{"id":227383,"date":"2025-10-20T12:01:11","date_gmt":"2025-10-20T12:01:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/227383\/"},"modified":"2025-10-20T12:01:11","modified_gmt":"2025-10-20T12:01:11","slug":"ucla-usc-benefit-from-rise-in-l-a-area-girls-basketball-talent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/227383\/","title":{"rendered":"UCLA, USC benefit from rise in L.A. area girls’ basketball talent"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The revival and rise of girls\u2019 high school basketball continues in Southern California, and the success of women\u2019s basketball programs at UCLA<\/a> and USC<\/a> is an example of the changing landscape. The Bruins are ranked No. 3 and USC No. 18 in the preseason Associated Press national rankings.<\/p>\n

Instead of players needing to leave the area for exposure and quality coaching, they\u2019re staying in Southern California, leading to UCLA and USC becoming national powers.<\/p>\n

USC\u2019s successful recruitment of JuJu Watkins from Sierra Canyon<\/a> was a huge turning point, leading to others becoming Trojans, such as All-American Kennedy Smith<\/a> from Etiwanda. UCLA\u2019s pick up of McDonald\u2019s All-American Gabriela Jaquez,<\/a> combined with national recruits, sets the stage for others to follow.<\/p>\n

Both programs are receiving national TV exposure and selling out games when they face off, something unheard of in years past. It shows the excitement generated by local stars on their teams.<\/p>\n

UCLA coach Cori Close<\/a> has been an advocate of growing girls\u2019 basketball locally and joined USC coach Lindsay Gottlieb<\/a> to promote the sport despite the rivalry.<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone talks about the rivalry,\u201d Close said. \u201cThe reality is we\u2019re getting to grow the sport in this city together.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gottlieb said the talent level hasn\u2019t really changed. What\u2019s changed is players picking USC or UCLA instead of South Carolina, Connecticut or Tennessee.<\/p>\n

And there\u2019s lots of young talent ahead to be recruited at Etiwanda, Ontario Christian, Corona Centennial and elsewhere.<\/p>\n

This is a daily look at the positive happenings in high school sports. To submit any news, please email eric.sondheimer@latimes.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The revival and rise of girls\u2019 high school basketball continues in Southern California, and the success of women\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":227384,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-227383","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-basketball","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-basketball","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/227383","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=227383"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/227383\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/227384"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=227383"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=227383"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=227383"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}