The Wrap-Up Notebook: Cal Men's Basketball
The Cal basketball season wrapped up last week in the Pac-12 tournament, with a final Makale Foreman 3 rimming out against Colorado. Cal had arguably their strongest stretch in the final five minutes against Stanford, before nearly making a comeback against the highest seeded Pac-12 team in the NCAA tournament.
It brings to a close one of the more difficult seasons in recent Cal history to watch, one without fans in the stands for all of it, and one that already had a stick thrown into the spokes before it began.
Cal was one of the luckier teams, not having any Pac-12 games postponed due to Covid-19, but the more important part of the cycle was canceled. The Bears missed a whole offseason of development, without workouts, not being able to get the 10000 shots up that Mark Fox wanted. When half the roster is made up of freshmen or sophomores, having the best tool for improvement taken away doesn't help.
That said, these are the issues that every team had to deal with. California did have more stringent restrictions on teams working together, ones that kept the Bears from even passing a ball to each other until late September/early October. That was a contributor to a 9-20 season, the third twenty-loss season in Berkeley over the last four years.
While the term 'talent disparity' isn't one that is liked in this space, it does ring true. This Cal team has some level of potential, but it's a group that needed the development more than probably any other team in the conference. They didn't get that, and without a lot of the 'right out of the box' guys who could make a difference, they were often the less talented team in their games.
With the best tool for developing talent, an offseason, out the window, the Bears struggled defensively throughout the year. There is a clear need for length, a consistent scorer outside of Matt Bradley and more time to develop.
The hope is that the first two issues are addressed somewhat with the 2021 class, and the development of what's already on Cal's roster. Both Obinna Anyanwu and Sam Alajiki add longer wing-type players to the roster, along with the continued development of Jalen Celestine, Monty Bowser (who suffered a bruised lung early in the season), and Kuany Kuany, among others. Marsalis Roberson has shown scoring ability at the high school level, and the Bears need another player who can open things up for Matt Bradley (given that he stays in Berkeley for his senior year). Andre Kelly was one of the most efficient scorers in the conference (3rd in field goal percentage in Pac-12 play), but wasn't as consistent as the Bears needed during an uneven season.
Head coach Mark Fox has been candid throughout the year about the difficulties they've had as a team, from Grant Anticevich having to get an emergency appendectomy, the general lack of offseason development, Matt Bradley's two ankle injuries, and a whole host of other things from false positive Covid-19 tests to general fatigue. It's still a year he will be judged on, because there are wins and losses and other teams had similar restrictions placed upon them, but the context is always worth looking at.
Who Improved
While the Bears lost their development time over the course of the season, a few players showed their development as the year went on.
Kelly - During the conference games without Bradley, Kelly scored in double figures in five of the seven contests, including an 11-13 shooting performance in a win over Washington. The junior from Stockton added a couple counter-moves to his post game to make him a more effective offensive player.
Jalen Celestine - The freshman from Long Island Lutheran didn't start getting minutes until the Washington State game, but in the absence of Matt Bradley, he provided extra length, a willingness to pass and the ability to knock down a 3 point shot. Celestine's top performance came in the upset over Colorado, with 13 points on 3-5 shooting (all threes).
Joel Brown - While Brown's free throw shooting leaves a lot to be desired, the sophomore point guard upped his game as a defender and showed some heretofore unseen shooting ability from the perimeter.
Bradley - Despite two ankle injuries, Bradley put together an all-Pac 12 worthy season, ranking 3rd in the conference in scoring while improving as a playmaker. Bradley had two of his best performances late in the season, with a career high of 29 against Colorado in a win, along with a 19-6-6 performance in the win over Stanford, with a block to transition assist sparking the game-breaking run for the Bears. Bradley now ranks 22nd among Cal's all-time scoring leaders.
What Fell Off
Three point offense and defense - The early season saw the Bears shooting more 3s than ever at a higher percentage than they had in Mark Fox's first year. Then Matt Bradley and Grant Anticevich got hurt, Makale Foreman had a back issue that stymied him throughout the year, and Ryan Betley slumped, taking out the Bears' perimeter game. Fox noted that he may have worn out Betley early in the year, as after the home game against UCLA, the Penn grad transfer topped the 30 minute mark once, after topping it 11 times prior.
The defense suffered, and when the Bears went on long stretches without scoring, teams were able to get quick baskets, along with open 3s, which led to Pac-12 teams shooting 38.8% from 3, along with 53.8% from two. Those were the worst marks in the conference, up from 36% from 3 and 50.1% from 2 a season ago.
A lack of consistency in the rotation - The Bears used 17 different starting lineups throughout the season, partially due to injury, partially due to trying to figure out what worked. The rotation by the end of the season usually had Bradley, Kelly, Anticevich, Brown, Jarred Hyder, Betley, Makale Foreman, Lars Thiemann, and Celestine taking up time, with others playing based on matchups. There wasn't consistency, as there hasn't been with just about anything over this last year.
The Bigs - Kelly played well, but the Bears are still in need of finding consistency on defense. DJ Thorpe provides plenty of length and athleticism, and showed during the Pac-12 tournament loss to Colorado that he can add some offense, but he struggled not to foul when on the court. Lars Thiemann has reportedly been a solid player in practice, but hasn't translated that to games and has been turnover prone. Kuany Kuany has played some minutes at the four, but dealt with a mid-season concussion and didn't get consistent minutes. It's all a work in progress.
A Returning Roster
Fox noted throughout the season that this would be a longer rebuild, and there's the potential for every player on the Cal roster right now to return (with Ryan Betley having not decided his future plans yet). The transfer portal is becoming a bigger and bigger piece of the puzzle for players, and it's not clear if every player will return for the 2021-22 season. The group will have what they didn't have in 2020, an offseason of development, as the state and country rounds the corner on Covid-19. Whether that will be enough to make a big enough jump to satiate Cal fans, donors, and administrators remains to be seen.
The biggest piece missing from this season has been the lack of fans in the stands, and when there are fans in Haas Pavilion, that metric will be telling for the future of Mark Fox's tenure. A lack of season ticket sales were a contributing factor to Sonny Dykes' firing in 2017, and a lack of 'moving the needle' led to Wyking Jones' termination in 2019. The financial metric may not be all the way there for the next season, but it's one worth keeping an eye on moving forward.