By Morris Phillips

BERKELEY, CA–Coach Mark Fox gave an honest opinion in handicapping his Bears’ assignment against high-scoring Arizona State saying, “we’re going to have to overachieve.”

Fox got his wish, with Cal playing above its current abilities and pushing the Sun Devils to the limit. But that effort wasn’t quite at the level needed to pull a significant, early season upset.

Senior Remy Martin led ASU with 22 points, five assists and the Bears went the final 2:11 scoreless, falling 70-62 at Haas Pavilion. The Pac-12 opener for both teams saw the Sun Devils maintain a slim lead throughout the game’s final 21 minutes after Cal led for the final time, 34-31 just before halftime.

Matt Bradley led Cal with 20 points, but missed 14 shot attempts as Cal’s offense never got dialed in despite a significant edge on the glass providing additional opportunities.

The Bears shot just 40 percent from the floor and committed 20 turnovers. That and a quiet night from the Cal bench (6 points) marked the line between Fox’s desired overachievement and something decidedly less.

The Golden Bears (2-2, 0-1) travel to UCLA on Sunday afternoon knowing their glaring needs of better ball movement and a consistent, secondary scorer are clearly discernable for their opponent. The Bruins exploited both issues in Cal’s worst offensive effort of last season, also at Pauley Pavilion.

While transfers Ryan Betley and Makale Foreman have been capable starters and shooters, returning Bears Joel Brown, Andre Kelly, Lars Thiemann and Grant Anticevich haven’t had representative games in any of the four contests to date. Anticevich is 3 of 16 from distance thus far with Fox saying shooting improvement from distance should come quickly for his senior forward and Bradley as well.

The Sun Devils got 14 points, three rebounds from their highest rated recruit in program history, Josh Christopher, the younger brother of former Cal star Patrick Christopher.