CU To Wrap Up Regular Season This Weekend

BOULDER – Colorado's women's basketball team will head to Los Angeles this week to wrap up the regular season at No. 10 UCLA and Southern California. The Buffs (14-13, 5-11 Pac-12) are taking a two-game winning streak into the weekend, their best stretch of Pac-12 play since 2015 as they defeated Washington and Washington State this past weekend.

Thursday's game at UCLA tips off at 9 p.m. MT and will be televised on Pac-12 Networks. Saturday's game at USC will not be televised and but starts at 2 p.m. Both games will be on the radio in the Denver area on 630 KHOW. Saturday's pregame radio show will be cut short due to previously-scheduled programming, but will join the action just before tipoff.

SCOUTING THE OPPONENTS:
UCLA (21-6, 12-4 Pac-12), which was perhaps the hottest team in the conference entering this past weekend, had its 10-game winning streak snapped on Friday in overtime at No. 15 Oregon State. The Bruins lost again Monday night in overtime, falling 101-94 at No. 8 Oregon.

The Bruins are led by seniors Jordin Canada and Monique Billings, and a supporting cast of several other standouts. Canada, a 5-foot-6 senior, was an honorable mention All-American last season and is averaging 16.0 points, 6.7 assists and 3.1 steals this season. She had one of her best performances of her career at Oregon, finishing with 26 points and 13 assists on 9-of-17 shooting.

Billings is a 6-4 senior who averaged a double-double last season and has averaged 14.8 points and 9.7 rebounds so far this season. She had 26 points and 10 rebounds at Oregon and has 14 double-doubles this season.

Kennedy Burke, a 6-1 junior, averages 10.5 points and Japreece Dean comes off the bench to average 7.6 points. She had a season-high 21 points in UCLA's 93-55 win in Boulder earlier this season. Colorado native Michaela Onyenwere is a 5-11 freshman and averages 7.2 points and 4.9 rebounds.

UCLA's up-tempo style has the Bruins second in the conference in scoring (75.4) and fourth in scoring defense (61.4). They also are third in rebounding margin (+7.8).

USC didn't fare quite as well as the Bruins this past weekend in Oregon, dropping both games, but taking the Ducks to double overtime on Friday. The Trojans are still 17-10 overall and 7-9 in the Pac-12, despite the two-game losing streak, and handled CU in Boulder on Jan. 12 to the tune of an 86-51 victory.

Not much has changed since that meeting in Boulder as USC still plays just six or seven players each game. Kristen Simon, a 6-2 senior, leads the team in scoring (17.7) and rebounding (8.7). She has 10 double-doubles this season, including 26 points and 15 rebounds at Oregon and 16 points and 10 rebounds on Sunday at OSU.

Aliyah Mazyck is a 5-9 junior and averages 16.3 points and has a team-high 71 steals. She scored 29 points and hit six 3-pointers in Boulder earlier this year. Sadie Edwards (13.8) and Minyon Moore (13.3) round out the USC players averaging over 10 points. Moore also averages 5.8 assists.

USC leads the Pac-12 in steals (10.3 per game) and also has the best turnover margin (+5.4).

PAC-12 TOURNAMENT:
CU will open the Pac-12 Tournament next week in Seattle at KeyArena. The Buffs currently would have the No. 9 seed in the tournament and would play the No. 8 seed. At the moment, USC holds the No. 8 seed, one game behind Utah. If USC defeats Utah this weekend, the Trojans would move ahead of Utah, and would set up a first-round tournament matchup between CU and Utah.

The Buffs are virtually locked into the No. 9 seed unless they lose both games and Washington State wins both of its games this weekend, in which case the Cougars would bump the Buffs to No. 10 due to a tiebreaker. USC could also tie CU for eighth place if CU wins both games and USC loses both games this weekend.

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