Cal Basketball: Ice-Cold Bears Fall to WSU in Opening Game of Pac-12 Tournament
Coach Mark Fox has tried to construct his Cal basketball teams with defense as the foundation. But the Golden Bears are going to have figure out how to be a better offensive team if they hope to climb out of the Pac-12’s lower division next season.
Their 2021-22 campaign ended on Wednesday night in the opening round of the Pac-12 tournament amid an avalanche of missed shots. The 10th-seeded Bears played defense well in spurts and grabbed 21 offensive rebounds.
But they couldn’t score enough to threaten seventh-seeded Washington State in a 66-59 loss, their first in three years in their opener at Las Vegas.
Cal (12-20) shot 23 percent in the first half and was at 29 percent for the game until making two baskets in the final 22 seconds.
It marked the 12th time this season the Bears scored 60 points or fewer. Their 63.1 scoring average was lowest in the Pac-12. And it’s been that way for three years, although partly because Fox believes playing slowly has given the Bears their best chance.
Cal is 35-58 in three seasons under Fox and has failed to score 60 points in 37 of those games.
The Bears actually made their first three shots against the Cougars (19-13), who advance to Thursday’s second round to face UCLA. But the Bears turned the ball over four times in the opening 4 minutes and the Cougars never trailed.
“We didn’t start the game very well,” Fox said. "I was disappointed in our defense. Offensively, we seemed a bit our of rhythm and didn’t shoot it well in the first half so we dug ourselves too big of a hole, even though in the second half we played a little bit better. So we’re going home.”
Lars Thiemann
Photo by Stephen R. Sylvannie, USA Today
WSU was up 32-20 by halftime after Cal shot 8 for 35 over the first 20 minutes, including eight straight misses at one point. The Cougars’ lead reached 14 points midway through he second half and the Bears got no closer than eight points until Jordan Shepherd’s long 3-pointer with 2 seconds left.
The Bears dominated the boards, outrebounding WSU 48-35, with Lars Thiemann contributing 10 of those. The 21 offensive rebounds really stood out, but also highlighted Cal’s offensive woes.
“The worst part about that many offensive rebounds is we missed that many shots to begin with,” Fox said.
Actually, the worst part about it might have been the fact that Cal cashed in those 21 opportunities for just 14 second-chance points. In other words, they converted just seven of 21 shots from point blank after grabbing their own misses.
Here is Cal's post-game news conference:
The Bears struggled just as much from long range, making only two of 18 shots from the 3-point arc until Shepherd’s last-second howitzer.
"Once we decided to defend we got back in it. But we didn’t make enough shots to give ourselves a chance to really put the pressure on them," Fox said. “On this stage you’ve got to play better than we did today."
The Bears played the final 11 games without their best interior player, senior forward Andre Kelly, who broke his foot against USC on Jan. 29. Kelly, who averaged 13.4 points and 8.4 rebounds, can return for another season, but Fox said he has not made that decision.
The Bears also were handicapped Wednesday night by point guard Joel Brown’s inability to function. He sat out both games a week ago in Arizona with a knee injury and played just nine first-half minutes against WSU. He is expected to have offseason surgery to remove a cyst, according to the Pac-12 Network broadcast.
Fox had appreciative words for players whose eligibility has expired: Anticevich, Shepherd and guard Makale Foreman, who played all season with a toe injury.
“The hardest part in a rebuild is the first couple years because there’s not as much success as everybody wants,” he said. “For those kids to stay locked in and bought in and be the great young people that they were, and they represented us well, that’s to be commended.
“As we do turn the corner, someone had to take those hard first steps, and they did that. We’ll be family for life.”
Cover photo of Cal's Jordan Shepherd, Lars Thiemann and coach Mark Fox
Follow Jeff Faraudo of Cal Sports Report on Twitter: @jefffaraudo
