February 7th. 2015. UCLA in town. 20 seconds left to play. Cal trailing by one, 62-61. Dwight Tarwater caught the ball in the corner, and in a split second hoisted the ball up in a high-arching prayer over standout freshman Kevon Looney.

The Tennessee native knew most of his family -- dad, brother, and sister -- was watching back home, a couple thousand miles away.

 

But he also knew that one member of his family was watching him right in Haas Pavilion.

He knew that as his corner shot rotated perfectly through the bright orange iron cylinder, his mother, Mary Tarwater -- who passed away in December of 2012 -- could see her son making the biggest shot of his life. And he could see her, too.

"I know she was smiling when that shot went in," Dwight says.

According to Dwight, who grew up in East Tennessee as the youngest of three siblings, "smiling" is a pretty good descriptor of his mother when it came to his athletic endeavors.

"She was just a supporter," Dwight explains. "She didn't know a whole lot about basketball but even when I played awful she was always there for me after the games. Even when I did make a mistake she never thought it was my fault. Then my dad would have to tell her. She would always tell me she loved me and supported me. That's kind of what it was. Not that she was an expert on the game, just the support she gave me."

 

Evidently, Mary's supportive tendencies went a long way for her children. Dwight's older brother Davis snagged a gold medal in the 2012 London Olympics in the 800m free relay. His sister Katherine was an all-state soccer and track athlete in high school, and although she did not pursue athletics in college, Dwight insists that she is the best athlete in the family.

 

"Honestly," he says, "me and my brother will both admit that she's probably the best athlete of the bunch."

 

Even when "the bunch" includes an Olympic gold medalist?

 

"No, I don't think (she could beat him in the pool)," Dwight laughs. "She's really fast though. He probably couldn't beat her on land."

 

The stretch-four, who sometimes finds himself tasked with playing bigger due to the Bears' lack of depth under the basket, didn't follow the most conventional road through the doors of Haas Pavilion. A graduate student in UC Berkeley's Public Health program, Dwight already has a degree in Economics from Cornell University, where he played for four years. This year, as he works on his masters degree, Dwight has worked equally hard on the basketball court, intent on proving he has what it takes to play in a power conference. He's averaging 18.5 minutes a game for the Bears, sixth most on the team, contributing as a scorer, a rebounder, and a UCLA-burying shot-maker after a rocky senior season at Cornell.

That he's even playing at all is maybe a bit of a surprise. Especially after his mother's death. With Dwight home for a couple of days during winter break of his junior year at Cornell, Mary suffered an episode of cardiac arrest and passed away on December 28, 2012.

 

"It was really weird timing," Dwight says. "I was home maybe three days the whole year, and it happened then. It was hard."

 

Dwight took a month off of basketball, then got back into the starting lineup at Cornell by the end of that year, even with doubts about whether he wanted to continue playing basketball at all.

 

"But I felt I was going to do what she wanted me to do," he says, "and it was to keep doing what I loved. So I continued to play."

 

Sunday, Tarwater will play in his second senior night in as many years against Oregon State, with a slim hope of an NIT berth still held in the balance for the Bears.

His father and siblings will join him in Haas Pavilion for what is likely the final home game of his career, on a team where he has continued to fulfill his vision of what his mother supported unconditionally for as long as he could remember. And while onlookers may not be able to see her there, Dwight has no doubt that she'll be watching him.

 

"I definitely play for her," he says. "I know she's looking over me right now."