from the field.
Sophomore forward Mary Carter led the offense with 11 points, shooting 3-for-5 from three.
Carter has stepped up tremendously this year in terms of scoring, helping to fill the offensive gap left by forward Natalia Ackerman upon transferring to the University of California, Berkeley.
After losing Ackerman, who averaged 8.9 rebounds per game and totaled a program-record 63 blocks, a wider range of Mustangs have crashed the boards, averaging 34.7 rebounds per game. Last season, they averaged 35.3 rebounds per game.
However, Ackerman’s presence in the paint on defense has not gone unnoticed. Cal Poly averaged 1.7 blocks per game compared to 2.4 last season.
One positive is that the team’s opponent turnover rate has increased from 17.7 to 19.6 per game, another example of its “scrappy” defense. Cal Poly also averages 10 steals per game, compared to 9.2 last season.
A continuing problem for the Mustang offense has been their turnovers.
Last year, they averaged 19 turnovers per game, the second-highest in the Big West. Now, they average 20.3 turnovers per game after putting up 20 against UCLA.
The Mustangs have two more non-conference games to tune up their play before the rest of the conference season.
On Friday, the Mustangs return to San Luis Obispo to play Seattle University at 2 p.m. at Mott Athletics Center. The next week, they travel to Cedar City to play Southern Utah on Dec. 28.
