UCLA Women's Basketball: Cori Close Reveals What Could Be Bruins' Biggest Downfall

Let's hope she's wrong!

UCLA Bruins head coach Cori Close knows that the team's charmed 14-0 season start is a testament to its ability, but cautions that things could get rocky as the year progresses.

During a recent press conversation, as captured by the official Twitter/X account for UCLA women's basketball, Close unpacked what she perceives to be the top vulnerability confronting the Blue and Gold this season: the fact that UCLA is playing in a loaded Pac-12 conference.

"When you play in the best conference in the country, you're going to have things exposed, you're going to have bad habits exposed, so what do you do with that?" Close acknowledged.

As of this writing, UCLA finds itself at serious risk of losing its first game of this season so far, against its local Pac-12 rival the USC Trojans at the Galen Center. At 12-1, the ninth-ranked Trojans aren't exactly chopped liver themselves, and their combination of veteran savvy and long-range has made them a lethal Hollywood chip.

The Bruins have been ranked as the second-best club in the nation by The Associated Press' weekly poll for over a month now, behind only the similarly undefeated South Carolina Gamecocks. Even if it does lose the game, UCLA will remain a powerhouse with a real shot of winning it all in the spring.