A star player coming out of the game early is never ideal.

But when senior center Lauren Betts picked up her third foul on a technical call with 90 seconds remaining in the first quarter, coach Cori Close made the decision to sit her for the rest of the half.

Missing their go-to big for a large swath of the opening two frames, No. 2 UCLA women’s basketball (20-1, 10-0 Big Ten) managed a 80-67 win over Illinois (15-6, 5-5) Wednesday afternoon at State Farm Center in Champaign, Illinois. The Bruins, who entered the game with a 27.8 point differential over conference opponents, only led the Fighting Illini by seven points with just over a minute left in the game.

UCLA was already getting outrebounded by the Fighting Illini starting lineup – which boasts three players above 6 feet tall – when 6-foot-7 Betts was benched. The Bruins exited the first quarter with six rebounds to the home team’s 10.

Then freshman forward Sienna Betts stepped up. 

The Centennial, Colorado, local grabbed five rebounds in the first half to go along with 10 points, helping UCLA take a 45-31 lead into the break. 

Graduate student guard Gianna Kneepkens added in eight points of her own in the first half on perfect 3-for-3 shooting, hitting a 3-pointer – the Bruins’ first across the opening quarters –  with 14 seconds left in the half to close out her squad’s scoring.

In a foul-plagued game, free throws proved vital. In the first half alone, UCLA shot 12-for-13 from the charity stripe, with senior guard Gabriela Jaquez going 7-for-8. Illinois shot 11-for-14 from the line across the same time frame.

Despite entering the second half trailing by 14 points, the Fighting Illini seemingly came out of the break with momentum, carrying a 15-6 run and forcing Close to call a timeout with 4:37 remaining in the third quarter. 

Forward Cearah Parchment and guard Destiny Jackson were the only Illinois players who scored in the third quarter, but with Parchment’s 12 points and Jackson’s six, the team was able to outscore UCLA 18-11 and close the gap to just seven points. 

Sienna Betts was held scoreless in the third frame, playing only four minutes after logging 15 in the first half. Lauren Betts scored nine points on 3-for-9 shooting from the field and had three rebounds after playing the full 10-minute frame.

The Bruins got off to a 9-7 run in the fourth quarter before the media timeout, with graduate student forward Angela Dugalić scoring five points on 2-for-2 shooting from the field. Parchment countered with seven of her own for the home squad.

The Fighting Illini flirted with just a seven-point deficit at multiple points in the final quarter, and the Bruins looked like they could have failed to reach 80 points for just the second time in a conference match. A pair of free throws sandwiching a layup from senior guard Kiki Rice pushed UCLA to a 13-point lead for the closest win over an unranked team on the season.

[Related: UCLA women’s basketball beats Minnesota to remain undefeated in conference play]

The Bruins had 13 turnovers for the third game in a row, in comparison to nine from the Fighting Illini.

The game’s biggest difference maker was the points in the paint, with UCLA scoring 48, doubling Illinois’ 24. The Bruins also outrebounded the Fighting Illini 22-10 in the second half, with Lauren Betts leading the way with nine total and Jaquez close behind with her eight.

Lauren Betts finished the game with 23 points on 8-for-20 shooting from the field, and five other Bruins reached double figures – Dugalić, Jaquez, Sienna Betts, Kneepkens and Rice.