Cal Baseball: Bears Sent Home Early in ACC Championship by Stanford
California’s 2026 season comes to an end at 29-26 after Stanford dismantles the Bears by a final score of 11-4
CHARLOTTE, NC – The ACC Championship tournament is a tournament of very few guarantees. What is for sure is that Syracuse and SMU will not be there. At the same time, every other member of the conference gets a seat at the table, as all 16 ACC baseball programs that were fielded qualify, and are seeded with teams one through four receiving a double-bye into the quarter finals. At the same time, five through eight begin competing in the second round of the tournament.
California finished the regular season with an ACC record of 12-18. While a new best for the program since joining the conference across the country, those 12 wins put the Bears at 13th in the standings and slated to play in the first round against the number 12-seeded… Stanford Cardinal, who finished 13-17 and were seeded below Louisville and Notre Dame after going 2-4 against the two schools. Because Stanford lost two of three against Cal, their placement in the conference slated them back against the Bears – meaning the two losses Stanford surrendered ultimately put them in position to get a rematch against their biggest rival.
Otto Espinoza got the start for the Bears in front of 2,455 fans in Charlotte, NC’s Truist Field – home of the Triple-A Charlotte Knights (White Sox-Affiliated) against Stanford’s Toran O’Harran, with the Bears striking first in the top of the 3rd as Hideki Prather brought Gannon Snyder home on a one-out single to make it 1-0 Cal, but Stanford’s Jimmy Nati came right out of the gates in the bottom half of the inning with a leadoff home run to tie it up at one a piece.
The Cardinal then jumped ahead in the bottom of the 4th as Espinoza got Teddy Tokheim to lead off the inning with a pop-up to second, but then immediately walked Cort MacDonald and Charlie Bates before Mike Neu and Chris Bodishbaugh went to the bullpen and brought in Cade Colombara, who would go on to give up a base hit to JJ Moran to load the bases, a sac-fly RBI to Eric Jeon, and a base-RBI to Nati to make it a 3-1 lead for Furd. Colombara returned for the bottom half of the 5th, and after putting two runners on with two outs, gave up a three-run home run to Charlie Bates, making it 6-1 Stanford.
The Cardinal would add four more runs to gain a 10-1 lead over the Bears with four doubles being hit in the bottom half of the 6th, while Cal finally got something back in the top of the 7th with a solo shot from Prather to left to cut the deficit to eight runs. Stanford, of course, would respond with a run in the 7th after taking advantage of an error by Carl Schmidt in left, and an Ethan Kodama two-run shot in the top of the 9th would be all the Bears would have left in the tank, as California Baseball was eliminated by their biggest rival in the first round of the ACC Championship, thus ending their 2026 season.
For some perspective: Cal and Stanford wrapped up a series in the Bay Area where both schools call home, to play a neutral site game against one-another in North Carolina after flying for hours on Sunday, losing three hours, and practicing all day Monday – only to have one of these schools get a guaranteed first-round exit before continuing in the tournament – which Stanford will not after getting dismantled by Miami.
(I’m not saying they could have played this game against each other in California, but they could have played it here.)
California finishes 29-26 in 2026.
Cal played this game with 4 position stsrters injured and both of their best starting pitchers because they went 6-7 innings just last friday to beat Stanford 2 of 3. Ridiculous that acc scheduled their tournament this way, but could care less about travel challenges for Cal and Stanford. Injuries piled uo this year with the travel etc for both teams. Nil has deprived both teams of excellent playrrs (e.g. CAL’S 2nd baseman for 2 years was offered and took large money to tranfer to Georgia Tech and led the acc in hitting at well over.400). Cal was 34-19 just 2 yeaes ago in its last season in PAC 12, but then the portal and NIL plus acc travel/compettion took hold. Stanford went from an NCAA Super Regional team just 2 years ago to an also ran, almost immrdiately. Call these excuses, if you will, but its a stark reality facing these 2 quality baseball programs. Cal football has perhaps found a way to spend its team to success next year (we will see). Baseball is on its own to sink or swim.
The Bears vs. Cardinal matchup did not occur in front of 2,455 fans. That number is probably how many had tickets, including those who purchased the full tournament package in order to watch their NC, NCSU, Duke, WF, FSU etc. ballclubs compete throughout the week. You could hear the sound of mostly empty seats during the Cal-‘Furd telecast.