Londynn Jones' 15-point outing vs Dawn Staley’s South Carolina nets her NCAA honor as No. 1 UCLA pulls off historic upset

No. 5 UCLA stunned No. 1 South Carolina 77-62 to end the Gamecocks 43-game win streak. Londynn Jones shined in the game, scoring 15 points on five 3-pointers to lead the Bruins to a historic win at Pauley Pavilion in Los Angeles on Sunday.

After the game, Jones was named Player of the Week by the NCAA women's basketball.

Jones had more reasons to celebrate as the guard helped UCLA take down a No. 1 team for the first time in the program's history. UCLA had gone 0-20 in previous encounters, with its best wins being against No. 2 Stanford in 2008 and No. 2 Oregon in 2019.

UCLA becomes No. 1 team after historic win vs South Carolina

UCLA is officially the No. 1 team in the AP Top 25 poll for the first time in the program's history after dethroning defending champions South Carolina on Sunday. The Bruins dominated the game from start to finish and suffocated the Gamecocks' defense.

Eight players, including Londynn Jones, contributed 11-0 and 7-0 runs in the first and second quarters, while also shooting 52% from the field. As a result, the Bruins led 43-22 at halftime.

The Gamecocks suffered a double-digit halftime deficit for the first time since December 2021 and the first 20-point halftime deficit since March 2019, per ESPN.

Dawn Staley's South Carolina, which finished undefeated last season after winning the program's third championship in seven years, had 22 points on a 26.5% shooting clip at the break. The loss also marked the Gamecocks' largest defeat since the 2019 Sweet 16 and their first road loss since December 2021.

"It doesn't feel good when you're on the receiving end of it. But you also know you got beat by a great team, executing on both sides," Staley said per ESPN. "That was beautiful basketball by UCLA, beautiful on both sides. I thought our kids fought. But we ran into a buzzsaw today."

Meanwhile, UCLA coach Cori Close said the Bruins win was no surprise as they prepared for it.

"There just was never a doubt, and we prepared like we expected to win," she said.

The Bruins, who are coming off a Sweet 16 loss in the 2024 NCAA Tournament, hope that Sunday's win will inspire their journey to their first NCAA Final Four appearance. However, Close does not care about the ranking but insists that players should fall in love with the process of achieving greatness.

"I don't mean to be boring, but I really don't care who's ranked what at what point," Close said. "I just want us to learn the lessons that this game taught us and I want us to fall more in love with the process of what it takes to become great."

Next, UCLA travels to the Rainbow Wahine Showdown in Hawaii to play UT Martin on Friday.