JuJu Watkins silences Kiki Rice and & UCLA in style as USC wins Big Ten championship

USC star JuJu Watkins was once again instrumental in the star-studded Trojans, beating star Kiki Rice and the No. 2 UCLA Bruins 80-67 in the Big Ten championship game on Saturday evening. She tallied 30.0 points on 45.5% shooting from the floor and 36.4% shooting from beyond the arc, 3.0 rebounds and 5.0 assists.

It was the Trojans' first regular season title and first conference title in 30 years and UCLA fans inside the Pauley Pavilion made the environment a hostile one for Watkins constantly booing her all night.

After draining a 3-pointer in the second half, the competitive Trojans star stared down the Bruins fans and held up two fingers to indicate the number of times that USC had beaten their rivals in the past few weeks.

During her postgame news conference, Watkins revealed her thoughts on the behavior of the UCLA fans towards her.

"It means so much, knowing the history of it all. We don't come here very often but when we come here, we make sure to seize that opportunity. That did fire me up," JuJu Watkins said. "I think I would be remiss to say playing UCLA doesn't motivate me extra."

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JuJu Watkins gets praise from coaches

During her postgame news conference, USC coach Lindsay Gottlieb lavished praise on her talented star's mentality and performance.

"She's 19 years old. Her talent is off the charts," Gottlieb said. "But it's her humility and the stuff you can't teach, (like) the inner drive. I literally had a phone call with her yesterday and I could just sense through the phone how ready she was. She has stuff no one can teach."

JuJu Watkins is averaging 24.2 points, 6.9 rebounds and 3.6 assists this season and few teams have found a solution on how to stop her.

Against the Bruins, she had 23.0 points by halftime including four made 3-pointers and during her postgame news conference, UCLA coach Cori Close detailed the adjustments that she had to make to stop the Trojans star in the second half.

"We did make the adjustment in the second half that we started switching the ball screens more," Cori Close said.

"We started having some different rotations that we tried to have to give JuJu some different looks, and I thought we defended much better in the second half. But it's really hard."

Next up for JuJu Watkins and the Trojans is an assault on the national championship title after showing their mettle against the best team in the country twice in a month.