Saturday’s Cal-Stanford Game Has NCAA Tournament Implications

It’s almost February, which is when serious NCAA tournament talk begins. And Cal and Stanford seem to be on the bubble heading into Saturday’s 5 p.m. Cal-Stanford basketball game at Maples Pavilion.

Cal and Stanford are both 14-5 and both will have 11 games plus the ACC tournament remaining after Saturday’s game, and that includes another game between the two Bay Area rivals on February 21 in Berkeley. The Cardinal seems to have a slightly better chance of making the NCAA tournament than Cal, as of January 23, but Stanford will have to go the rest of the season without its No. 2 scorer, Chisom Okpara, who is averaging 13.9 points but suffered a season-ending lower body injury.

Stanford still has Ebuka Okorie, who is second in the ACC in scoring (22.1) and is one of the top freshmen in the country.

A lot can happen between now and when Cal and Stanford meet for a second time, but at the moment it seems Cal and Stanford might be competing against each other for one of the final spots in the NCAA tournament. At least that’s what reputable NCAA tournament projections suggest.

In his projections this week, Mike DeCourcy of Fox Sports puts Stanford in the field as a No. 11 seed and one of the Last Four In. He puts Cal among the First Four Out, so the Bears are right on the fringe.

Teams on the bubble if the tournament was seeded today.

Will any of these teams still be on it come March? pic.twitter.com/63EFIPEpnn
— FOX College Hoops (@CBBonFOX) January 20, 2026

Andy Katz of NCAA.com also has Stanford in the tournament as a No. 11 seed, but does not put Cal in the field or have the Bears among the First Four Out.

CBS Sports has Stanford comfortably in the 68-team field as a No. 9 seed, but does not have the Golden Bears in the tournament or in its First Four Out.

Bleacher Report puts Stanford in as a No. 10 seed, but does not include Cal and only mentions North Carolina State and Cal in its ACC appraisal as “others considered.”

Finally ESPN’s Joe Lunardi, probably the most respected Bracketologist, has neither Stanford nor Cal in the NCAA tournament, but lists Stanford as the First Team Out while not including Cal in his First Four Out or his Next Four Out.

In the opinion of Lunardi and others, Cal has work to do to get itself into the NCAA tournament picture.

Cal has a NET (NCAA Evaluation Tool) ranking of No. 60, which isn’t bad and typically puts a team in the bubble category. Generally speaking a team needs to be in the top 40 or 50 to feel fairly comfortable about getting an NCAA tournament berth.

Interestingly Cal has a better NET ranking than Stanford, which is 68th.

Wins against quality opponents count heavily in the selection committee’s appraisal of teams, and Cal has only two wins against top 80 NET teams – North Carolina, which is 27th, and UCLA, which is No. 40.

Cal will hope UCLA and North Carolina come on strong down the stretch because that will make the Bears’ wins over them look better.

Cal’s five losses are against Duke, Louisville, Virginia, Virginia Tech and Kansas State. Duke Louisville and Virginia are all among the top 15 in NET rankings, so those defeats don’t hurt Cal much, although losing to Virginia Tech, which is 51st, didn’t help. The road loss to Kansas State back on November 13 may haunt the Bears because Kansas State has slipped to 82nd in the NET and has a 10-9 record.

Cal’s 0-3 road record won’t help either, although Cal has a chance for its first road victory on Saturday at Stanford.