Cori Close of UCLA is one of college basketball’s premier women’s coaches. Now in her 14th season, Head Coach Close has piloted UCLA to its first season with 30 or more wins, the 2025 Final Four, and was named the 2024–25 Coach of the Year by the U.S. Basketball Writers Association. She talked with Military Press Magazine regarding her team, college basketball, and her personal philosophies.

Elise Cooper: Who has influenced you the most regarding coaching?

Coach Close: I had a village of people, great teachers in life, which is how I consider myself. My dad was a teacher and a coach. Steve Cain was the coach for the boy’s high school basketball team in Milpitas, California where I’m from, and was my most influential basketball person growing up. Obviously, I played for great people, my high school and college coaches were great role models.

EC:  You spoke often with Coach Wooden, even before your tenure at UCLA. How was your relationship with Coach Wooden?

CC: When someone talks about success at the highest levels but in a principled and centered way, nobody did it like him.  Spending time with him was transformational. I just had a transfer in last week as a recruit and I took her through the UCLA Hall of Fame.  I asked her, does she know about Coach Wooden?  I was pumped when she was able to tell me his accomplishments. One of the ways I want to honor his mentorship in my life is to keep his principles and stories alive. I see it as my responsibility to share how he impacted me. I also share his Pyramid of Success on how success is redefined and the process to lead to competitive greatness.

EC: How would you describe Coach Close as a person?

CC: Passionate, people oriented, driven, and more laid back as a person than a basketball coach. I do enjoy a good laugh and am a good audience. I enjoy being with people I trust and admire. Outside of basketball, I have a simple life. My relationship with Jesus is foundational for me. I want to grow from the inside out. I also enjoy books about leadership and culture and my relationship with God.

EC: What do you want your players to take out of their time at UCLA?

CC: My philosophy is that the ball will go flat, banners hang in gyms, and rings collect dust but how I coach their hearts and impact who they become as young women will hopefully stay with them forever. This is very important to me.

EC: Is your coaching style “we over me?”

CC: There are two ways to coach. Transactional coaches push buttons to get a response or manipulate to get to a different end, making someone look good as a coach. I do not want to be about that, what I want to be is transformational. It starts with ‘It is not about me but serving others.’ With my team and staff, I ask what they do need from me right now to serve them. I try to have habits, accountability, and a culture that reinforces that kind of behavior.

EC:  Is women’s basketball different than men’s college and pro basketball where team matters?

CC: Coach Wooden used to say that he loved women’s basketball because of the emphasis on fundamentals, strategy, and teamwork. I really think women’s basketball needs to hold on to this. Players can still be flashy and creative while still having great fundamentals, but they need to do it within the team concept. I want to protect this in our game.

EC: Do you think the rules for compensating players for their Name Image Likeness (NIL) should change?

CC: NIL should have happened a long time ago with the increase of TV rights and how a name/image was used. But now there are huge changes without good boundaries that have unintended consequences. We need a Federal law because there are different laws in every state. It is crazy. I do think we should learn from the professional model: a need for a salary cap for competitive equity, infrastructure with possibly a collective bargaining agreement, and accountability rules like having players able to transfer one time without any penalty but the next time they must sit out a year. This will dictate how contracts need to go. This is not a sustainable model.

EC: Do you agree with Connecticut Coach Gino Auriemma who said about the transfer portal, “How about we teach kids how to make a commitment and stick to it,” and that players only want to start?

CC: Yes. 90% of players are not willing to wait their turn and define their development as to whether they start or not. The exposure, the more money, the more what is at stake, there are challenges that go along with it. Fans enjoy watching someone’s growth process over four years. There is a powerful connection to help develop a fan base.

EC: Did the player’s impatience in waiting for their turn contribute to UCLA losing their whole freshman class?

CC: Yes.  The reality is that everyone’s journey is a little different.  Playing time was a part of it. All four of the freshmen had their own reasons and their own story. We only wish them well and nothing but the best.

EC: UCLA also lost two seniors.  Why?

CC: The reality is I had amazing conversations with them. I wanted to know from them what they needed to have a great experience next year and I told them what I needed from them. If there is not alignment there is no hard feelings.  We had three hours of meetings and what they needed from me I could not promise them. So, I decided to be totally supportive of their next step. Moving forward, we have a great relationship. After they committed somewhere else, I will be rooting for them unless we play each other. We were not in complete alignment and had to make hard decisions to make sure the current team reaches their potential.

EC: Do you think the coaches in women’s college basketball should be able to challenge the referees’ calls?

CC: We can challenge a certain amount but need a more robust replay challenge system. I also think there is a need for better training of refs, better accountability, more transparency, and former players to become refs. At the start of every year, I have the refs discuss how they got into it and how much they get paid. The refereeing is not improving at the rate the game is improving. I do think they work very hard and want to grow the game as well, but the system is broken overall.

EC: UCLA made the Final Four for the first time this year. What does the team need to do to achieve the next step?

CC: Every year we do a deep dive on the last five years of national championship teams. What was exposed is what we need to work on. For example, the last five years, each championship team turned the ball over 12 or less times on average per game. Last year UCLA averaged 15 times a game. We go through an improvement plan for each individual player and what do they need to work on mentally, physically, with their skill development, leadership, and being a great teammate. We are together eight weeks in the summer where we do a lot of relationship building, a team retreat, and every week we have team time.  We want to bring any player who transfers or comes in as a freshman into the culture with an atmosphere of family. We work to get to know each other and to be a whole with the individual pieces.

EC: It seems part of your style is to have the teammates also speak about what happened in a game?

CC: Yes.  When they meet after a game it might not always be warm and fuzzy and during a game in the timeouts there are players who will speak up about what they see.

EC: What do you want to say about UCLA attendance?

CC: We are going to do a deep dive in the next month or so.  We improved 40% last year in attendance so we are going in the right direction. That said, the competition for the entertainment dollar or as a sports fan in Los Angeles is a lot different than in Columbia South Carolina or East Hartford Connecticut. Regarding recruits, we will point out how there are a lot of cool things to do and experience in LA that they cannot do anywhere else. Yes, those teams mentioned will have more fans at their games because there is not much else to do. We had two sellouts last year, one the year before, and hopefully four sellouts next year.

EC: UCLA men’s basketball coach Cronin said that joining the Big 10 has created problems because of the travel. Do you agree?

CC: I have a different opinion with him on this. Is it hard, yes. I have lots of time to prepare and plan for travel logistics, and its overall mental and physical effects on the student athletes. The reality is our cumulative team GPA is 3.4. But I am so thankful to be in such a good conference and the resources we receive, including the great media rights deal. I do not think we can have it both ways. Unless I have a solution that is better, then I will not complain.

EC: What would you like to say to UCLA women’s basketball fans?

CC: Next season we could potentially have the best team we have ever had.  People will love watching Charlisse Leger-Walker play alongside Kiki Rice, Lauren Betts, and Gabriela Jaquez.  We have a two-time Olympian returning in Angela Dugalic and two freshman coming in, Sienna Betts and Lena Bilic. I am hopeful we will add one or two transfers.

THANK YOU!!

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