For four days, Oregon coach Kelly Graves preached the same two goals: limit live-ball turnovers and keep UCLA off the offensive boards.
Those, Graves said, were the two keys that kept Oregon from knocking off No. 12 UCLA on Friday night. The Ducks lost 77-72, snapping a five-game win streak. Oregon remains one win away from 20 wins at 19-7, 8-7 Pac-12.
UCLA’s backcourt of Jordin Canada and Nirra Fields combined for 43 points while Oregon forward Jillian Alleyne tallied 25 points and 11 rebounds.
The Ducks lost the rebounding battle 36-27 including 15-6 on the offensive glass. Earlier Friday, Washington beat Arizona, so the Ducks now stand at sixth place in the Pac-12 standings.
“That’s the best rebounding team in the conference and you can see why,” Graves said. “We had a difficult time blocking out. They got almost 50 percent of their misses. That’s a recipe, against a top-10 team, for disaster.”
Oregon had its chances late.
A rebound-bucket from Alleyne tied the game at 70 with 52 seconds left. UCLA’s Canada then scored a quick bucket to make it a 72-70 UCLA lead. She was fouled, but missed the ensuing free throw. On Oregon’s next possession, Petersen, who had 15 points, turned the ball over.
“That last play we kind of got stripped late,” Graves said. “The (plan) was to go down and pound it down to Jill from the top and instead we drove and turned it over.”
Fields made the two ensuing free throws to make it a 74-70 Bruin lead with 19 seconds left. Maite Cazorla then missed a two-point field goal attempt. UCLA split its free throws and scored on an offensive rebound. Bando had a jumper in the final second.
“We just didn’t counter enough and have a run in the end,” Petersen said.
Both teams committed 17 turnovers. UCLA had 16 bench points and Oregon had none.
“This was a game we had chances late,” Graves said. “Again, didn’t make the right plays down the stretch. But really proud of our team’s effort and execution for the most part. … Defense kind of let us down late.”
Oregon led 19-14 after the first quarter and extended its lead to 26-18 on a bucket from Lexi Bando, who finished with 15 points on 6-of-11 shooting. After Bando’s bucket, Oregon didn’t record a field goal for the final 7:23 of the first half. UCLA capitalized, taking a 15-3 run to halftime for a 33-29 lead.
Oregon scored the first 10 points of the third quarter. A pair of free throws from Alleyne gave the Ducks a 43-35 lead with 6:30 left in the third. UCLA bounced back and ended the third on a 5-0 run to lead narrowly 56-54.
The Ducks finished the night shooting 48.1 percent from the field while UCLA shot 47.6 percent. Oregon was 8-of-19 from beyond the arc against UCLA, the conference’s top 3-point defense team.
“A lot of stuff you can say on paper, but when you’re in the game you have to get it done,” Alleyne said. “And they got it done, unfortunately. On those second chance points (15-6), that’s what really killed us.”
Friday night provided Oregon yet another opportunity to improve its NCAA Tournament chances. The Bruins were ranked No. 10 of the NCAA’s top seeds on Monday night.
“It’s something we think about, but it’s kind of on the back burner,” Petersen said. “This was a tough one to let go, but we have to bounce back.”
The Ducks play again on Sunday against USC at 2 p.m. in the final regular season game for Oregon’s six seniors.
Follow Jonathan Hawthorne on Twitter @Jon_Hawthorne