In Reply to: Women's Final Four went chalk - worrisome is posted by barrya on March 30, 2026 at 20:59:00
UCLA (35-1) vs. Texas (35-3)
The Longhorns are the only team to defeat the Bruins this season, all the way back in November during the Players’ Era Championship. It was a loss that course-corrected UCLA’s season, as it beat Duke by 30 points the next day and proceeded to roll undefeated through the Big Ten.
That isn’t to say the Bruins have solved all the issues Texas presented the day before Thanksgiving. The Longhorns’ full-court pressure got UCLA out of sorts; they forced 10 first-half turnovers, attempted 10 more field goals and took a 20-point lead into halftime. When the Bruins faced Duke in the Elite Eight, they had similar struggles with the press, committing 12 turnovers in the first half.
The possession battle is the No. 1 area of concern between Texas and UCLA. The Bruins have the nation’s top-ranked offense, per CBB Analytics, and when they get up shots, they convert them at a high clip (51.3 percent, the second-best field-goal percentage nationally). But they average only about four more field-goal attempts than their opponents; the Longhorns, meanwhile, take 15 more field goals per game thanks to their turnover margin and crashing the offensive glass. The closer to even the field-goal margin gets, the more it favors UCLA.
The next big question is what the Bruins do with Madison Booker. Although UCLA prides itself on its team defense, there isn’t really a wing stopper on the roster; in previous seasons, Gabriela Jaquez has been tasked with guarding the JuJu Watkins types, and it has not gone well. Booker can shoot over any Bruins defender, and she has the strength to get through them on her way to the basket. UCLA will need to wall off the paint and force Booker into a diet of jumpers.
The Longhorns will have a similar conundrum with Lauren Betts, who has been a matchup problem for just about every team the Bruins have faced this season. Texas doesn’t have the pure size to contend with Betts, though Breya Cunningham and especially Kyla Oldacre are at least physical enough to be able to move Betts. The key for the Longhorns is denying the ball to Betts altogether, and they have arguably the best perimeter defense in college basketball to make that happen.
The careers of three great veteran point guards (Texas’ Rori Harmon, and UCLA’s Kiki Rice and Charlisse Leger-Walker) will come to an end in Phoenix, either Friday or Sunday. Harmon had Rice and Leger-Walker in hell during their first meeting, but Rice had been back from shoulder surgery for only one month, and Leger-Walker was playing her seventh game for UCLA. If one of those lead guards can take control of this matchup, it could swing the game in their favor.
Ultimately, Texas is in better form (the Longhorns won their first four games by 142 points) and have the athletes to disrupt UCLA.
Prediction: Texas 74, UCLA 66
Sabreena Merchant