UCLA Women's Basketball: Cori Close Added to COTY Award Watchlist
UCLA women's basketball head coach Cori Close has been named to the Naismith Women's Coach of the Year watchlist. Close is one of 15 women's college basketball coaches to be named to the 2023-2024 Naismith watchlist.
If Close were to win, it would be her first Naismith Women's Coach of the Year award. Close has been the coach of UCLA women's basketball since 2011 and has previously won the Pac-12 Coach of the Year in 2019.
It might be challenging for Close to win since the Bruins have been less dominant over the past month than they were at the start of the season. The Bruins currently rank No. 12 in the AP Top 25 poll, ten spots lower than their highest ranking this season at No. 2.
Even still, Close and the Bruins are having a great season. UCLA is 20-5 overall and 9-5 against Pac-12 opponents.
To signify how tough the Pac-12 is this season, Close is just one of five Pac-12 coaches to have made the Naismith Coach of the Year watchlist. The Pac-12 put up one-third of the coaches on the watchlist, the most among all college basketball conferences.
Along with Close, the Pac-12 also saw USC's Lindsay Gottlieb, Colorado's JR Payne, Oregon State's Scott Rueck, and Stanford's Tara VanDerveer on the watchlist.
Even in the most challenging conference, Close and the Bruins are still succeeding. The next step to this success is making it further in March Madness than they did a season ago when they excited in the NCAA Sweet Sixteen. The Bruins of course plan to make a run at the title, which starts with making the Elite Eight for the first time since 2018.