UCLA Women's Basketball: Charisma Osborne Appears To Hurt Head Vs USC
Your UCLA Bruins' first quarter of their Pac-12 Tournament Semifinals matchup against the USC Trojans went about as terribly as it could have. USC quickly galloped to a 16-point lead by the end of the opening quarter, 24-8.
The Blue and Gold rallied mightily in the second quarter, and astoundingly even snagged a surprise 31-30 lead.
And that's when the team's luck turned again, possibly fatally. UCLA grad student guard Charisma Osborne appeared to hurt her head while fighting for a loose ball. She collapsed to the ground and stayed there for a few minutes as she was tended to by team medical staffers.
Eventually, she was helped to her feet, and managed to walk mostly under her own power into the team locker room, with a towel over her head. 51 seconds remained in the half when she left.
USC had at that point recaptured its lead, 34-31, and would go on to finish the half on a 7-0 run. The Trojans lead 37-31 at the break. Still, UCLA outscored USC 23-13 in the second frame, showing major signs of life in what's been an offensively-challenged affair to this point (neither team is shooting better than 38.2% from the floor).
At the time of her departure, Osborne had been the Bruins' leading scorer, with 10 points on 2-of-6 shooting from the floor (2-of-2 from deep) and 4-of-5 shooting from the foul line. She had also chipped in two rebounds.
The winner of tonight's matchup will go on to face the Stanford Cardinal in the Pac-12 Tournament Final on Sunday, slated for 2 p.m. PT on ESPN.