No. 2 UCLA sends Hawkeyes to their second straight West Coast loss, 88-65

Note: This report was written in Iowa.

The West Coast trip turned out to be a rough one for the Iowa women’s basketball team.

Two games, two double-digit losses.

Second-ranked UCLA outscored No. 8 Iowa by 30 points in the paint and handled the Hawkeyes, 88-65, in a Big Ten battle Sunday afternoon at Pauley Pavilion in Los Angeles.

Angela Dugalic came off the bench to lead the Bruins with 22 points, and the Bruins (21-1 overall, 11-0 Big Ten) won their 15th consecutive game.

UCLA’s two big names — Kiki Rice and Lauren Betts — added 17 and 16 points, respectively.

Iowa (18-4, 9-2) slipped into third place in the Big Ten. The Hawkeyes were defeated at USC on Thursday, 81-69.

“I think this trip can be summed up that we had a lot of turnovers,” Iowa Coach Jan Jensen said on her postgame show on the Iowa Radio Network after the Hawkeyes committed 19 of them Sunday.

“I thought we were just a little bit timid, a little bit on our heels.”

Trailing by 22 points late in the third quarter, Iowa forced a UCLA timeout when it crept within 66-53 on Taylor Stremlow’s 3-pointer with 7:07 to go.

But the Bruins responded with a 20-6 run in the next five minutes.

UCLA scored 56 points in the paint, Iowa 26.

Ava Heiden was scoreless in the first half, but tallied 14 in the third quarter and ended with a team-high 19.

Hannah Stuelke added 13 points, Stremlow 12, Chit-Chat Wright 10.

Stuelke grabbed eight rebounds; Wright dished out seven assists.

The Hawkeyes welcome Minnesota to Carver-Hawkeye for a game at 6 p.m. Thursday.

“We’ve had a tough stretch. Now we’ve got to dig in,” Jensen said. “We’ve got to keep battling. We don’t want two losses to snowball.”

Comments: jeff.linder@thegazette.com