UCLA Women's Basketball Coach Celebrates Historic Championship Victory

When ESPN's Holly Rowe pulled Cori Close aside for the on-court interview after the final buzzer in Phoenix, the UCLA women's basketball coach got an unexpected co-presenter: her 80-year-old mother, Patti, known throughout the program as "Mother Bruin," rushed in to embrace her daughter before the cameras. It was the kind of unscripted moment that matched the magnitude of what had just happened.

UCLA won its first NCAA women's basketball championship, defeating fellow No. 1 seed South Carolina 79-51 on April 5. "This has been a calling, not a job," Close said in the postgame press conference. "It's immeasurably more than I could ask or imagine."

Gabriela Jaquez, Lauren Betts and the rest of the UCLA seniors secured the first NCAA women's basketball national championship in school history, a goal that was set after losing in the first Final Four last season. Jaquez scored 21 points, Betts added 14, and UCLA routed South Carolina 79-51 in the title game. Jaquez became just the fifth player to finish a national title game with 20 points, 10 rebounds and five assists, joining Sarah Strong, Breanna Stewart, Chamique Holdsclaw and Dawn Staley. Betts was named the 2026 Most Outstanding Player.

"I knew we were going to do it," Jaquez said. "Coming to UCLA we all set out for a goal, and I imagined this moment. I imagined it so many times, and I am just so, so proud."

The Bruins, playing before a capacity crowd at Mortgage Matchup Center, never trailed in the championship showdown. By the end of the first quarter, UCLA had already established control, leading 21-10 behind efficient shooting and aggressive defense. The 79-51 win marks the third-largest margin of victory ever in the women's title game. After getting blown out in last year's Final Four, the Bruins went 37-1 in 2025-26 and closed the season on a 31-game winning streak.

All five starters finished in double figures for the Bruins. Gianna Kneepkens contributed 15 points on 3-of-7 shooting from three-point range, while Charlisse Leger-Walker and Kiki Rice each added 10. It was a full team effort, with UCLA's six seniors accounting for all of the team's points.

The victory carried a weight of history beyond the scoreboard. In toppling South Carolina 79-51, UCLA claimed its first-ever NCAA title, which also became UCLA's 126th overall championship. Ann Meyers Drysdale, the UCLA basketball legend and four-time All-American who was a hero of the program's 1978 AIAW title, was among the luminaries in the stands, as was Gabriela Jaquez's brother, Miami Heat star Jaime Jaquez, who flew in from the NBA to watch his sister make history.

The 2026 tournament featured an all-No. 1 seed Final Four for the fifth time in women's tournament history. UCLA cruised past Texas, and South Carolina handed UConn its first loss of the season en route to the title game.

For Close, who built this roster around the recruiting classes of 2022 and the high-profile transfer of Betts from Stanford, Sunday's victory represented the culmination of years of deliberate construction. The Bruins had now played the last possible game of the season and won it, outlasting a South Carolina program that had been to the championship stage before. As confetti fell in Phoenix, Close put it plainly: it was beyond her wildest dreams.