Thursday, March 12, 1998
Words of wisdom
Inspired by its seniors, team has turned around a season that at
first appeared headed for disappointment
By Chris Umpierre
Daily Bruin Contributor
It was Dec. 20 and the team had just finished losing a
heartbreaker in overtime to No. 5 North Carolina, 78-82. The defeat
put them at 2-4 on the season, well below preseason expectations
for the talent-laden UCLA women’s basketball squad.
But as the team lay slouched with their heads down in the North
Carolina locker room after the game, the four seniors on the team
stood up.
Tawana Grimes, Carla Houser, Jamie Oenning and Aisha Veasley
told their teammates on that fateful day that they were not going
to end their last season in blue and gold this way. They were not
going to finish the season sitting out yet another tournament as
they did their previous three years.
And largely because of the speeches from those four seniors, the
UCLA women’s basketball team turned its season around.
Since UCLA’s loss at North Carolina, the No. 25 Bruins (19-8
overall, 14-4 Pac-10) went 17-4 and captured a third-place finish
in the Pac-10 and a tournament bid along the way.
"They came into the locker room after that North Carolina game
and the team was mad," UCLA head coach Kathy Olivier said. "They
weren’t disappointed, they weren’t sulky – they were mad. They felt
that we should have won that game.
"Everyone in that locker room made a pact that day. ‘Let’s make
that commitment and let’s go for it. We are a lot better than we
are playing.’"
But it wasn’t the coach or the coaching staff that initiated the
pact in that North Carolina locker room; it was the four seniors
that ripped into the team.
"The seniors just said that they were not going to take this
anymore," Olivier said, who, along with her coaching staff, was
listening from just outside the locker room door. "They told the
team that they (would) have to work harder in practice, work harder
in the games and give 100 percent effort."
And pay off it did.
From that game on, one could see a visibly different Bruin team.
A Bruin team that dove for loose balls and a Bruin team that left
everything on the court after games.
"We started to go into games after North Carolina very focused,
which was something we hadn’t been doing before," Olivier said. "We
are a young team and we would go through lapses where we were not
focused, where we get silly fouls – inexperience things. They
learned from that point on."
One began to see this much more focused and hardworking team two
nights after the North Carolina game, when UCLA took on No. 17 Duke
in the Cameron Indoor Arena. The Bruins played inspired ball to
capture a 93-83 upset of the Blue Devils, igniting a winning streak
that, before the season was over, would make UCLA the hottest team
in the land.
After beating No. 17 Duke, UCLA went on to beat highly ranked
Washington twice. The Bruins blew out the Huskies 80-59 on the road
and 96-72 in Pauley Pavilion.
Their only defeats since North Carolina have been to top-ranked
teams. Although UCLA got blown out by No. 6 Stanford 105-80 on Feb.
13, the Bruins played the Cardinal tough at home before succumbing
75-70 on Jan. 18. And the team played No. 10 Arizona tough before
eventually losing 84-73 on the road and 82-71 at home.
All told, UCLA won 17 of its last 21 games of the season. The
focused UCLA team is as different as night and day from the Bruin
team that began the season.
After being ranked No. 25 in the pre-season, the Bruins opened
their season with three straight loses. UCLA lost to St. Mary’s
63-83, George Washington 73-78 and Notre Dame 91-93 in double
overtime.
The squad rebounded with two victories against Fresno State and
San Diego before playing North Carolina in Chapel Hill.
Despite the rocky 2-4 start, both the coaches and players always
knew that the team had the talent to do much better.
"We have always felt that we had a lot of talent on this team,
but we didn’t know when we put it all together," Olivier said.
"They stayed focused and did things we wanted them to do and they
all believe in what we were doing, which is huge for any team."
When the seniors took it upon themselves to stand up and talk to
the team on that fateful December day, they reminded the players of
this.
"I loved it," Olivier said about the impromptu speeches by the
seniors. "To be honest, that’s what makes the team that much
better, when the team is running the team. They know that if
everyone is on the page and everyone has the same goals it just
makes us all that much stronger."AARON TOUT/Daily Bruin
Sophomore guard Erica Gomez prepares for a drive.