On Friday, Cal women’s basketball fell to Washington by a final score of 67-64. Washington improves to 10-3 overall and 2-0 in the Pac-12 while Cal falls to 8-4 overall and 0-1 in the Pac-12. Washington senior guard Amber Melgoza led the way for the Huskies with 31 points and 5 rebounds while senior center CJ West and senior forward Jaelyn Brown each finished with 12 points for the Golden Bears.
“This is a tough one,” Cal head coach Charmin Smith said after the game. “Obviously we’re disappointed. We just dug ourselves too big of a hole in the first half and weren’t able to make enough shots. Get enough stops down the stretch to get the victory. I think we showed a ton of fight, but still disappointed that we couldn’t come away with the win.”
Washington got out to an 11-5 lead with 4:56 to go in the 1st quarter. Sophomore center Darcy Rees was up to 5 points for Washington while junior forward Alaysia Styles was up to 4 points for Cal. Cal was coming out a little rushed and out of control. They needed to slow it down.
“I think it was honestly more us than them,” West said of what caused their rushed start. “They’re a very good team. They pressured, they trapped very well, but I think we were rushing and were playing really fast and rushing ourselves. I don’t think we were very patient. We practice so much in practice of the fundamentals of jump stop; ball fake; sweeping the pass; ripping it through; sweeping it over; and I think sometimes our first Pac-12 game the freshmen had never experienced it before.
“Being a senior it’s my last run in Pac-12, so I think just all the adrenaline and the excitement sometimes kind of clouds our judgment when we need to be thinking about fundamentals. So I think we kind of, we slowed down and gathered ourselves a little bit too late.”
With 2:50 to go in the quarter, Washington was up 15-13 with 2:50 to go in the 1st quarter after freshman guard Jazlen Green got Cal back in the game with a couple of three-pointers. Cal was up to 3 assists, matching the men’s total from the night before against Stanford.
“Charmin had mentioned earlier that Pac-12 is where it gets real,” Green said. “In the game, you could feel the difference intensity, but it’s still basketball at the same time. And credit to Washington, but also our heart and our play. It just made it feel more easier. I didn’t feel like it necessarily that we didn’t come out like we weren’t prepared for the Pac-12 play because I feel like we always come out prepared, but as a freshman I think I was more excited because it was Pac-12 because it’s the number one conference in the nation. So to be able to play that is looked at as a gift rather than nervousness.”
At the end of the 1st quarter, Washington was up 19-15 as Melgoza was up to 10 points on 5-5 shooting from the field, getting whatever she wanted. Green was the top scorer for Cal with those 6 points on 2-4 shooting from 3-point range. Cal had 0 points in the last 2:29.
With 4:37 to go in the half, Washington was up 28-17 as Melgoza was now up to 14 points. Cal really needed to do a better job defending her. Washington was shooting 10-20 (50%) from the field while Cal was shooting an abysmal 6-24 (25.0%). Cal’s offense needed to pick up as much as their defense.
At halftime, Washington led 36-24 having made 5 of their last 7 field goals. Cal was in the midst of another scoring drought having not scored in the last 2:13. Melgoza was up to 18 points for Washington while Green was the top scorer for Cal despite still having 6 points.
Cal got off to a strong start in the second half as freshman guard Leilani McIntosh found CJ West inside for a bucket while Sara Anastasieska found Alaysia Styles for a jumper near the foul line. Washington called for time was they were now up 36-28 with 8:55 to go in the 3rd quarter.
With 4:54 to go in the 3rd quarter, Washington still led by 8 points up 44-36. Melgoza was up to 22 points and was the only player in double figures. Cal was back in the game but couldn’t afford to be trading baskets. They needed to get some stops. As for the officiating, the weren’t too popular at the moment after McIntosh got called for an offensive foul.
Shortly after that, Green went down with an apparent leg injury and had to get carried back to the locker room. Fortunately, she was able to return to the game later, but at the time, it was unclear whether or not she’d be able to.
At the end of the 3rd quarter, Washington was up 52-46 as Melgoza was still having her way with 26 points. West was leading Cal with 10 points. What was keeping Cal in the game was their 35-25 rebounding advantage. Without that, they wouldn’t have been in the position that they were in. Also, at this point, Green had returned to the bench, a sign of optimism after her injury.
“So what happened was I was going for the rebound and caught a muscle spasm in my thigh,” Green said. “I didn’t know. I thought it was a cramp. But I guess it was more like a muscle spasm. That’s basically how I can explain it.”
Cal would make a comeback in the 4th quarter to go up 58-56 with 5:09 to go after a 3-point play from Anastasieska. It was at this point that Green checked back in the game, confirming that the injury she sustained wasn’t that serious. Washington would respond as Mai-Loni Henson got a bucket to fall inside to go along with a foul. She wouldn’t make the foul shot, making it a 58-58 game with 4:40 to go.
With 1:01 to go, the game was tied again 64-64. Cal went on a 6-0 run consisting of a made free throw from McIntosh, a 3-pointer from Green following a block/steal from her, and two free throws made from Evelien Lutje Schipholt. What tied it back up at 64 apiece was a 3-pointer from Melgoza. It was a wild sequence of events.
“She had 18 at half,” Smith said of Melgoza. “We went zone in the second half. We didn’t do much in the first half to mix it up. With Jaelyn in foul trouble we were just a little limited. So, we tried the zone some in the second half and I thought that was effective a little bit. Then we she found a rhythm in that we went back to player-to-player, we put Evelien on her a couple possessions just to get a different look. Different size. She missed a couple shots there, but then in the end we just had a really poor rotation off of her that allowed her to tie it up with a minute left. That was really unfortunate.”
Melgoza would break the tie to give Washington a 66-64 lead with 15.0 to go. A 3-pointer from Green to give Cal the lead didn’t go in, resulting in a defensive rebound from Henson, who got fouled. Henson would go 1-2 at the foul line, giving Cal the ball down by three points (67-64) with 6.5 to go. Green got another look at the basket to tie it up and once again her shot wasn’t able to drop. In the end, Washington escaped with a 67-64 win.
“They actually make it easier to embrace it,” Green said of the belief her team has in her. “To look at me and be like ‘you’re going to make it.’ There’s no ifs, ands, or buts. Like you’re going to make it. I appreciate coach for having that confidence in me because she just understands how much I want it and how much my heart is in it that she knows that I have that confidence to take that shot in order to give it to me. But I don’t think it’s more pressure on my shoulders or a lot on my shoulders as a freshman. I just think it’s a part of it and I’m going to embrace it more and more as I continue to play.”
For Cal, this loss stings because it was so winnable. Had they played better in the first half and not gotten down by 12 points at halftime, they probably would have won this game. At the same time, they can take some pride in knowing that they didn’t give up and ended up retaking the lead. Such games are ones that they are certain to learn and grow from. Hopefully for them, they’ll close it out next time they’re in this kind of situation.
“At the end of the day, I think we can score more than 64 points,” Smith said. “And it doesn’t matter that she [Melgoza] has 31 [points]. I just think we missed too many shots. No one else is in double figures and if we take care of the basketball and get more shots up, I don’t think it matters if Melgoza has 31 or not.”
Up next for Cal is a home game on Sunday against Washington State. That game will tipoff at 12:00 PM PST on Pac-12 Networks. Below are quick thoughts from Charmin Smith about the Cougars:
“Molina is a handful. She’s a really good point guard. She’s just really good and Bobby [Borislava Hristova] is no Robin to the Batman. I don’t know which one. They’re both just really good players. So, we’re gonna have to work. I do have a lot of confidence in this team. I told them in the locker room based off of what we did on that Harvard-UConn swing, we had a one day prep for UConn at UConn. And we did really well on with the one day prep so I’m confident that we can bounce back and play well on Sundays in Pac-12 play just because I know that they’re good with walking through things and retaining information and being able to put a game plan in place with just one day of practice.”
