Men’s basketball blows late lead vs. Cal, damages NCAA tournament hopes

BERKELEY — One way or another, history was going to repeat itself.

On Thursday, UCLA survived a last-second heave by Stanford senior guard Chasson Randle to win by two. Minutes later on the other side of the San Francisco Bay, Cal junior guard Tyrone Wallace drained a 3-pointer at the buzzer to give Cal a one-point win over USC.

In the waning seconds of Saturday night’s game between UCLA and Cal, the two teams found themselves in nearly the exact same situation. Leading by one with 20 seconds left, UCLA ran out of luck this time.

Cal fifth-year senior forward Dwight Tarwater buried a high-arcing 3-pointer from the corner over the outstretched arms of UCLA freshman forward Kevon Looney, and sophomore guard Bryce Alford missed a prayer of a 3-pointer at the buzzer as UCLA lost to Cal 64-62.

“That last shot, I thought Kevon got there and contested it about as well as you can contest a shot,” Alford said.

In-between Tarwater’s go-ahead 3 and Alford’s last-second heave, UCLA senior guard Norman Powell had a chance to tie the game at 64. But Powell’s 12-foot push shot from the right baseline rimmed out, forcing the Bruins to foul the Cal rebounder with under six seconds left. After Cal missed the first on the ensuing one-and-one free throws, UCLA had a final opportunity, but Alford’s contested 3-pointer from just past the half-court line was errant.

Even before Tarwater’s game-winner, the final minutes played out much like UCLA’s game against Stanford. The Bruins blew a 22-point lead in the final minutes to the Cardinal and went scoreless for the final 92 seconds against the Golden Bears, allowing Cal to ride a 6-0 run to the finish.

“(We’ve) got to close out games,” said junior forward/center Tony Parker. “Tough teams finish games and we did not finish that game well at all.”

The start to the game wasn’t much better. UCLA found itself trailing by 10 in the early minutes, but eventually battled back to finish the half trailing by just four. Coming out of halftime, the Bruins finally showed some life, boosted by improved play from its bigs.

After combining for just nine first-half points, Parker and Looney combined for 21 points in the second-half, helping the Bruins secure a narrow lead for the majority of the final 20 minutes. The duo also helped UCLA grab a 44-33 rebound advantage and outshoot Cal 46.3 percent to 37.7 percent.

“You go on the road, you want to give yourself a chance to win and we gave ourselves a chance to win. We just didn’t’ make the plays down the stretch,” said coach Steve Alford. “Just little things that you got to be able to do, especially on the road.”

In such a close game, the little details make the difference and they came back to haunt the Bruins. An 87.6 percent free throw shooter coming into the game, Bryce Alford was just 3-6 from the stripe Saturday and UCLA was just 9-16 on free throws as a team. Factor in the Bruins’ 12 turnovers, some of their close shots that came up short and a loose ball here and there that they missed and the sum of their mistakes was enough to cost them the game – a game they needed to win.

UCLA’s win over Stanford Thursday brought the Bruins into a tie for third place in the Pac-12, but the team needed to complete the Bay Area sweep Saturday before returning home to Pauley Pavilion – where it will play five of its final seven games. Needing a near-perfect end to the season to earn an NCAA tournament bid, the Bruins’ loss Saturday could have put an end to those postseason hopes.

“Oh it hurts bad. Very, very bad,” Parker said. “We needed that, we needed this game and they played like they wanted it more than us and they got it.”