The following is a transcript of a recorded interview. It has been edited for length and clarity. To listen in full, check out The Bulletin on Spotify.

 

On Thursday, UC San Diego women’s basketball (17-6, 12-1 Big West) secured its 11th win of conference play in a 64-53 victory on the road against Long Beach State. Junior center Erin Condron dominated the Beach in the paint with a Division-I program record of 32 points, scoring exactly half of the Tritons’ total. Following the game, The UCSD Guardian’s Sports Co-Editor Alan Zhang sat down with the Long Beach Current’s Assistant Sports Editor Monica Badolian to discuss the game.

 

Alan Zhang: Monica, thanks for joining us.

Monica Badolian: Hi, thanks for having me.

AZ: First question is, how do you feel about the loss?

MB: I feel fine. I think [the Beach] did a really great job keeping the pressure and taking the lead several times. They were keeping up the physical momentum; they were really getting the rebounds and blocking the shots. It was a great game for them compared to the last time UC San Diego and Long Beach State played each other.

AZ: You are only a single game behind CSUN [in the Big West Championship qualification fight].

MB: They just need to keep pushing it. If they just played a little bit more defensively today, I think it could have gone a lot better. The fouls really gave away the game.

AZ: Thirty-four free throws for UCSD compared to 10 for [the Beach], and [the Beach] only made 4 of 10 as well.

MB: Exactly, definitely got to work on the free throws and then also got to work on those fouls.

AZ: Erin Condron, in particular, had a really good game tonight — a career-high 32 points and 13 rebounds as well. She is now only the second Triton since transitioning to D1 with 30 and 10 in a game since Sydney Brown in 2022. She really got to the line a lot, going 14 for 16. What did you think about how she played?

MB: I thought she was on fire; she was just unstoppable. I don’t think Long Beach was able to really keep up with her as much. She was taking advantage of those moments throughout the game whenever there were open nets, getting around the defense, just powering through, so she was on it.

AZ: It’s kind of crazy, I don’t think I’ve ever seen UCSD win a game where we’ve shot 8% from three. Condron had half of UCSD’s points.

MB: She was definitely the leader tonight for UC San Diego.

AZ: Have you faced any bigs like Condron so far, or is this the first time you have really struggled against a big?

MB: I don’t think so. There were definitely tougher games than tonight, games where I feel like they were trying but they weren’t there, and they just needed to get these movements in. I was talking with head coach Amy Wright, asking her some questions about that, and she brought up some really good points. Like she said, we really want to expose Condron and use a lot of ball screen actions. It was utilizing skip passes in order to get some of our shooters open looks, and we were able to knock a couple of those down. Just talking about that defensive play and how they had moments where they were able to trap San Diego a little bit with that offense, but I don’t think this game necessarily was one that they struggled with. It was fairly great for them compared to some other games I’ve seen this season so far.

AZ: You defended really well from three today. We were missing some shots on our end, but defending 1 for 12 from three is always a win.

MB: I thought the defense was there. They had a lot of good shots they were blocking. They stole the ball a couple of times. It was just those fouls that really kind of cost them.

AZ: If you don’t commit that many fouls [and] subtract the free throws, it’s like a double-digit win [for the Beach].

MB: Just gotta work through them, but I think they’re gonna use this game and learn from the fouls, learn from their movements, and learn how to play the right kind of defense, then carry that with them through the next few games.

AZ: All right. Thank you for joining us; we really appreciate your time.

MB: Of course, thank you for having me.

UCSD clinched a Big West Championship berth with this win against the Beach and remain atop the Big West standings. The Tritons will look to add more wins in the coming weeks as they push for their first-ever Big West regular season title.