Cal Loses to Wake Forest, Virtually Ending Bears' Chance for an At-Large NCAA Tournament Berth

Cal’s chances for an NCAA tournament at-large bid probably came to an end in an 80-73 loss to Wake Forest on Saturday in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, in both teams’ final-regular season game.

The Bears (21-10, 9-9 ACC) desperately needed a victory to push themselves on the good side of the bubble. A Cal win would have given the Bears a fifth Quad 1 win, and improved their NET ranking and Wins Above Bubble (WAB) ranking. Nearly all the NCAA tournament projections had the Bears just outside the field of 68. But losing to a team that had a .500 record overall and a losing conference record pushed the Bears further behind.

It appeared the Bears might get the win they needed after taking a 15-point lead late in the first half. And in the second half the Bears made a late rally from a 13-point deficit to get within one point with 4:40 left in the game.

However, the Bears suffered a loss that probably means the Bears will have to win the ACC tournament to get into the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2016.

Cal will be seeded ninth in the ACC tournament, which gives the Bears a first-round bye before facing a red-hot eighth-seeded Florida State team in its opening game on Wednesday in Charlotte, North Carolina. The Bears lost to Florida State (17-14, 10-8 ACC and 9-2 in its final 11 games) by three points in their regular-season meeting. If Cal wins that game it would face top-ranked Duke in the quarterfinals

A career-high 31 points by Cal’s Dai Dai Ames went for naught, while Juke Harris collected 31 points and 15 rebounds for Wake Forest. Harris scored 21 of his points in the second half.

"We had no answer for Juke," Cal coach Mark Madsen said.

It was a game of big momentum swings, Cal led by 15 points with 4:55 remaining in the first half when the Demon Deacons (16-15, 7-11 ACC) struggled offensively. And the Bears held a nine-point lead three minutes into the second half.

But Wake Forest worked its way back, then broke the game open with a 14-0 run that turned a 45-44 Cal lead into a 58-45 deficit with 8:30 left.

Cal went 0-for-8 from the field and 0-for-2 from the foul line in that three-minute span that turned the game in Wake’s favor.

."To open the second half we missed two or three box-outs," Madsen said. "They had a tip dunk, they had a layup. They had extra possessions. We didn't get it done rebounding-wise tonight. They had 15 second-chance points to our two second-chance points.

"We held them to 29 points in the first half., They got 51 on us in the second half. So it was tale of two halves, and the second half was not good enough."

The Bears got to within a point on Nolan Dorsey’s corner three-pointer at 62-61 with 4:40 left. But Cooper Schwieger scored 14 seconds later to keep the Deacons in front by three.

Cal got within two points with 1:33 to go on two Ames free throws and was within two again on two Justin Pippen foul shots at the 1:07 mark.

But Schwieger scored again with 48.5 seconds to go to make it 72-68, and when John Camden missed a three-point shot with 39 seconds left, the Deacon were able to finish things off from the foul line.

Rebounding was again a problem for Cal, which was outrebounded 45-29, even though Wake Forest entered the game ranked 16th among th 18 ACC teams in rebounding margin.

"Sometimes we rely so much on Lee [Dort] and Milos [Ilic] for rebounds. We needed to have a better collective effort," Madsen said. "We scored 73 points. That should be enough to win a game. Our defense in the second half did not get it done."

Cal committed just seven turnovers, but shot just 35.8 percent from the field and went 8-for-29 on three-pointers. Besides Ames' big game, Justin Pippen added 17 points

Cal’s 9-9 ACC record is the Bears’ best conference finish since the 2016-17 season, when the Bears went 10-8 in the Pac-12. This season Cal finished tied with Stanford for ninth place in the standings, but Cal earned the ninth seed while the Cardinal is the 10th seed and will have to play a first-round game Tuesday because Cal won both games against Stanford this season.

Wake Forest began the game cold from the field, making only one of is first 14 field-goal attempts. That helped the Bears take a 14-point lead with 4:56 left in the first half.

The Demon Deacons closed the gap to eight points by halftime, with the Bears leading 35-27.

Dai Dai Ames led Cal with 15 points in the first half.

The Deacons shot just 24 percent in the first half, but made 15 of 19 free throws.

NOTES

Wake Forest was a 4.5-point favorite in Saturday’s game, according to FanDuel, while DraftKings listed the Deacons as 5.5-point favorites.