Cal men's basketball concludes home campaign with Oregon and Oregon State
The California Golden Bears will have two more Pac-12 home games in the 2023-24 season.
The California Golden Bears have two final home games in Berkeley. Tonight’s contest takes place against Oregon State (7 PM, Pac-12 Network), and then Senior Day will follow Saturday (4 PM, Pac-12 Network) versus Oregon.
Cal will play the Beavers for the first time this season. Oregon State is situated in last place in the conference, with a 3-12 Pac-12 record. The Beavers have lost six in a row, but did ride a hot shooting performance to upset fourth-ranked Arizona before that. Oregon State has yet to win on the road this year, with a host of obliterations during that time.
It’s safe to say Cal needs to win this game to stay on the right track. The Bears are 9.5 point favorites. Victory would clinch a winning record at Haas Pavilion for the first time since the 2019-20 season.
Cal faces Oregon in their season finale at home on Saturday afternoon. The Ducks are situated at third in the conference. Cal has proven they can hang with Oregon, building a huge lead in Eugene in January before the Ducks locked in on both sides and took an impressive Cal win away.
A quick lookback at what went wrong at Matthew Knight Arena from Nick:
Our Computer Overlords quibble slightly with exactly how likely Cal was to win the game when they built a 41-23 lead, but the basic story is there: For 16 minutes, Cal was hotter than the sun and Oregon couldn’t hit a 3. Then, for 24 minutes, Oregon was hotter than the sun and Cal couldn’t hit a 3.
Here are the shot splits:
3 POINTERS, FIRST 16 MINUTES:
Cal: 5-8
Oregon: 2-113 POINTERS, LAST 24 MINUTES:
Cal: 1-16
Oregon: 8-15I didn’t particularly have the impression that Cal’s 3 point shot quality took a nose dive or that Oregon did something to start getting better looks; sometimes the shots go down, sometimes they don’t, and there doesn’t necessarily have to be a rhyme or a reason to it.
Despite a very solid record, Oregon’s 17-8 record is unlikely to place them anywhere close to the NCAA tournament. The Ducks lost nearly all their major Pac-12 games, with only one road win at Washington State holding up their resume.
Oregon’s path to the Dance likely lies through the Pac-12 Tournament. So like nearly all of Cal’s games at the Haas of Pain, the Bears should have a shot, if they can make a shot.
Cal currently stands in a four-way tie for sixth with Utah, Arizona State and Stanford. While a top four seed is unlikely (Cal is 2 to 2.5 games short of that top four bid), the Bears could jostle themselves into more favorable seeding for the Pac-12 Tournament (i.e. avoid Arizona for as long as possible).
There is still a lot for Cal to play for, and plenty of good reason for Cal fans to show up. The Bears have played seven straight home games that have basically come down to the final seconds, going 4-3 in those contests. The fight is there every game, and with a few more wins, Cal has a shot to make an incredible one-year turnaround that gets the momentum going for the ACC jump.
Haas Pavilion has turned around from a mausoleum to a madhouse in barely a season. Let’s send the Mad Dog Bears out with a roar this week.
Cal fans, your thoughts on this week’s homestand?
Let’s close the home slate out with a bang.
Also, bears mentioning….if you are thinking of donating, or already donate, $$$ to the Athletic Dept. in hopes that it goes to Men’s Basketball, you may consider donating instead to the NIL and earmarking it for MBB…this is far and away the best chance to tangibly help the program. In the transfer portal era, it is vital, and helped us land Fardaws, Tyson, Cone and Keonte...
No matter what happens Mark Madsen has done a terrific job resuscitating this program.