Cal Basketball Hangs On The Outside Of Both Bubbles
The California Golden Bears could be headed to the postseason, but not the postseason they'd like.
Cal men’s basketball is running out of chances to make the NCAA Tournament, barring a magical ACC tourney run. After splitting at Boston College and at Syracuse, the Bears can probably afford a loss or two before Selection Sunday, because right now they’re on the outside looking in.
Let’s look at the brackets:
Joe Lunardi of ESPN currently has Cal in their first four out.
Cal being among the last eight teams left out appears to be the consensus, as only one bracket in Bracket Matrix currently has Cal in the Dance.
Mark Madsen’s Bears get a great shot this week against Stanford to notch a resume-enhancing win (and likely end what faint hopes the Cardinal might have of Tournament play) and their first Quad 2 victory. But every loss has cut the margin that much more.
Similarly, Cal women’s basketball had a great chance to firm up their tournament bona fides, but a pretty tough loss at home to Virginia Tech dealt a huge blow to their efforts. ESPN projects them at 76th overall right now, eight spots away from a tournament bid. The Cal women have a manageable schedule to close out 2025-2026, but there can be no more disappointing defeats to get there.
tonight's bubble watch:
It'd be great if USC were to lose to Illinois tonight. Maybe Stojakavich can do us a solid for old times' sake.
Along those same lines, maybe Dennis Gates can find it in his heart to have his Mizzou Tigers lose to Vandy tonight.
It'd be nice if our old Pac-12 brethren Utah could beat bubblicious WVU tonight.
I don't think Seattle has a chance to beat St. Mary's tonight, which is fine because I can't root against the Gaels anyways.
Would love to see us make a run and win a couple of ACC tourney games to have a real chance but talking about this scenario Vs what we were lamenting about last year - I’ll take that every time.