Women's college basketball Power Rankings: Two teams rejoin the list - ESPN

In their second year in the Big Ten, the UCLA Bruins are closing in on a milestone. With a victory at longtime rival USC on Sunday, the Bruins will be just the fourth program to finish with a perfect regular season in Big Ten women's college basketball.

The last to do it was Maryland in 2015, the season the Terps joined the Big Ten and advanced to the Final Four for the second year in a row. The others were Purdue in 1999, when the Boilermakers won the national championship, and Ohio State in 1985. That was coach Tara VanDerveer's last season with the Buckeyes before she went on to a legendary career at Stanford. Ohio State lost to eventual national champion Old Dominion in the Elite Eight in 1985.

The Big Ten began sponsoring women's basketball in the 1982-83 season. The league's makeup has changed a lot since then, including the addition of former Pac-12 teams UCLA, USC, Oregon and Washington in 2024-25. USC won the regular-season title last year at 17-1. The Bruins were second at 15-2, then won the league tournament title over the Trojans and made the women's Final Four for the first time in the NCAA era. (UCLA won the AIAW national championship in 1978).

This season, UCLA's only loss was to Texas at the Players Era Championship in Las Vegas on Nov. 26. The Bruins' 21-game winning streak is the third-longest active streak among Division I women's teams, behind UConn's 29 games this season and 45 dating to last season and North Dakota State's 23.

The Bruins — No. 2 again in this week's ESPN women's college basketball Power Rankings — will take a 55-54 all-time series lead vs. USC after their 80-46 victory at home over the Trojans on Jan. 3. JuJu Watkins' absence as she rehabs a knee injury has changed the dynamic this