Cal Women Lose to Virginia Tech, Hurting Their NCAA Tournament Chances

Cal's hopes of landing a berth in the women's NCAA tournament took a major hit on Sunday afternoon when the Bears lost to Virginia Tech 68-58 at Haas Pavilion.

Cal (17-11, 7-7 ACC) had won six of its previous seven games to move close to the NCAA tournament bubble, but a poor fourth quarter ruined the Bears' chances of improving their chances of landing a berth.

The Bears' record at home dropped to 12-3.

The Bears entered the game with a NET ranking of 53 and were listed among the Next Four Out in the ESPN NCAA tournament projections posted Sunday morning. But they may be knocked out of that category after Sunday's loss. With four games left before the ACC tournament, the Bears could still win their way into March Madness, but there is little room for error now, especially since Cal does not have any Quad 1 wins.

Virginia Tech (20-7, 10-5 ACC) began the day with a NET ranking of 42, and the Hokies used a surge early in the fourth quarter to take command of the game.

Cal led 45-44 when Bears center Sakima Walker scored 13 seconds into the fourth quarter. But the Hokies outscored Cal 15-2 over the next 4:45 to take a 59-47 lead with 5:02 remaining in the game. Missed shots and turnovers prevented the Bears from making a field goal for more than eight minutes.

With Cal's troubles from the three-point line and its ballhandling problems it was too much of a deficit for the Bears to overcome. The Bears committed 22 turnovers, and were just 3-for-16 from beyond the arc. And Cal's three-point shooting was actually worse than the final 18.8 percent suggests, because two of those three-pointers came in the final 1:43 of the game, after the Hokies had built a 13-point lead.

The key player was Virginia Tech's Sanyha Suffren. Not only did she score 19 points, but she did an excellent defensive job on Cal's top scorer Lulu Twidale, who came into the game averaging 15.3 points.

On Sunday, Twidale was limited to a season-low four points on 1-for-8 shooting, and for the first time in ACC play, she failed to make a three-pointer, going 0-for-5 from long range.

Cal freshman forward Taylor Barnes missed her fifth straight game with an ankle injury.

Freshman guard Puff Morris was back in the starting lineup Sunday after coming off the bench the past two games following a 10-game absence because of a knee injury. She scored 15 points on Sunday and was responsible for all three of Cal's made three-points, although one was a banked-in three.

.The game was closely contested until that 15-2 run in the fourth quarter ruined Cal's day.

A 10-0 run by the Hokies in the second quarter helped Virginia Tech take a 33-29 lead at halftime.

The Bears led 23-20 with 5:44 remaining in the second quarter. But Virginia Tech then ran off 10 straight points, eight of which were scored by Samyha Suffren, to take a 30-23 lead.

A series of Cal turnovers aided the Hokies’ surge, but Cal closed the gap to four points at intermission.

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