Lauren Betts’ ninth double-double of the season helped the No. 1 UCLA women’s basketball team stay undefeated Saturday.
The 6-foot-7 center scored 25 points and collected 12 rebounds as the Bruins came away 73-62 winners over Indiana in a Big Ten victory in Bloomington, Indiana.
UCLA also got 11 points from junior guard Gabriela Jaquez and 12 points, seven rebounds and seven assists from junior guard Kiki Rice to improve to 15-0 overall and 4-0 in the conference.
Betts, who shot 12 of 16 (75%) from the field in the win, came into the game third in the Big Ten in scoring at 19.3 points per game, fourth in rebounding at 9.8 boards per game and fifth in field-goal percentage at .602.
The junior had missed two nonconference games with a leg injury in December before returning with 21 points and eight rebounds in a 91-54 rout of Nebraska. She followed that with a 13-point, 10-rebound effort Wednesday as the Bruins finished their first Big Ten homestand with an 86-70 victory over No. 24 Michigan.
The Bruins used a 15-5 second quarter to pull away from Indiana and snap its six-game winning streak. The Hoosiers (10-4, 2-1) were held scoreless for the first seven minutes of the second quarter, committing six turnovers during that span.
Yarden Garzon scored 19 points to lead Indiana, which forced UCLA into a cold shooting day. The Bruins’ field-goal percentage (28 of 62 for 45.2%), 3-point percentage (5 of 18, 27.8%) and free-throw percentage (12 of 19, 63.2%) were all below their season averages.
UCLA, which has been No. 1 for six weeks since defeating then-No. 1 South Carolina on Nov. 24, stays in state to take on Purdue at 4 p.m. PT Tuesday. It then comes home for games against Northwestern on Jan. 12 and Penn State on Jan. 15 before a nonconference showdown against Baylor on Jan. 20 in the Coretta Scott King Classic in Newark, N.J.
