Game thread- Women's Basketball at Cal- 8:00 MT

[AztecBuff]

After a well played game but tough loss against Stanford on Saturday, the women Buff's team plays its 2nd Pac 12 game of the year in Berkeley against the Cal Bears tonight.


cubuffs.com preview- http://www.cubuffs.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=600&ATCLID=209834631

A little bit about the Bears from that preview:


"...
ABOUT THE GOLDEN BEARS: California is 9-3 overall and 1-0 in the Pac-12 after opening conference play with a 67-49 win over Utah on Jan. 3. The Golden Bears, receiving votes in both AP and USA Today Sports WBCA Polls, have won their last two after dropping three tough contests. California is averaging 77.5 points on 46 percent from the field, the second best mark in the Pac-12. The Bears give up 67.3 points per game and allow opponents to shoot 36.5 percent from the field.


Senior forward Rashanda Gray leads Cal in scoring at 18.3 points per game while ranking third in the Pac-12 at 62.7 percent from the floor. Senior guard Brittany Boyd leads the nation at 8.5 assists per game while averaging 14.0 points and 8.0 rebounds an outing. Sophomore forward Courtney Range is Cal’s leading rebounder (8.1 rpg) and second leading scorer (14.3 ppg), but has missed the last four games with a knee injury. Freshman guard Gabby Green is averaging 6.9 points and 7.3 rebounds per contest.
...

"

Television- on Pac 12 Mountain and Bay Area networks


Streaming- If your cable/ satellite subscription includes access to the Pac 12 network, should also be available online after login through- http://pac-12.com/live or http://pac-12.com/network/pac-12-bay-area?DB_LANG=C&DB_OEM_ID=600


Audio- On 760 AM in the Denver area, and evidently should also be available through- http://www.cubuffs.com/mediaPortal/player.dbml?type=live&db_oem_id=600 come game time.

Edit- Live stats- http://www.calbears.com/liveStats/v2/basketball/index.dbml?GAME_STAT_ID=1702188&db_oem_id=30100

 

[AztecBuff]

14-8 Cal with ~12 minutes left in the half.

Given the Buff ball control issues early in the year, this will be a great test for them, as Cal plays a tight defense up top and a pretty serious full-court press. Buffs with a few turnovers already. J. Sborov has had 2 nice drives so far for the Buffs, and it was good to see J. Reese, who had an off game offensively against Stanford, scored the Buff's 1st 4 points.

 

[AztecBuff]

20-13 Cal. Buff timeout. Forgot to mention above, Cal also running the Buffs ragged so far- probably 8-10 points on fast break layup points already for the Bears.

 

[jsmilkst]

Buffs got back to within 1, then a run back by Cal to go up 7. Cal is just ripping the ball out of our hands a few times.

 

[jsmilkst]

And back to 1 point lead for Cal 20-19. When they're not turning the ball over, the offense running smoothly and we can set up half court d which has been solid

 

[AztecBuff]

22-19 Bears at media timeout- ~7 minutes left in the half.

One good thing tonight so far- Buffs have probably already made as many mid-range jumpers as they did the whole game against Stanford. On the bad, they have given up 4 offensive boards, and the Bears have been getting points that way, as well as getting points in the paint on nice entry passes.

 

[AztecBuff]

28-21 Cal with 4:20 left. TO Cal.

Cal beating the Buffs down the court too often, leading either to straight fast break points, or leaving some one open to make an easy entry pass to one of the Bear post players, who are only single covered because the help defense hasn't set up yet.

Edit- by the way, both Swan and Sborov already with 2 fouls, so assume they won't be playing the rest of the half.

 

[AztecBuff]

33-23 Cal at the half.

Lots of Buff turnovers at the half. They already have 12, with 6 of those off steals usually leading to easy scores. Conversely, the Bears only have 5 turnovers. Also, at one point I believe the announcers said 22 of the Bear's 30 points were in the paint.

Thankfully, Cal not shooting that well (40%), although that's still a little better than the Buffs (37%). Based on the relative quality of the shots being put up, that's about as good of a shooting % difference as could be hoped for.

 

[buffgal]

I'm listening as I'm not home. Carol Callan and the guy said 1 of the fouls on Jamee Swan belonged to Jen Reese and the last thing Jamee needs is "phantom" fouls. Jen is having a good game and Jamee was starting to until the foul call that she didn't commit. Fouls are unbelievably lop-sided.

CU only has 2 offensive rebounds in the first half. That will not get the job done.

Now it's bedtime for me. Hopefully when I read this tomorrow, things will have turned around in the 2nd half.

 

[90sBuff]

Cant wait for this team to get back to boulder and make a statement in the next few games. Didn't really expect a win at Stanford or Cal. But would like to see what we can do in Boulder. Definitely lopsided in the fouls. With 12 minutes to go in the 2nd half, 16 fouls on us, only 5 on the bears. Ridiculous?

I'm listening as I'm not home. Carol Callan and the guy said 1 of the fouls on Jamee Swan belonged to Jen Reese and the last thing Jamee needs is "phantom" fouls. Jen is having a good game and Jamee was starting to until the foul call that she didn't commit. Fouls are unbelievably lop-sided.

CU only has 2 offensive rebounds in the first half. That will not get the job done.

Now it's bedtime for me. Hopefully when I read this tomorrow, things will have turned around in the 2nd half.

 

[AztecBuff]

51-39 Cal with around 10:20 to go.

Buff's can't seem to get much offensive continuity going. Game is getting physical, and J. Swan has had a couple good inside shots lately. Hopefully the Buff's can build on that, and use the emotion to get some momentum.

 

[Buffnik]

51-39 Cal with around 10:20 to go.

Buff's can't seem to get much offensive continuity going. Game is getting physical, and J. Swan has had a couple good inside shots lately. Hopefully the Buff's can build on that, and use the emotion to get some momentum.

Had it down to 7 before a 6-0 run by Cal.

Buffs should go on another run in this one, but there's a big gap between "coming back" and "coming back to win".

 

[AztecBuff]

And now it's gotten ugly- 62-43 Cal (with around 7 min. left.). Cal with 13 steals in the game.

 

[AztecBuff]

69-48 Bears. Bench players coming in for both teams with around 4 minutes left.

Well, Buffs got to shake this one off and get ready for USC, UCLA, and then a back to back against Utah, with the next 3 being home games, starting with USC this Friday night.

 

[AztecBuff]

75-59 is the final score. Good to see Buffs did keep playing hard and stay up to the end. Jamie Swan ended up with ~20 points, most of them late.

 

[BeBe]

This team still needs a point guard. So any team that has really quick hands (ex. LBSU) or really presses (ex Cal) will have their number.

 

[MarkW]

I felt CU was over-matched physically in the backcourt and in the low post. It showed in the Stanford game in the backcourt, but Cal exposed the post as well. CU has some scholarships available still - it would be interesting to see if they'd go after a pair of athletic juco players at the 2 and 5 to give some immediate help, rather than waiting for the incoming freshmen develop?

 

[90sBuff]

Thats a great idea. I hope that happens.

One question, though. Why do we not have a point guard? This isn't Lappe's first or second year.

I know this won't be popular to say..... But Chucky and the wilson twins were all recruited by KMM? Linda snagged Arielle but that in some ways was a slam dunk due to Andre being here. I like some of our players, but how long does a coach get here to turn around a program? Are we on a 10 year plan? It seems like our team is worse.

Can someone give me some hope that we will be competing in the Pac as one of the best in the near future. A year ago, there was talk about us beating stanford. We played well against this this year, but lost badly to cal.

im not trying to be negative here but in my time at CU, we had ceal barry and we were a dominant team. I'd like to see that again.

I felt CU was over-matched physically in the backcourt and in the low post. It showed in the Stanford game in the backcourt, but Cal exposed the post as well. CU has some scholarships available still - it would be interesting to see if they'd go after a pair of athletic juco players at the 2 and 5 to give some immediate help, rather than waiting for the incoming freshmen develop?

 

[jsmilkst]

Thats a great idea. I hope that happens.

One question, though. Why do we not have a point guard? This isn't Lappe's first or second year.

I know this won't be popular to say..... But Chucky and the wilson twins were all recruited by KMM? Linda snagged Arielle but that in some ways was a slam dunk due to Andre being here. I like some of our players, but how long does a coach get here to turn around a program? Are we on a 10 year plan? It seems like our team is worse.

Can someone give me some hope that we will be competing in the Pac as one of the best in the near future. A year ago, there was talk about us beating stanford. We played well against this this year, but lost badly to cal.

im not trying to be negative here but in my time at CU, we had ceal barry and we were a dominant team. I'd like to see that again.

Well, we have a monster class coming in next year, ranked top 25 I'm pretty sure (haven't gone and checked latest), including a new pg and some definite scorers. Brecca is here to be a pg, obviously some development there but she should come in to it. I'd also expect us to be better at this point, but the scourge of injuries hasn't helped.

 

[BeBe]

KMM and her staff did some good recruiting but couldn't coach the players or the game. Very little improvement from any of them. And her teams never seemed to improve or show second half adjustments to what the other team was doing. Her good players (Spears, Chucky, the Wilsons) all improved once they were being coached by Lappe and staff.

Re: the point guard situation... In Chucky's senior year(2012-13), the Buffs added a freshman pg (Kyleesha Weston) who the staff felt would be able to learn as a frosh and take over as a soph. But, before her sophomore season would have begun, she left to return to a school near her home in Missouri. Some of you may remember her mother posting on here for a while. The mother was diagnosed with breast cancer early in Ky's freshman year. It was really tough on her being away. Unfortunately, that left the Buffs in a poor position as most of the good WBB players for the 2013 class had long since committed to schools. They signed Desiree Harris hoping she would be OK but that didn't work out. So in this years freshman class they signed a pretty good prospect, Brecca Thomas, who was rated in the top 100 by at least one of the rating services. But, like all but the very top players, the jump from high school to high division 1 BB is a tough process, especially for a point guard. Right now Brecca is getting schooled by the senior point guards she is playing against in the PAC games. If Ky were still here, she would be a junior.

 

[jsmilkst]

And Ky had some nice flashes her freshman year. That was a bummer

 

[MarkW]

KMM and her staff did some good recruiting but couldn't coach the players or the game. Very little improvement from any of them. And her teams never seemed to improve or show second half adjustments to what the other team was doing. Her good players (Spears, Chucky, the Wilsons) all improved once they were being coached by Lappe and staff.

Re: the point guard situation... In Chucky's senior year(2012-13), the Buffs added a freshman pg (Kyleesha Weston) who the staff felt would be able to learn as a frosh and take over as a soph. But, before her sophomore season would have begun, she left to return to a school near her home in Missouri. Some of you may remember her mother posting on here for a while. The mother was diagnosed with breast cancer early in Ky's freshman year. It was really tough on her being away. Unfortunately, that left the Buffs in a poor position as most of the good WBB players for the 2013 class had long since committed to schools. They signed Desiree Harris hoping she would be OK but that didn't work out. So in this years freshman class they signed a pretty good prospect, Brecca Thomas, who was rated in the top 100 by at least one of the rating services. But, like all but the very top players, the jump from high school to high division 1 BB is a tough process, especially for a point guard. Right now Brecca is getting schooled by the senior point guards she is playing against in the PAC games. If Ky were still here, she would be a junior.

I agree and would add that Lappe has had some good recruits beyond Roberson, most significantly, Jamee Swan. At the same time, the sophomores have only one player of impact, Haley Smith and with the juniors it is only Jamee - Arielle was initially in the class that is now seniors and as pointed out Ky Weston left after her freshman season (I think she is our of organized basketball). The result of all of this is a lack of skill, depth and adequate athleticism.

It seems that next year's freshmen will be as talented a group as have come in in a long time, especially the backcourt due of Alaxis Robinson and Kennedy Leonard who both have a chance to make a big impact from the beginning. On the flip side, it would seem that the Buffs' backcourt will be very young next season. This is why I am advocating for a juco or two to jump start the team's resurgence.

I'll add that it's interesting how the departure of one player, Ky Weston in this case, can really cause problems for a program. It also makes the case for continuously creating depth through recruiting.

 

[BeBe]

One small correction ... Ky is not out of organized basketball. She is playing at Mid-America Nazarene, an NAIA school, in Olathe KS.

 

[buffgal]

And Ky had some nice flashes her freshman year. That was a bummer

Ky definitely showed she could play basketball at this level.

I sat with her aunts at the Illinois game her freshman year. Her mother was supposed to come to the game also, but the chemo had made her too sick and she didn't feel up to making the trip. I saw the disappointment and concern on Ky's face when her aunts told her that was why her mother wasn't there.