LONG BEACH, Calif. — Long Beach State returns to the road Saturday for a marquee non-conference test at UCLA, aiming to turn competitive stretches into a complete performance against one of the nation’s top programs.<\/p>\n
RIGHT AWAY
\n\u2022 Saturday, Long Beach State’s hits the road to continue non-conference action with a high-profile matchup at UCLA. The Beach enter the contest holding a 28\u201323 all-time series lead, though the Bruins have claimed the last five meetings.<\/p>\n
\u2022 LBSU (0\u20139) seeks to reset after a 94\u201358 loss to Portland, a game in which the Beach produced their most efficient three-point outing of the season (5-for-11, .455, their top percentage to date) but again faced challenges in transition defense and opponent shot volume.<\/p>\n
\u2022 Despite the winless start, the Beach have competed through extended stretches in nearly every outing. They’ve held multiple opponents below their season scoring averages and continue to defend with discipline in the half court. However, scoring consistency, turnover control (19.4 per game) and second-chance prevention (\u20134.4 rebounding margin) remain defining areas of emphasis entering Westwood.<\/p>\n
\u2022 JaQuoia Jones-Brown<\/a> continues to anchor the Beach on both ends and enters the UCLA game as one of the Big West’s highest-usage players. She leads LBSU in scoring (17.2 ppg), rebounding (6.7 rpg) and assists (2.4 apg). She has scored in double figures in eight of nine games and is coming off a 25-point, 9-rebound performance vs. Portland, her third 20+ outing of the season.<\/p>\n \u2022 Khylee Pepe<\/a> remains one of the Big West’s most active rebounding guards, averaging 5.3 rebounds and a team-best 1.8 steals per game. She has posted 7+ rebounds in four contests and recorded four steals at UC San Diego, tied for the most by any LBSU player this year.<\/p>\n \u2022 Rosie Akot<\/a> has emerged as LBSU’s most productive reserve rebounder, highlighted by her 13-rebound performance at Oregon State, still the Beach’s single-game high and one of the conference’s best individual rebounding marks this season. She enters UCLA averaging 3.0 rebounds in 9.6 minutes per game.<\/p>\n \u2022 Brynna Pukis<\/a> continues to be the team’s primary floor-spacer, leading LBSU with 14 made threes and averaging 5.9 points. Her season-best came at UC San Diego (4-for-7 3FG), and she followed it with another strong perimeter showing vs. Portland (3-for-3 3FG). Pukis accounts for nearly 30 percent of the team’s made threes this season.<\/p>\n \u2022 Judit Oliva Fernandez<\/a> anchors the interior defensively and ranks fourth in the Big West in blocks at 1.56 per game, including a career-best four blocks vs. Portland. She’s averaging 7.4 points and 5.0 rebounds and has reached double-figure scoring in two games this season. Her combination of rim protection (team-high 14 blocks) and interior finishing remains central to LBSU’s half-court identity.<\/p>\n ABOUT THE BEACH \u2022 Other returning players for Long Beach State in addition to Jones-Brown, Richards, Oliva Fernandez and Ka include sophomore guard Christy Reynoso<\/a>, forward Brelynn Brice<\/a> and center Haley Wright<\/a>. The trio combined for 32 games played during the 2024-25 campaign.<\/p>\n \u2022 Two redshirts also return for Long Beach State. Tairat Samuel-Afolabi<\/a> is a redshirt freshman from Sweden, while Lauren Cummings<\/a> returns after playing 26 games in 2023-24 before redshirting last season.<\/p>\n \u2022 Khylee Pepe<\/a> gives Long Beach State some veteran experience, joining the program as a senior after spending four years at San Diego State, including one as a medical redshirt in 2024-25. Pepe played in all 35 games for the Aztecs in 2023-24 as a junior, averaging 4.2 points, 2.7 rebounds and 1.2 steals per game. In total, Pepe played in 95 games with San Diego State after entering the program as a high school recruit from Bishop Montgomery High School.<\/p>\n \u2022 Long Beach State brought in three high school recruits to join the team this season. Rosie Akot<\/a> is a 6-2 forward whose intensity was noted by Wright, coming from Adelaide in Australia. Morgan Mack<\/a> is a 5-10 guard from Lancaster, who finished her career as the top scorer in Hart HS history, while Brynna Pukis<\/a>\u00a0 was a four-time first-team all-league selection at Glacier Peak High School in Washington.<\/p>\n \u2022 Long Beach State made two changes to the staff in the offseason. Jesse Clark<\/a> joined the program as an assistant coach, coming to the Beach from the Academy of Art in San Francisco where he was the head coach for the last two seasons, capping over 25 years in coaching across multiple levels. The Beach added Ashley Arroyo<\/a> as the team’s Director of Basketball Operations, while Jashae Lee<\/a> and Raru Archer<\/a> return for their third seasons on staff with Amy Wright<\/a> and Long Beach State.
\n\u2022 Judit Oliva Fernandez<\/a> has had extensive experience playing Internationally for Spain in 3×3 tournaments, an experience that she detailed for the Long Beach State Beach Reads series found at www.longbeachstate.com.<\/p>\n
\n\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LONG BEACH, Calif. — Long Beach State returns to the road Saturday for a marquee non-conference test at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":101533,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[131,133,132],"class_list":["post-101532","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-long-beach","tag-long-beach","tag-long-beach-headlines","tag-long-beach-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101532","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101532"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101532\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/101533"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101532"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101532"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101532"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}