UCLA’s Lauren Betts is Big Ten Player of Year in LA sweep of awards

It was an LA story when the Big Ten Conference announced its women’s basketball awards.

UCLA and USC swept the major honors.

Bruins center Lauren Betts was named Player of the Year and Defensive Player of the Year – becoming the first player in conference history to win both awards in the same season – while Cori Close was named Coach of the Year and graduate forward Angela Dugalic Sixth Player of the Year. Trojans guard Jazzy Davidson was selected the Freshman of the Year.

UCLA’s Kiki Rice made the 10-player First Team as selected by conference coaches alongside Betts, Davidson, Illinois’ Berry Wallace, Iowa’s Ava Heiden, Maryland’s Oluchi Okananwa, Michigan’s Olivia Olson and Syla Swords, Ohio State’s Jaloni Cambridge and Washington’s Sayvia Sellers.

UCLA’s Gabriela Jaquez and USC’s Kara Dunn made the Second Team and UCLA’s Gianna Kneepkens was an Honorable Mention selection.

Rice joined Betts on the All-Defensive Team alongside Davidson, and Trojans teammate Kennedy Smith. UCLA’s Sienna Betts joined Davidson on the All-Freshman Team.

It was the second time in as many years that Betts was named the conference’s Defensive Player of the Year. She leads UCLA in points (16.3), rebounds (8.8) and blocks (2.0) per game while also averaging 3.2 assists.

Close’s award comes after she guided the second-ranked Bruins to becoming only the fourth unbeaten team in Big Ten play, joining Maryland (2015), Purdue (1999) and Ohio State (1985). She had swept the national coach of the year awards last season, winning those given by Associated Press, Naismith, the U.S. Basketball Writers Assn. and the Women’s Basketball Coaches Assn.

Davidson becomes the first USC player to be named the Big Ten Freshman of the Year during a season in which she’s the only Division I player leading her team in points (17.9), rebounds (5.9), assists (4.3), blocks (2.0) and steals (2.0).

Dugalic is the only non-starter in the country averaging nine or more points, five or more rebounds and one or more steals while shooting 50 percent from the field and 35 percent from long distance while starting fewer than 10 games.

Rice has now been an all-conference selection in each of her four seasons after being named to the Pac-12’s All-Freshman Team and the All-Pac-12 Team as a sophomore before being picked for the All-Big Ten First Team in each of the last two seasons.

Top-seeded UCLA (28-1) opens the Big Ten Tournament on Friday in a quarterfinal at Gainbridge Fieldhouse in Indianapolis against either ninth-seeded USC (17-12) or eighth-seeded Washington (20-9). The Trojans and Huskies will face one another at 9 a.m. PST on Thursday.

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