The joyful reaction to UCLA’s winning the NCAA women’s basketball championship on Easter Sunday reverberated from Phoenix to Westwood to Santa Barbara.
Bruins head coach Cori Close spent her formative years in college basketball as UCSB’s point guard from 1989 to 1993, and she started climbing up the coaching ladder as a Gaucho assistant during a nine-year run (1995-2004) that endeared women’s basketball to the community.
Mark French, UCSB’s head coach during that span, took delight in seeing Close’s Bruins dismantle South Carolina, a betting favorite going into the championship game, by a 79-51 score.