Photo credit: calbears.com

By Ana Kieu

Cal men’s basketball opened the 2019-20 season with a 98-75 blowout over Saint Martin’s in an exhibition game Wednesday night at Haas Pavilion.

Graduate transfer Kareem South led the Bears with a game-high 23 points. Sophomore Matt Bradley added 18 points and 5 assists, junior Grant Anticevich had 13 points on 6-of-8 shooting along with 6 rebounds and freshman Lars Thiemann scored 9 points and 4 blocked shots.

Cal head coach Mark Fox told CalBears.com, “We tend to practice very unselfishly. I don’t think we have anybody that’s a ball-stopper … I think they enjoy making each other better. We talk about making each other better and I think tonight we were able to do that.”

The Bears used a 11-0 run to build a 10-point lead at the 14:02 mark of the first half and led by as many as 15 in the first 20 minutes before the Saints closed the half on a 7-2 run for a 44-41 lead at the break.

The Bears extended the lead back quickly after halftime and held a 57-45 advantage at the under-16 media timeout with 15:34 left in the game. Cal used a 10-1 run to take a 79-58 lead and Saint Martin’s was unable to pull closer than 17 the rest of the way.

Cal scored 22 points off of 15 Saint Martin’s turnovers, held a 44-22 advantage in points in the paint and outscored the Saints 21-0 in fastbreak points.

Fox told CalBears.com, “It was great to finally play a game. It is why we all fell in love with the game was the chance to compete and to play and it was really good for our team to actually have a chance to play … We did a lot of good things, we have a lot of teachable moments we can look back on.”

The Bears open the Mark Fox era on Tuesday, November 5 at 7 p.m. inside Haas Pavilion against the Pepperdine Waves. The game will be televised on the Pac-12 Networks.