The Wildcat women's basketball team heads to Los Angeles this weekend for a critical Pac-10 road set against UCLA and USC.
After their sweep of Stanford and California at home last weekend, the Wildcats lead the Pacific 10 Conference entering tonight's game against the Bruins at Pauley Pavilion.
"The pressure is no different for our kids," said UA assistant coach Shimmy Gray about being in first. "It's different as far as our opponents, because we are the team they are gunning for. This is going to be a very tough road trip for us."
The fifth-place Bruins (12-10 overall, 7-6 Pac-10) are coming off a sweep of the Washington schools last weekend and have won four of their last six since losing to the UA in Tucson on Jan. 17.
UCLA relies heavily on the talents of point guard Nikki Blue, who leads the team with 14.6 points per game. However, early foul trouble for Blue stifled the Bruin offense, limited her playing time and led to her scoring just 12 points in the game in Tucson earlier this season.
Overall, the UA is just 6-19 all-time at Pauley Pavilion, including a 48-47 loss on Feb. 14 of last season.
"UCLA is athletic. They can shoot the 3, they can shoot well and they all drive well," said Gray.
On Sunday in front of a national television audience, the Wildcats will face Southern California. USC is sitting one notch above UCLA, in fourth place. USC was the first Pac-10 team to beat Stanford, which enabled the UA to make a run at first place.
The Wildcats are also 6-19 all-time at USC, and one of those six wins was a 78-64 victory last season. Earlier this season, the Wildcats and USC played a wild, physical game, with a combined 66 turnovers. The Wildcats managed to pull out the win, 75-64.
"UCLA has great guard play. So does USC, but they have a better post than UCLA. They both play uptempo, they both like to run and gun. USC is a very talented team, from the one position to the five," said Wildcat junior guard Dee-Dee Wheeler.
At the post position, the Women of Troy have Ebony Hoffman - a Preseason All-America candidate who averages 15.1 points per game and 8.1 rebounds a game.
For a team that is so successful at home, the Wildcats' overall road record is barely above .500 at 6-5. Two of those five losses have been in the Pac-10 - one to Stanford and one to Arizona State.
Gray says that for the team to be successful on the road, it needs to play a full 40 minutes of basketball.
"If we don't, we'll be in trouble," Gray added.
Gray contributed the UA's recent successes against Stanford and California to playing that full 40 minutes, and the emergence of a 3-point game that until last weekend was struggling.
"Rome wasn't built in a day, and neither was our 3-point game," she said. "It's added an entire new dimension to our game. Now other teams can't crash inside and send three, four people in on (Shawntinice) Polk. It's really helped us tremendously."