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Cal loses close game to #11 Oregon

On Thursday, Cal men’s basketball fell to #11 Oregon by a final score of 77-72. Oregon senior guard Payton Pritchard led the way for the Ducks with 21 points and 8 assists while Cal sophomore guard Matt Bradley was the top performer for the Golden Bears with 25 points. Oregon improves to 18-4 overall and 7-2 in the Pac-12 while Cal falls to 9-11 overall and 3-4 in the Pac-12.

“Certainly a hard fought game,” Cal head coach Mark Fox said after the game. “Oregon has a terrific team and I thought their experience and obviously Payton Pritchard late in the game was really a deciding factor. As hard as we played and we got in position to win, the battle tested team really separated themselves in the last couple minutes and congratulations to Oregon. They got a terrific team.

“I thought in the first half, we did an excellent job [on Pritchard]. I thought in the second half we, I thought we made some errors in the second half that gave him some easy ones. I thought we started the half poorly and he got a little momentum, but if you look at his scoring, in the last five minutes of games and overtimes, he’s been unbelievably productive. He’s scored a lot late. He’s a terrific point guard that gets others involved early. So, I’m not going to give us too much credit for slowing him down in the first half, but he obviously was a factor in the game. As he’s been all year. He’s a tremendous player. I think a great candidate for player of the year in the country.”

Cal got off to a strong start in this game, leading 11-6 with 15:26 to go in the half. Cal freshman center Lars Thiemann was off to a solid start with 6 points and 2 rebounds while Oregon junior guard Chris Duarte had all 6 of Oregon’s points, off to a solid start as well.

With 11:27 to go in the half, the game was tied 15-15 as both Cal and Oregon were shooting 6-11 from the field. Cal had scored 0 points in the last 3:04 as Oregon was on a 6-0 run over the last 2:30. Shortly thereafter, Oregon sophomore guard Will Richardson nailed a 3-pointer to make it a 9-0 run for the Ducks. Oregon was now up 18-15 with 10:17 to go in the half as Fox called for time.

With 7:58 to go, Oregon was up 25-20. Matt Bradley had a pretty baseline slam to get Cal within two points, but he unfortunately committed the cardinal sin of fouling a 3-point shooter (Chris Duarte), who made all three foul shots. Rather than being down by a pair, Cal was down by 5 points.

Fortunately for Cal, the game remained tight as Oregon would lead 25-22 with 3:50 to go in the half. Both teams were really struggling to score, which for Cal was both good and bad. Good that Oregon was struggling to score, but bad that they likewise were having difficulty on offense. Oregon had 0 points in the last 4:08 while Cal had 0 field goals in the last 4:26.

During the next few minutes, Cal junior forward Grant Anticevich started to catch fire as he was up to 10 points after a 3-pointer. 32-30 Cal led Oregon with 25.9 to go in the half. Oregon would quickly respond with a layup inside from Richardson to tie the game up 32-32 at halftime. Duarte (13 points) led Oregon while Anticevich (10 points) led Cal.

“My teammates did a good job of driving the ball, getting me on some closeouts,” Anticevich said. “I was able to just play off of that. Get a lot of open shots they drew defense, just put it in the hole. Pretty simple.”

To start the second half, Cal senior guard Kareem South came alive as he was up to 11 points. He was shooting 3-6 from deep and in a nice flow. Cal was on an 8-0 run over the last 1:41, leading 42-40 with 14:29 to go.

With 11:05 to go, Cal was now up 50-45 as South was up to 13 points. Bradley had 12 points, starting to get going as well. Duarte (15 points) and Richardson (13 points) were keeping Oregon in the game.

With just under 10 minutes to go (9:52), Cal was up 54-50 as Bradley (14 points) led the way for Cal. Considering the position they were in, Cal really couldn’t ask to be in a better position. It was just a matter of finishing strong.

Cal saw their lead shrink to one point (58-57) with 7:32 to go. Bradley was up to 18 points for Cal while Pritchard was up to 12 points. After scoring just 2 points in the first half, Pritchard was starting heat up.

“I’m going to give credit to their whole entire team,” South said of Pritchard’s performance. “But, Payton, he’s a really good player. He’s a veteran player. He’s proven himself on the highest level. Playing in the tournament last year. So, just give credit to their team and their coach puts him in a pretty good position to be successful throughout the game.”

Rather than fending off the Ducks, Cal would soon fall behind 63-58 with 5:58 to go as Oregon was on an 8-0 run over the last 1:34. Duarte (17 points) and Pritchard (13 points) were stepping up. With 3:47 to go, Oregon would lead 67-60 as Pritchard was up to 15 points after a tough finish inside. Cal called for time, having 0 field goals over the last 3:54.

The struggle continued for Cal as Pritchard hit what appeared to be the dagger from beyond the arc. He was up to 18 points and had Oregon in front 70-60 with 1:55 to go. Rather than going down without a fight, Cal found themselves down by 5 points (72-67) thanks to 5 quick points from Bradley, who got a dunk off a steal followed by a 3-pointer. If Oregon was going to win, they would have to ice the game away at the foul line.

In the end, that’s exactly what they did. Pritchard iced the game away at the line with two clutch free throws, giving Oregon a 77-72 win. Cal played a tough, competitive game, but was unable to get over the hump. Oregon showed why they are a borderline top ten team and Pritchard showed why he’s one of the top guards in the nation.

“I mean, I think overall it was a hard fought game,” South said. “I think Oregon just had some final few plays down the stretch where they were able to execute, take advantage of some mismatches. So, I think overall it was a really good game. They had more plays down the stretch.”

Despite the loss, Cal has to feel good about the way they battled and competed. They did way better than people expected and showed that they can hang with elite competition.

“Definitely,” Anticevich said when asked if this was an encouraging performance. “It was a high quality team. We played well. We’ve been improving every game, so to go out and compete for that long is definitely something we can take away and be proud ourselves with how we played.”

“I’ll say this,” Fox added when asked if he should be proud of his team in a loss. “This team has learned how hard you have to play. They’re learning how hard you have to compete and you have to answer some of the plays that the other team makes. And you have to go through battles like this to completely understand that process. But am I pleased at how hard we’ve played and the progress that we’ve made and the fact that we had a chance? Yes. Will I look at the tape and want to throw the computer through the window fifteen times tonight? Probably not. It’ll be probably be thirty. But you know what, that comes with the territory of a young team.

“But, we didn’t do some things well because we played a really good team. And Oregon’s got a really good team and they’re experienced and so, the things when we look back and see some mistakes that we made, a lot of them are caused by a great opponent and we have to take that into consideration also.”

Up next for Cal is a home game on Saturday against Oregon State. That game will tipoff at 1:00 PM PST on Pac-12 Networks.

Note: Mark Fox provided an update on junior guard Juhwan Harris-Dyson and sophomore guard Jacobi Gordon. From what Fox said, Harris-Dyson will not be back with the team for the rest of the season as he is focusing on his studies. Same situation as Jules Erving, who also left the team in the middle of the year to focus on his studies. As for Gordon, he remains out indefinitely. Fox isn’t sure when he’ll be back. Below are Fox’s exact words:

“Juhwan won’t be back. He’s focused on some schoolwork right now. Jacobi may not be back. We’re trying to get him back. He had a procedure done and he’s trying his best to be back, but I’m not hopeful that it will be anytime in the next week to ten days."




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