Cardinal Top the Bears For Bay Area Bragging Rights
Jan 19, 2013; Stanford, CA, USA; California Golden Bears guard Allen Crabbe (23) battles to maintain possession against Stanford Cardinal forward/center John Gage (40) during the first half at Maples Pavilion. Mandatory Credit: Kelley L Cox-USA TODAY Sports
In the quest for Bay Area bragging rights, or at least for the time being, the Stanford Cardinal (11-7, 2-3 Pac-12) came out on top over the Cal Bears (10-7, 2-3 Pac-12) by the score of 69-59.
The First Half
The first half was a back and forth affair as Cal held a 6-point lead early on in the half and Stanford coming back to take a 9-point lead into halftime. One of our guys in the matchup to watch, Chasson Randle, started off strong scoring the first 7 points for the Cardinal. He, along with Justin Gage off the bench who hit 3-3 from the field (all from behind the arc) and scored 11 points, led the team in scoring throughout the first half. However, other than that the starters for the Cardinal were outscored by the bench. Likewise for the Bears they got no scoring from the bench and instead got everything from their starting five. Leading the way for them was sophomore David Kravish who score 12 points while shooting 6-9 from the field and also grabbed four boards off the glass.
The Second Half
Early on in the second half the Cal Bears starting fighting their way back into the game. They even closed the gap to a 1-point Stanford lead before the Cardinal pulled away for good. Leading scorer Dwight Powell scored 11 points in the second half for the Cardinal and was key for them in regaining their lead from the first half. He, along with Josh Huestis’ 9-points second half were able to catapult the Cardinal to comfortable victory.
The Bears got a great scoring output from Cobbs in the second half who ended the game with 13 points after going 0-7 in the first half. He an fellow teammate Allen Crabbe, who ended with with 14 total points (12 of which came in the second half), helped keep Cal in striking distance, but with Kravish going cold were unable to mount the comeback on the road.
Key’s from the Game
Neither team had a very good shooting night with the Bears shooting just below 35% from the field and the Cardinal who were just a hair better shooting a whopping 35.8% from the field. Actually, both teams were pretty similar up and down the score sheet as far as turnovers, rebounds, etc. The biggest difference? It was free throws. The Cal Bears hit 11 of 15 total attempts from the charity stripe while Stanford doubled both of those categories shooting 25-31 from the line. That 14-point difference was good enough to launch the Cardinal over the Bears.