Everything UCLA's Cori Close and Lauren Betts said after beating Michigan in the first game of 2025

UCLA juniors Lauren Betts and Kiki Rice each recorded double-doubles on Wednesday, leading the No. 1 ranked Bruins to an 86-77 win over No. 24 Michigan. After the game, UCLA coach Cori Close and Betts addressed the media.

Close opened her remarks by praising Michigan's coach Kim Barnes Arico and the competitiveness of the Wolverines. The 14th-year Bruins coach mentioned that she has known Arico since her coaching days at St John's and highlighted one aspect of her coaching: the toughness of her players.

"They play with great toughness, and I thought they out-toughed us tonight," Cori said (0:21). "We may have more talent pieces and may have won the game, but they won the toughness, togetherness battle. I told our team that we didn't win enough teamwork plays."

Cori Close credited Lauren Betts for her dominant performance, which included 13 points, 10 rebounds and 5 assists.

"Every time we got Lauren a touch, she didn't necessarily score every time in the first half, but we created a rotation and then we got an assist or an easy bucket off of her handling of double teams."

Kiki Rice added 16 points, 10 assists and 4 rebounds while fellow junior Londynn Jones chipped in 13 points.

"I thought London was excellent in terms of her ability to stretch the zone, and we finally got her some good teamwork shots with that. I thought she was a huge response for us," Close added.

Lauren Betts agrees with coach Cori Close's remarks about a need for tougher performance

Lauren Betts, the UCLA Bruins' top scorer and leading rebounder this season. After the Sweet 16 run last season, Betts is expected to lead the Bruins on a deeper run in this campaign.

Betts joined the post-game presser alongside coach Cori Close and shared her thoughts on the team's overall performance.

"I think we just got to be tougher. I think that we just have to regroup tomorrow and just kind of go over the film and figure out what went wrong during the game," Lauren Betts said (4:03).

"We're just so talented, but we always talk about how our character is our ceiling, and I think that we just need that reminder a little bit today. Like Coach Cori said, we're a bunch of talented people, but I think once we start actually playing together, it'll go back to how it was before."

Lauren Betts' double-double on New Year's Day marked her 8th of the season. The 6-foot-7 center from Centennial, Colorado is averaging 19.3 points, 9.8 rebounds and 2.4 assists per game with 60.4% shooting from the field.

The UCLA Bruins (14-0 overall, 3-0 Big Ten) will play their next game at Indiana on Saturday.