PHOENIX — When Cori Close quotes John Wooden, she doesn’t read off a plaque on the wall, or out of a book. She is calling on 15 years of conversations with the legendary UCLA men’s basketball coach.
Close was a 22-year-old assistant coach at UCLA in her first coaching job more than 30 years ago when she was introduced to Wooden. They bonded for the next 15 years with him over her shared name (and spelling) with his great-granddaughter and a fundamental philosophy about coaching and in many ways, life.
“One of the things he gave me was a sense that you could compete at the highest levels, you could master your craft, you could do it in a transformational, character-building way,” Close said. “I was almost losing hope that that was possible. Then Coach Wooden was like, ‘No, it can be done and you have to value certain things.’”
“It doesn’t make you less competitive,” Close said.
Says the head coach of the new NCAA Champions.
Close’s team, the tournament’s No. 2 overall seed, led virtually from start to finish Sunday at the Mortgage Matchup Center in Phoenix for a 79-51 win over South Carolina, delivering the program’s first national championship in the NCAA era, with the other title coming in the AIAW in 1978.
“This has been a calling, not a job,” Close said. “I’ve been saying it all day, but I don’t even know how else to say it, it’s immeasurably more than I could ask or imagine.”
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Maybe it was the leather pants that Close has worn nearly every game since the season began in Paris in November (though they took the night off on Friday).
Maybe it was using the transfer portal to bring in veteran talent like Charlisse Leger-Walker and Gianna Kneepkens to complement a core group that included Kiki Rice, Gabriela Jaquez, Angela Dugaclic and All-American Lauren Betts.
Maybe it was finally her time after 15 years of Close and the Bruins having to settle for getting close.
After a tongue-in-cheek apology from Close to basketball watchers everywhere for Friday night’s gritty, but ugly win over Texas, Sunday’s game was a masterpiece. The Bruins dominated in every phase of the game, five players scoring in double figures, led by guard Gabriela Jaquez’s 21-point, 10-rebound, five assist game.
The moment never felt too big for a team whose top six scorers are seniors, who embraced the pressure of taking this one last ride together.
The “toughest, most together team” — as Close likes to say — got the outcome that came from embracing the process.
The game in hand, Close got to pull her starters with more than four minutes to go and give them all a long embrace. She was wiping tears away before the final seconds ticked off the block. When handed the NCAA trophy, Close raised it over her head and then immediately to her players, saying she is humbled that this group chose UCLA.
“We’ve said all year that our selflessness and our work ethic would be the things that fuel us. It’s one thing to say those things in the summer and it’s a whole other thing to follow through sacrificially, even when it’s hard,” Close said.
Close has stair-stepped this program since she took over in 2011. In her 15 seasons, the Bruins have reached the Sweet 16 five times, the Elite Eight in 2018, and skillfully navigated her team’s move to the Big Ten in 2024. Then last year’s breakthrough into the Final Four and a 34-point loss to Connecticut in the national semifinals.
After that unprecedented run, Close pivoted hard, losing six players in the transfer portal to reload a team that could contend for a title.
Sunday’s dominant victory was the crowning achievement for a coach that is universally respected and admired in the game.
“I’m so proud of Cori,” said Ann Meyers Drysdale, who played on that 1978 championship team and recalled broadcasting Close’s games as a player at UC Santa Barbara. “To see her grow and where she is today, and also what she’s done for UCLA women’s basketball is so impressive. She’s had a long journey to this.”
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Indeed, Close’s is not an overnight success story, but one of resilience and commitment. UCLA was her first head coaching job in 2011 after serving as an assistant at Santa Barbara and associate head coach for seven seasons under Sue Semrau at Florida State.
Close is relentlessly sincere about her attachment to her personal principles — the ones so heavily influenced by Wooden — her faith, her belief in intentional mental preparation for her team, and her authenticity about her own experience coaching in this new era.
In Sacramento, she said she was as tired as she’s ever been and wondering out loud how much long she wanted to coach. It was a point she felt she needed to clarify on Thursday.
“I’m not afraid of hard work,” Close said. “What I was trying to say is that we need to protect trying to keep really good coaches in our game. I think the thing we hear all the time is it’s just so different from what we signed up for… I don’t believe in the ‘balance’ phrase very much, but I do believe in staying principled-centered and remembering my ‘why’. That has been challenging the last couple of years.”
Days later in Phoenix, she admitted to being a “crappy coach” after her team’s deeply disappointing loss in the 2025 Final Four. She was more focused on the transfer portal than helping her team process what happened. But true to Close’s ethic, she and the Bruins pulled that experience apart and found every shred of its value.
Close was asked what Coach Wooden would think about what happened on Sunday.
“God, I don’t know. I think Coach Wooden actually wouldn’t care as much about the championship as he would about staying true to our process,” Close said. “I hope I would make him proud by realizing and recognizing that this is a by-product of what’s happened in their habits, in their love for each other, in committing to a process over a long period of time.”
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