San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Healthier Bears pull away in stretch
Santa Clara and Cal were tied with a little more than five minutes remaining at Haas Pavilion on Saturday. The Bears took control down the stretch and knocked off the Broncos 72-60.
Andre Kelly had a gamehigh 18 points and added eight rebounds for Cal (6-5), which also got 15 points from Jordan Shepherd and 12 points and eight boards from Grant Anticevich.
The Bears owned a 44-26 edge on the glass.
Keshawn Justice led the Broncos (7-4) with 13 points.
Cal did a fine job containing Santa Clara guard Jalen Williams, who finished with 12 points. Williams went 5-for-12 from the floor, including 0for-3 from long range.
He came into the day leading the WCC in scoring at 20.3 points per game. In his previous three games, Williams had gone for a combined 80 points, hitting 29 of 43 field-goal attempts.
Cal head coach Mark Fox said his team’s depth played a major role in limiting Williams.
“We’re starting to get
Cal forward Andre Kelly shoots as Santa Clara center Parker Braun (23) defends in the first half at Haas Pavilion.
healthy and have more guys,” Fox said in a postgame Zoom news conference. “And so we can come at you in waves defensively … and keep fresh bodies against a great player.”
With 6:36 left, Justice hit two foul shots, the second of which tied the game 51-51. Cal had been ahead since late in the first half.
After the teams exchanged buckets, Shepherd fed Kelly for a go-ahead layup. The Bears scored the next four points, all by Anticevich.
Two foul shots by Williams cut Cal’s lead to 59-55, but consecutive baskets by Kelly — one off a feed from Shepherd, the other a follow of a Shepherd miss — put the Bears on top 63-55 with 2:47 left. Shepherd had a game-high six assists, several of them connections with Kelly.
“Our chemistry is working really well together,” Shepherd said, adding that Kelly is “proving to be a dominant force in the paint. He’s proved that all season. He’s done it against the best bigs.”
The Broncos cut it to 63-58 before Kelly smartly passed out of a double-team. He went cross-court to Shepherd, who buried a 3 to give the Bears a 66-58 edge with 1:43 to go.
That was Kelly’s lone assist, and he took pride in it.
“I’m not too caught up in who’s doing all the scoring,” said Kelly, who’s averaging 15.2 points and 9.1 rebounds per game. “I was happy to reward to Shep because he was giving me easy looks all night.”
Santa Clara got no closer than six the rest of the way.
“I was very pleased with our effort,” Santa Clara head coach Herb Sendek said, “but you’ve got to give Cal credit. They played an excellent game.”
Santa Clara led by as many as 11 in the first half and was up 34-24 with just more than four minutes remaining. The Bears then scored the final 14 points of the half.
Briefly: Santa Clara is still without preseason All-WCC forward Josip Vrankic, who has been sidelined nearly a month with a non-coronavirus-related illness. … Backup center Jaden Bediako also has missed the Broncos’ past two games with plantar fasciitis in his left foot. He will be out a while. … After a season-opening loss to UC San Diego, the Bears have won six home games in a row.