Tag: Cal

By Morris Phillips

This time, what Cal was doing was working… at least for a little while.

Then the prevailing reality sprung the surface, and Cal was cooked by top-seeded Arizona once again, this time in the Pac-12 tournament quarterfinals on Thursday afternoon.

Led by Rondae Hollis-Jefferson and Stanley Johnson, Arizona raced past Cal for the third time this season, 73-51.  The Wildcats advance to face fourth-seeded UCLA in the tournament semis on Friday, and the Bears return to Berkeley unsure if they will get a phone call from the NIT or another post-season tournament.

“On the offensive end, we did a good job of being patient, finding the next guy, and we were able to get some shots down,” Tyrone Wallace said of the Bears solid first half effort which had them down just 33-27 at the break.  “The second half, not as many shots went down.  They played good.”

“They played well in the first half and we kind of stagnated.  Credit Cal for that, but we made the plays when we needed to,” Arizona point guard T.J. McConnell said.

In each of the regular season matchups, Cal was overwhelmed by Arizona, especially in attempting to find quality scoring opportunities against the bigger, broader Wildcats.  But this time, at least in the opening half, the Bears pushed back.

Cal’s shooting was any better—33 percent in the opening half, 34 percent for the game—but early on, the Bears held their own on the glass, limited Arizona’s second shot opportunities and short-circuited any big runs.  Arizona coach Sean Miller felt the Bears’ intensity might have surprised his team early on.

“There’s always a feeling-out process in March when you get into these tournaments because teams are desperate,” Miller said.  “Individual players are kind of playing with house money or playing with a lot at stake, depending on which team you’re on.”

Cal’s “house money” man, senior David Kravish had his way with Washington State in the tournament opener, scoring a career-best 25 points.  But against Arizona, Cal’s big man had to battle 7’1” Kaleb Tarczewski and 6’10” Brandon Ashley.  Kravish grabbed 12 rebounds, but couldn’t get going offensively, scoring just six points while missing 10 of his 13 shots.

Meanwhile Arizona’s “high stakes” guy undoubtedly was Hollis-Jefferson, a defensive wizard able to guard Cal’s leading scorer Tyrone Wallace as well as their other threats, Jordan Mathews and Jabari Bird.  When Arizona made its push, scoring 14 of the first 20 points after halftime, Hollis-Jefferson delivered the spirit-raising, offensive plays as well.

Hollis-Jefferson had a dunk and a layup in transition during Arizona’s 9-0 run that put them up 46-32 with 15:50 remaining.

Freshman Stanley Johnson led the Wildcats with 19 points and Ashley added 15 points and seven rebounds as Arizona advanced to the tournament semis for the fifth straight year.

Wallace led Cal with 19 points, but needed 20 shots to reach that total.  Mathews was bottled up by Hollis-Jefferson, T. J. McConnell and others, finishing with three points on 1 of 7 shooting.

Cal (18-15) hadn’t scored as few as 51 points in a game since January 24 when Arizona came to Berkeley and held the Bears to 50 in a 23-point rout.  The Bears dropped six of their final eight games following a five-game win streak.

Kravish broke the school record for games participated in with his 135^th on Wednesday and now has 136 under his belt.  Wallace moved into 25^th place on the school’s all-time scoring list with 1,196 points.

By Morris Phillips

For now, being the eight-seed represents a tremendous opportunity for the California Bears.

At least it does, until their high noon in the desert meeting with top-seeded Arizona commences on Thursday.

The Bears did all they could on Wednesday at the Pac-12 tournament in Las Vegas, dispatching ninth-seeded Washington State, 84-59, with a massive run spanning halftime that turned a close contest into a blowout.  Cal began their big roll, trailing by one, then after Christian Behrens’ layup led 47-30 with 15:21 remaining.  The Bears missed more free throws (3) than shots (1) in the run, hitting 13 of 14 from the field.

“We established David (Kravish) in the post.  I thought that set the tone for us offensively—if we’re able to do that, then our perimeter guys could play,” Coach Cuonzo Martin explained.

Cal’s senior post epitomized the fast turnaround; Kravish missed his first six shots, then commenced his big finish during the run, hitting 10 of his last 11.  He finished with a career-best 25 points, a distinct signal that the Bears’ leader is locked in for a big finish to his collegiate career.

“It’s just one of those things you play the game for so long, you can’t dwell on something in the middle of a game,” Kravish said of his in-game switch.  “You don’t really worry about the misses.”

Washington State surprised Cal January 4 in Berkeley, then the Bears won the rematch January 29 in Pullman.  In both Cal wins, the Cougs let the normally pedestrian Bears offense jump into a Ferrari.  Cal ranks 197^th (out of 345) in Division I scoring at 66.5 points a game, but they averaged 80 points in the two wins against WSU.

Jabari Bird didn’t envision himself as a defensive specialist when he signed with Cal in 2012, but he was one Wednesday, shutting down WSU’s leading scorer DaVonte Lacy.  The senior guard was held to two points in the first half and finished with nine in his final appearance as a collegian.

The Cal sophomore also capped off the first half, hitting a three-pointer as a pair of WSU defenders froze, unwilling to contest Bird’s shot four feet behind the arc as time expired.  The Bears led 37-26 at the half.

Washington State hasn’t won a Pac-12 tournament game since 2009, Klay Thompson’s freshman year.  They’ve lost seven in a row since, including the March 2011 thriller in which Thompson scored a tournament-record 43 points but saw his Cougs fall 89-87 to Washington.  WSU and Cal had never met in this tournament prior to Wednesday.

The Bears got 19 points from Jordan Mathews and 12 from Tyrone Wallace.  Ike Iroegbu led Washington State with 17 points.  The Bears enjoyed a healthy 37-22 edge on the glass and hit 8 of 12 from distance.

Cal will need more of the same against Arizona; they fell to the Wildcats by 23 in Berkeley, and last week in Tucson, Cal was embarrassed, losing by 39. Making their task that much more difficult is the significant improvement of 7’0” Kaleb Tarczewksi who anchors the middle for the Cats, and was terrific last week limiting Cal and Kravish.

By Morris Phillips

On the occasion of Arizona’s clinching of a second straight Pac-12 regular season championship, the Cal Bears were like a 30-second commercial spot needed to defray costs of the fancy celebration.

Instead of 30 seconds, the Bears were afforded the first five minutes of the game to compete, make plays and look respectable.  After that, the No. 5 Wildcats made all the plays—mostly inside, but also out—in a 99-60 rout of outclassed California.

The Bears were hoping for a magical weekend in which they would sweep their final two regular season games, even their conference record, and put themselves on the fringes of the NCAA tournament conversation.  Instead, they were just reminded of how far off they are from their post-season aspirations.

With the game tied at 12, the Wildcats took off, scoring 29 of the next 37 points to take a commanding 20-point lead with a couple minutes still to play before halftime.  Things got worse after the break with Arizona pushing their lead to 30 with 12 minutes remaining in the game.

Arizona shot 57 percent for the game, persistently working the undersized Bears over in the paint.  Only an off-night from the free-throw line where the Cats missed 13 of 32 attempts kept Arizona from totaling 110 plus points.  As it was, the 39-point margin was the biggest of the season for Arizona, as well as the biggest loss margin for Cal.

Coach Cuonzo Martin, a defensive specialist as a player at Purdue and then later in NBA, of course pointed to Arizona’s defensive effort in trying to explain the whipping suffered by his Bears.

“I thought they did a great job of battling, taking away passing lanes,” Martin said. “When you talk about the No. 5 team in the country, not necessarily are they a good defensive team, they’re a sound defensive team.  You have to be able to go inside and out.  If you don’t have low post production, low post scoring and low post offensive rebounding, that can be tough.”

Cal’s only legitimate post threat, David Kravish, had his hands full with Arizona’s 7’0” Kaleb Tarczewski.  That matchup allowed power forward Brandon Ashley to take advantage of smaller defenders on his way to a career-best 21 points. Still, Kravish succumbed to foul trouble, playing just 17 minutes.

Leading scorer Tyrone Wallace led Cal with 16 points but missed 11 of his 18 shot attempts.  The Bears’ other two threats to put up decent numbers, Jabari Bird and Jordan Mathews, converted just four of their 14 shot attempts.

Once the rout took hold, so did the personalities in the sold out crowd at the McKale Center.  Four ultra-serious historical impersonators, complete with the fake white hair and a hand-written plaque called the “Declaration of Rondaependence,” appeared pleased when their accomplished leader, Rondae Hollis-Jefferson recovered his lost dribble and spun around Cal’s Sam Singer for a dunk that put the Cats up 39-18 with 4 minutes remaining in the opening half.

“Learn from it.  Keep moving.  You don’t have time to dwell on it,” Martin said when asked if his Bears would easily recover emotionally from the lopsided affair.

Hollis-Jefferson was one of six Wildcats to finish in double figures led by Ashley’s 21 points and Tarczewski with 14.

The Bears (17-13, 7-10) conclude the regular season on Saturday afternoon in Tempe where they will face Arizona State, who got past Stanford, 67-62, on Thursday.

By Morris Phillips

Dissecting a loss is never fun, and it wasn’t for Cuonzo Martin on Saturday.

The Cal coach rightly had an expectation of better things given his Bears had won five of six, and had almost a full week to hatch a plan to upset rival Stanford   But Cal simply didn’t play well enough to damage the Cardinal’s NCAA hopes in a 72-61 loss at Maples Pavilion.

“We just didn’t get stops defensively,” Martin admitted.  “We had breakdowns, missed box-outs.  I don’t think we defended well.”

And that was just the coach’s insights on the final 20 minutes that saw the Bears grow frustrated with Stanford’s double-digit lead that they maintained for all but 90 seconds of the half.  Stanford’s size and experience in the paint were a problem, but so was Chasson Randle.  The Cardinal’s senior leader didn’t do much early, but he was a handful after halftime, finishing with 19 points and eight assists.

Randle’s final act of the afternoon—a beautifully executed in-bounds play where he caught the pass over the top from the baseline in the paint, and quickly shuttled the ball to Stefan Nastic for the lay-up—showed that Stanford’s experience is a tough thing for youthful Cal to overcome at this point.  Repeatedly, the Bears were a step slow while Stanford was patient and purposeful, content to methodically wear down their most notable opponent.

“It was more so just about our standards and what we want to do for the rest of the year, NCAAs or not.  We just wanted to go out the right way,” Randle said.

The Bears shot 35 percent in the first half in which they were basically a one-man show, with senior David Kravish accepting the challenge with 16 of his career-best 23 points.  The rest of the Bears missed makeable shots, and couldn’t summon a critical stop with Stanford within reach in the final minutes of the half.

Leading 28-23, Randle penetrated the lane but threw up an air ball, wide right.  But Stanford freshman Michael Humphrey was in the right place, scooping up the miss and laying it in.  A few seconds later—after a Cal turnover—Anthony Brown used a well-timed screen to knock down a 3-pointer as Bears’ freshman Kingsley Okoroh was a step slow on the closeout.

Brown’s big shot not only exposed Cal’s perimeter defense, it gave Stanford their first 10-point lead.

While Cal’s “it takes a village” approach to stopping Randle worked initially, Stanford’s similar approach to slowing the Bears’ leader Tyrone Wallace seemed to have a more lasting effect.  Wallace missed eight of his first ten shot attempts, and couldn’t lift his team as he has all season.  In the final moments, when Cal got as close as eight down, Martin elected to keep Wallace on the bench in favor of freshman Brandon Chauca.

Jabari Bird didn’t manage many good looks nor did Jordan Mathews, who appeared slowed by an ankle issue.  The indispensable pair missed 11 of their combined 16 shots and made just one 3-pointer.

And without the injured Christian Behrens, the Bears were outmanned in the paint.  Stanford was without 6’9” Roscoe Allen but it didn’t seem to matter.  Freshmen Humphries and Reid Travis were just as tough to handle for the Bears, who elected to start undersized Dwight Tarwater on their front line, bringing the hobbled Mathews off the bench.

The Bears (16-11, 6-8) get an opportunity to even their Pac-12 record in their final two home games this week with Oregon up first on Wednesday night, followed by Oregon State on Sunday afternoon.

By Morris Phillips

Utah’s superb defense figured to test Cal and their unlikely five-game win streak, but at least for a while the Bears had the Utes on their heels thanks to Tyrone Wallace.

Wallace scored 17 of his game-best 26 points in the first half, but an 11-minute stretch spanning the halves in which Cal made just one basket tipped the scales for Utah in their 76-61 win on Sunday in Salt Lake City.

“We just didn’t make plays down the stretch of the first half and they did,” Jabari Bird said.  “That gave them the boost they needed and they used that to their advantage in the second half.”

Had Cal maintained their early lead, and upset No. 11 Utah, it would have marked the biggest win of their season, and given them a tremendous boost to their post-season aspirations.  But the Utes haven’t allowed more than 72 points to any opponent all season, and their early struggles on defense didn’t seem likely to last.

“We just didn’t have much energy and they were playing a heck of a lot harder offensively than we were defensively,” Utah coach Larry Krystkowiak.

But Utah’s energy issues didn’t last, after Cal shot 54 percent and led by six after the first 15 minutes.  From that point, the Bears scored just 25 points the rest of the way, and never led after halftime.  As usual, the stingy Utes started the run with a steal, and a big boost from their sellout crowd.

Utah won at the historic Huntsman Center for the 17^th consecutive time.  Utah has been dominant in conference play, winning all six previous Pac-12 home games by an average of 23 points.  A 16-point win over Cal Sunday ranks at the closest of the bunch.

All-conference guard Delon Wright started the rush with a steal and breakaway basket and Cal almost immediately was stuck in the mud.

Consequently, the Bears spent much of the second half trailing by double digits and failed to make Utah uncomfortable at any point.

The Bears fell to 6-7 in Pac-12 play with the loss, but they get another big game on Saturday at 7-6 Stanford, who have seen their NCAA hopes take a hit with losses in three of their last four games.

Cal’s 3-point shooting during their win streak was dramatically better than it was over the balance of their schedule, and it was the first to go in the loss to Utah.  The Bears missed 10 of their 14 attempts and that surely made any hopes of another buzzer beater shot on Sunday. Also, they lacked the scoring balance that normally would be essential to beating a highly-ranked opponent.

The Bears got 21 of their 26 made baskets from Wallace and Bird.  The other seven Bears missed 23 of their combined 28 shots.

Besides Wallace’s 26 points and Bird’s 21, the Bears got seven from backup point guard Brandon Chauca.  The Utes were lead 7’0” center Jakob Poeltl with 18 points.

By Morris Phillips

This time the Cal Bears didn’t seem particularly excited about summoning last second dramatics to pull out a win.  So instead, they ran their tried-and-true offensive look with leading scorer Tyrone Wallace attacking from his left between the circles facing the basket.

Wallace’s runner with 21 seconds left followed by Sam Singer’s steal iced the Bears 68-61 win at Colorado, their fifth straight.  Cal had dropped six in a row at Boulder–and never won at the Coors Event Center under Coach Mike Montgomery–a drought dating back to December 1974.

“To beat a team of this magnitude on their home floor with this energy and passion is a real credit to our guys,” Cuonzo Martin said.

The loss was a bitter one for the Buffs.  Colorado had their three top players—Askia Booker, Josh Scott and Xavier Johnson—available for the first time since early January, but they didn’t look healthy.  The 6’9” Scott struggled to run and missed eight of his 13 shots.  Booker wasn’t his  usual explosive self and did not shoot daggers through the Bears as he has in the past, and Johnson failed to make half his shots for the fourth straight game upon his return from injury.

“We knew that the energy and emotion would be there but like I said to our guys, ‘all we have to do is be sound’ because there is a chemistry that you are trying to get when so many guys have been out,” Martin said.

Colorado shot just 36 percent from the floor and lost consecutive conference home games for the first time since 2009.  Unless the Buffs can resurrect themselves from their 4-7 Pac-12 record, they’ll miss the NCAA Tournament for the first time in four seasons.

“We’re down right now, but we’re not out,” CU Coach Tad Boyle said.

The Bears hurt Colorado with long range shooting, continuing the hot streak from distance that has been a constant during their win streak.  Cal was 10 of 22 against CU with Jordan Mathews and Dwight Tarwater combining for seven of the makes.  Cal led by one at the half, and extended their lead to double-digits early in the second half.  But when that comfortable lead evaporated to two in the final minute, the Bears seemed visually perturbed, and Martin called Wallace’s number.

Wallace’s unique ability to turn his hips, deceive with his eyes, and speed through a pair of pick-and-roll defenders on his way to the basket is quite simply world class.  Similar to how Dywane Wade operated in his prime, a bigger Cal teammate runs back from the free-throw line extended and sets a high screen for Wallace, forcing his defender to run away from the basket to meet the screen.   Wallace picks the precise moment to engage the screen, often circling his teammate with a head of steam almost always eliminating the primary defender.  Then with his eyes and hips, he navigates the bigger defender, who is at a disadvantage needing to quickly reverse ground to keep Wallace from getting into the paint.

The fact that Wallace is narrow, fast and can turn his hips and dribble ahead of his body with his dominant right hand makes the play deadly.  The path taken also leads the 6’5” guard directly to his sweet spot in the mid-lane area where he has a variety of shots and release points.

Up 63-61 with 21 seconds left, Wallace saw a pair of bigger screen defenders in the 6’7” Johnson and Scott and both retreated in tandem, seemingly stopping Wallace at the free throw line.  But Wallace proved resourceful, first hesitating, then penetrating into the lane with Johnson and Scott still retreating, and lofted a five-footer that was perfect.

The Bears have battled back from a 1-6 start in Pac-12 play to get to .500, but their NCAA hopes would still have to be considered a long shot.  A win over either ranked Arizona or ranked Utah would have to be a must, but Cal may also have to beat all four of their other remaining opponents—with a trip to better-positioned Stanford included.

The Bears (16-9, 6-6) get their opportunity to upset No. 11 Utah on Sunday afternoon in Salt Lake City.

By Morris Phillips

Tyrone Wallace’s final dash up the floor could have easily fallen into the same category as the entirety of Thursday’s USC-Cal clash: mildly entertaining fare emanating from the Pac-12’s soft underbelly.

But Wallace’s rush up the floor and buzzer-beating, game-winning three was much more than that.  It not only surprised the young Trojans, robbing them of a win both rare and unlikely, it also incited an impromptu mid-court celebration of Cal fans and players that quickly allowed the Bears to forget how depressing the whole evening could have ended.

And the 70-69 decision also served as a reminder of how much promise remains in Cal’s wildly inconsistent, up-and-down season entering the final stretch.

“The thing I tell our guys—even after an exhibition game—is that you have to enjoy the wins because you never know when the next one is coming,” winning coach Cuonzo Martin said.  “It’s always tough to play.  Injuries and key guys go down and stuff happens, so appreciate the wins, learn from them, enjoy them and don’t let them cripple you.  I think our guys understand the importance of winning games, appreciating the wins and moving forward.”

Wallace’s game winner came less than 10 seconds after he missed the front end of a one-and-one that would have evened the score at 68.  But after a quick foul, USC’s Jordan McLaughlin could only convert one of two free throw attempts allowing room for Wallace to redeem himself and snatch victory from the powerful jaws of defeat.

David Kravish grabbed McLaughlin’s miss and quickly unleashed an outlet pass to Wallace streaking up the left side of the floor with USC freshman Malik Marquetti in close pursuit.  Wallace’s clear release meant the Bears would eschew their remaining timeout and hopefully catch the Trojans napping, but Marquetti was in position to contest and he was joined by teammate Elijah Stewart when Wallace approached the three-point arc looking for an opening to release a shot.

So Wallace gave a quick pump fake and rose above both defenders who decided to stand, reach skyward and avoid a foul instead of aggressively contesting Wallace’s shot.  So Cal’s leading scorer went up and sank the game winner.

“The shot felt really good,” Wallace recounted.  “It felt it off my hands and I thought it was going in.  I followed it all the way through, it went in and everybody rushed the floor.”

Cal has won consecutive games with a 3-pointer at the buzzer and three straight overall after six straight losses.  The Bears (14-9, 4-6) remain stuck in the middle of the pack in the Pac-12 trailing seven conference foes with only two or three likely to gain NCAA bids.  So their path is an uphill one, but not an impossibility given the spark the mini win-streak has provided.

“There’s definitely still work to be done, but seeing things start to go our way is huge,” Kravish said.  “Guys are starting to hit shots.  Sam hit that game winner, came back out and hit another three today.  It’s really good.  It gets our confidence going.”

Youthful USC may have lost this one in the first ten minutes and not at the buzzer.  The Trojans needed more than 10 minutes to score 10 points, and their energy and attention to detail at both ends were clearly lacking.  Already, USC entered the game last in shooting percentage in conference from the field, the 3-point line and the charity stripe.  Along with missing shots, the Trojans also let too many Bears find their sweet spots offensively allowing Cal to lead by 14 at one point in the opening 20 minutes and by nine points at halftime.

But midway through the second half, USC caught fire behind herky-jerky freshman McLaughlin and led 66-61 with less than two minutes remaining.  But the Bears fought back and were poised to shock when the Trojans’ freshman was able to convert only one of two free throws with less than five seconds remaining.

Wallace led Cal with 18 points, including three of Cal’s nine made threes.  The Trojans got 20 from McLaughlin and 16 from Katin Reinhardt but couldn’t overcome 18 turnovers or nine missed free throws.

The Bears look to stretch their win streak on Saturday when UCLA visits Haas Pavilion at 5pm.  The Bruins held on to win at Stanford, 69-67, on Thursday.