Bear Tracks: Oct. 17th California Golden Bears men's roundup

Despite the big story being about the Cal football team over the past week, with anticipation growing more and more, many of the men's athletic programs have continued to remain busy as well.  Men's basketball is back and Mike Montgomery is leading the way for the blue and gold.  The fifth-ranked water polo team is back on track and making waves (pun intended) within conference and national rankings play.  The tenth-ranked soccer team has had a bumpy ride, but hopes to get on a winning streak starting with their biggest rival.  On the links, the men's golf team is working through competitions and trying to improve on their standing as a top team.  After a week off, the men's tennis team is back in action.  We'll get back into football later tonight, but for now let's check in on all of the other men's sports. 

Christopher and the Bears hope
March Madness is in store
for 2009

Basketball - What?  No Midnight Madness?  No, it doesn't look like the Bears will be having that inauguration of their basketball season.  They will begin practicing like the rest of the country on October 17th.

Cal fans won't get their first opportunity to see the team in action until October 29, from 5pm - 7pm PST, for Fan Appreciation day at Haas Pavilion.  The first hour will be a chance to see the team in a scrimmage, while the second hour will be for fans to get autographs from players and coaches.

These guys are hungry, they want to win.  We're going to have to play as one. That's no revelation. Everybody would say that. But it is going to be particularly important for us to all buy into what we need to do to win. Players will sometimes have to make individual sacrifices for the good of the group.
- head coach Mike Montgomery on his first season

Montgomery comes across the bay to turn a semi-successful Cal program into one that can be considered a national contender.  The one-time Stanford Cardinal and Golden State Warrior head coach has his work cut out for him as he takes over a team that finished second to last in the Pac-10 and had a second-round exit in the NIT.

Pac 10
Team	Conf. W-L	Tot. W-L
UCLA	19-2	35-4
Stanford	15-6	28-8
Washington St.	12-8	26-9
USC	12-8	21-12
Arizona St.	9-10	21-13
Oregon	9-10	18-14
Arizona	9-11	19-15
Washington	7-12	16-16
California	7-13	17-16
Oregon St.	0-19	6-25

Returning juniors Patrick Christopher, Jerome Randle, and Theo Robertson will lead the way for the Bears.  Christopher averaged 15.2 points-per-game last season to go along with 2 assists-per-game.  Randle averaged 11.8 ppg and 3.7 apg, while Robertson missed last season after a hip surgery.  Two seasons ago, Robertson 8.6 ppg, 4.4 rebounds-per-game, 2.2 apg, and .8 steals-per-game.  The team seems to be completely behind Montgomery, and ready to succeed this season.

Everyone’s really embraced him and his style and his experience.  He knows the game and he’s really a technician. He’s really hands on and likes to show us how it’s supposed to be done.
- Robertson about coach Montgomery

Brian Dudley and the Bears are
working to get back to #1

Water Polo - The defending national champs and currently fifth-ranked, were busy last weekend as they took third in the SoCal open down in Malibu, California, hosted by Pepperdine.  It was a much better finish than the one they had at the NorCal open where they lost in the third round and the third-place match to start a three-match losing streak.  In fact, you might say that they were able to serve a little revenge to UCLA, who was responsible for sending the Bears to that NorCal third-place match.

In round one, the Bears took on and defeated #14 St. Francis 11-5.  All-Amercan junior Spencer Warden and freshman Ivan Rackov each helped lead Cal with three goals apiece.  Warden also had three steals, which led all Bears.  Sophomore goalie, Jacob McIntosh, put in a stellar performance by making 16 saves for the match.

Round two brought out the best in Cal, as they came from behind to tie with only :26 seconds left in regulation and went on to defeat #4 Pepperdine 8-6 in overtime.  Warden again led all Bears with two goals and five assists, while Luka Saponjic led in assists with three and scored a goal.  McIntosh again showed that he's worthy as a top-ranked goalie with 13 saves.

Riding high after two very solid wins, the Bears ran into the buzz-saw that is #1 USC this season.  Senior captain Frank Reynolds was the Bears' leading scorer with three goals.  McIntosh had seven saves for the match.

USC just took us out of our game early and controlled tempo.  We played hard in the last two quarters and we were able to build off that for UCLA. It was a great learning experience for the team and we just need to get back to work and get better.
- head coach Kirk Everist on the USC match

Coach Everist was right about #2 UCLA.  The Bears were definitely ready for them when they faced them for the third-place match, but it still wasn't easy.  The Bears needed two overtimes, but they came out with the victory over the Bruins 12-11.  After taking a commanding lead into the fourth period at 10-5, they let up five straight goals to UCLA in the fourth period bringing the end of regulation to a tie.  It wasn't until the second overtime, after the Bruins went up by one, that the Bears scored two goals, one at the buzzer, to win the match and take third place in the SoCal Open.  Reynolds along with sophomores Zach White and Brian Dudley each led the Bears with three goals.  Warden had five steals and McIntosh had 17 saves.

The 10-4 Bears now have #13 UC Davis in their sights as they will face them Saturday, October 18, at the Schaal Aquatics Center in Davis at 12pm PST.

The Bears hope this weekend is better than last

Soccer - The tenth-ranked Bears are coming off of a tough weekend where they went 0-1-1.    The loss and the tie were frustrating for Cal as they went into the weekend ranked fifth and dropped five spots this week to tenth.  They'll hopefully get to take their aggressions out on conference and bay area rival Stanford, this weekend.

The Bears were defeated by the UCLA Bruins (3-3-5, 1-0-1 Pac-10) Friday 3-2 in overtime.  The Bears and Bruins played the first third of the contest as a scoreless tie, but in the 36th minute UCLA struck first blood.  Starting the second half down by one, the Bears went down by two when the Bruins scored in the 60th minute.  That's when Cal woke up.  Three minutes later, they got on the board with a score by sophomore Demitrius Omphroy on a free kick.  In the 78th minute another sophomore, Hector Jimenez, kicked one in to tie the match at 2-2.  Regulation play ended with the score tied, but three minutes into overtime a costly penalty in the box gave the Bruins the winning penalty kick to end the game.

Cal did a little better on Sunday when they faced San Diego State, but it wasn't the outcome they had hoped for.  The Bears again let a victory slip away when the Aztecs were able to tie the game on a penalty kick.  The final score was a tie 1-1, thanks in large part by sophomore leading scorer, Andrew Wiedeman putting the Bears up at the 11th minute mark.

The #10 Bears (6-2-4, 1-1-2 Pac-10) will meet up with rival Stanford (3-6-2, 1-2-1 Pac-10) this Saturday, October 18, at Stanford's home, Laird Q. Cagan Stadium.  The game will start at 7pm PST.

Eric Mina led the Bears at The
Prestige at PGA West

Golf - The Bears finished their fall play with The Prestige at PGA WEST in LaQuinta, California, which ended on Tuesday.  Their next event won't be until February 2, 2009 when they'll be a part of the Ping-Arizona Intercollegiate.

The #21 Bears started slow, but came on strong to finish seventh for the tournament out of a field of 16.  Out of the 16 teams participating, nine were ranked in the top 50 in the nation, so Cal's finish wasn't as bad as it may sound, considering that they had become accustom to placing in the top three.

After the first round, Cal was in 13th place with a sub-par outing of 312 (+24), but in the second round, every Bear either improved or shot the same as the first round.  The Bears shot the sixth best score with a 293 (+5) and moved up to seventh at the end of the first day.

The Bears didn't stop improving.  In the third round, they shot a team score of 292 (+4), but it wasn't enough to overcome their rough first round.  Their final round was still only the seventh best team score, and it only aided them in maintaining their spot for the tournament.

Showing enough resiliency to come back like they did was something that even the Bears' head coach could be proud of.

You love that kind of attitude. We've alway held our spot or moved forward. And we're not backing up tomorrow. That's the goal.
- head coach Steve Desimone after the second round

Here are the final standings and scores:

This is Oct. 14. The real question is, what kind of team are we going to have when we get to May 14? That's what it's all about. Yes, we have things to work on, make no mistake about that, but it's been one of the best falls we've had in the last eight to 10 years. I like the way things are setting up for the spring.
-Desimone on the outlook when the real season starts in the spring.

The Bears easily beat the Tigers last week.  Can they
do it again this week?

Swimming - The Cal Bears can't seem to get enough of Pacific when it comes to swimming.  After their dual meet last weekend, it's easy to see why.

Last weekend, the Bears participated in a dual meet with the Tigers of Pacific and came out on top with their first victory of the season 135 - 113.  Even though the Bears won nine of fourteen events, it wasn't good enough for their second-year head coach.

Guy Barnea did a fantastic job in the 100 butterfly and was good leading off our 200-medley relay.  Graeme Moore did really nice job with a lot of things, and Matt Scanlan was very consistent, very disciplined, in a lot things we were having him do. It was good to see Bennett Clark get into the mix for us.  But other than that, there were really not a heck of a lot of highlights. We have to knock off the rust and get back to the race mentality.
- head coach David Durden

Moore won in the 50 and the 200-yard freestyles and was also part of a winning relay team that included Scanlan, Clark, and 2008 Olympian, sophomore Damir Dugonjic.

The Bears will be returning to Pacific again this weekend to compete in the first day of the Pacific Invitational.  Again, there will be no diving.  After this event, the Bears won't compete again until October 30, when they'll host conference foe Washington at Spieker Aquatics Complex in Berkeley.

The Bears host the Wilson/ITA Northern Cal
Championships starting this weekend

Tennis - The following is a press release from Cal about the Wilson/ITA Northern Cal Championships being hosted by the Bears.  I didn't see the point in not putting it here for consumption:

The California men's tennis team welcomes the top collegiate men's tennis players in the ITA West-North region as the Golden Bears host the 2008 Wilson/ITA Northern Cal Championships at the Hellman Tennis Complex and Channing Tennis Courts in Berkeley, Calif. Friday (Oct.17) through Tuesday (Oct. 21). The five-day tournament will name singles and doubles champions but more importantly will determine participants in the upcoming ITA National Indoor Championships in Charlottesville, Va.

Play begins with first round singles matches on Friday at 8 a.m. Losing players from the first round of singles play will be automatically entered into a consolation draw that plays out on the remaining four days. The first doubles matches will take place on Saturday. Play opens at approximately 8:30 a.m. each day and will conclude with singles finals and doubles semifinal and finals on Tuesday.

In addition to Cal, other schools represented in the regional championships include: Fresno State, Gonzaga, Nevada, Oregon, Pacific, Portland, Portland State, Sacramento State, St. Mary's, San Francisco, Santa Clara, Stanford, UC Davis, and Washington.

Here are the links for you to keep up with the five day tournament:

Tournament Central

Draws

Results