Gina Conti Returning to UCLA Women's Basketball After Earning Medical Redshirt

The former Wake Forest transfer point guard missed the entire season with a foot injury she suffered in October.

Gina Conti initially came to Westwood with one final year of eligibility in her pocket as a result of COVID-19.

But after a year spent on the bench recovering from injury, she has earned one last season of collegiate basketball.

The former Wake Forest transfer point guard announced she would be returning to UCLA women's basketball for the 2022-2023 campaign. Conti was one of eight players honored during the Bruins' Senior Day festivities on Feb. 20, but coach Cori Close said at the time that she was unsure what lied ahead for all the seniors given several injuries and eligibility complications post-coronavrius.

As it turns out, Conti isn't going anywhere just yet.

Conti was slated to be UCLA's starting point guard this season, but she suffered a foot injury in October just before her team's preseason exhibition against Texas.

Although the initial diagnosis in early November had Conti slated to be out for several weeks, she wound up missing the entire season.

As Conti's timetable got stretched further and further, it left shooting guard Charisma Osborne as the Bruins' primary point guard for virtually the entire season. Jaelynn Penn and Dominique Onu were the other point guards while Osborne was hurt or off the floor.

Conti did not return, and she was granted an additional year of eligibility by designating this past season as a medical redshirt year.

While Penn, Natalie Chou, IImar'I Thomas, Chantel Horvat, Kiara Jefferson and Kayla Owens are on their way out the door, Close will now have Conti, Osborne, Onu, Angela Dugalic and Emily Bessoir as returning members of the team's core. On top of that, UCLA has locked in the No. 1 recruiting class the country.

Guard Kiki Rice is the headliner, having won multiple national player of the year awards and ranking No. 2 in her class. Gabriela Jaquez and Lina Merle Sontag will play on the wings, Christeen Iwuala will play down low and Londynn Jones will also be a ballhandling option.

That gives the Bruins quite the loaded – or crowded – backcourt next fall, a problem that Close has not faced in recent years.

In terms of what Conti can bring to that backcourt, she averaged 13.8 points, 4.6 assists, 3.8 rebounds per game and 1.8 steals per game during the 2020-2021 season at Wake Forest. She left the Demon Deacons as the program's third-leading assister with their sixth-best career assist-to-turnover ratio.

Between Conti's talent as a floor general, Osborne's ability as a scorer and Rice's high ceiling and dynamism, Close and UCLA will have their fair share of high-level guards to lean on next season.

Follow Connon on Twitter at @SamConnon
Follow All Bruins on Twitter at @SI_AllBruins
Like All Bruins on Facebook at @SI.AllBruins
Subscribe to All Bruins on YouTube

Read more UCLA stories: UCLA Bruins on Sports Illustrated
Read more UCLA women's basketball stories: UCLA Women's Basketball on Sports Illustrated