Cal Coach Mark Madsen: `We're in the chase to do something special'

Mark Madsen is not satisfied with his Cal basketball team’s place in the ACC standings or the NCAA tournament picture, but he knows it’s a far cry better than anything the Bears have done in a decade.

“We’re in the chase to do something special,” he said Monday. “We’re not definitively where we want to be, but we’re in the chase. That’s a great thing. It’s a step forward from where we were last year.”

The Bears are 18-8 overall and 6-7 in conference play, part of a three-way tie for ninth place in the 18-team ACC.

For context, keep in mind this is Cal’s first winning season since going 21-13 in 2016-17. The Bears haven’t played in the NCAA tournament since the year before that.

Madsen came onboard two years ago and his team showed progress each season, posting records of 13-19 (9-11 in the final season in the Pac-12) in 2023-24 and 14-19 (including 6-14 in its SCC debut) in 2024-25.

In the six seasons before that, under coaches Wyking Jones and Mark Fox, the Bears were 54-134 with an abysmal conference mark of 22-92.

These Bears are coming off an 86-75 victory at Boston College and set to begin a three-game homestand, starting Saturday afternoon against rival Stanford.

They are at No. 61 in the latest NET computer rankings, where a spot around No. 45 or so gives coaches and fans some level of comfort they are in the mix. So, there is work to do and the Bears need to make the most of games at Haas Pavilion against Stanford (16-10, 5-8), SMU (17-8, 6-6) and Pitt (9-17, 2-11) before closing out the regular-season with road games vs. Georgia Tech (11-15, 2-11) and Wake Forest (13-12, 4-8).

“We’re going into a stretch of conference play that’s going to be very challenging,” Madsen said. “So yes, we have three home games but we have three home games against very tough, well-coached teams.”

DORT UPDATE, SORT OF: Starting center Lee Dort, who provides the Bears 8.3 points and 7.7 rebounds per game, has missed the past six outings with a lower-extremity injury that Madsen described as “kind of unusual.”

He reported that Dort was on the practice floor late last week on the road trip and said he expected his work to be ramped up this week. But that it’s still not clear whether he will be ready by Stanford.

“I’m hopeful Lee plays Saturday. I don’t know. One of the people in the meeting (Monday) says it’s 50-50 that he plays. I don’t know what that means,” he said.

“Hopefully, we have a whole week of progression with no setbacks. And hopefully at the end of the week we’re sitting here saying it’s 80-20 that he’s going to play.”

YEANAY DEBUTS: Sammie Yeanay, a 6-foot-8 sophomore transfer from Grand Canyon, saw his first action for the Bears at Boston College, playing four scoreless minutes. Yeanay was injured at midseason last year with the Antelopes and hadn't played since.

“Sammie’s awesome. He plays with a personality, he plays with physicality, he can shoot the ball,” Madsen said. “It takes any player a little bit of time to catch your rhythm. Sammie’s already in the process of re-establishing his rhythm.

"Sammie’s going to really help us because of his versatility — he can shoot, he can pass, he can dribble, he has a great basketball IQ.”

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