Combined feed (RSS)Basketball: Chico St. game thread
By Jeff Faraudo
Thursday, November 5th, 2009 at 7:24 pm in Basketball, Gameday.
QUICKIE POST-GAME UPDATE: Montgomery said afterward that Gutierrez suffered a mild ankle sprain. He also said Harper Kamp definitely will not play Monday against Murray State, and gave no timetable for his return. Will have more later.
FINAL: Cal 84, Chico State 42. Christopher led the Bears with 16 points, 14 in the first half. Gutierrez had 11, but apparently sprained his left ankle with 1:20 left and was helped to the bench. Will have more on this later. Cal held the Wildcats to 28.6-percent shooting and squeezed 25 turnovers out of the D-2 foe. Damario Sims, the former McClymonds HS star, led Chico with 10 points.
3:39 2nd HALF: It’s almost over. Cal leads 79-35. CSU’s turnover total: 24.
7:57 2nd HALF: Cal has stretched out the lead to 71-29. Monty is playing all subs right now, including freshman Bak Bak in his first appearance. The Bears used a little zone earlier. Christopher has 16 points, and likely won’t be back. CSU has 23 turnovers and is shooting 12-for-42.
12:46 2nd HALF: Cal 57-27. You get the idea. Monty has five subs in right now — Max, Gutierrez, Amoke, Seeley and Brandon Smith.
15:52 2nd HALF: Cal 53-24. You were expecting that big Chico comeback? Over/under on CSU’s final turnover count: 23. Wildcats are at 15 and counting.
HALFTIME: And not a moment too soon. The Bears may yet eke this one out — they lead 48-20 at the half. Chico is shooting 32 percent from the field, which includes a 10-minute stretch during which it was 1-for-18 with six turnovers. CSU is 0-for-5 at the FT line. Christopher has 14 points for Cal, and Boykin has 10 rebounds. Former McClymonds HS standout Damario Sims leads the Wildcats with eight points. Turnover count: CSU 12, Cal 8 — 20 in 20 minutes.
3:50 1st HALF: Cal definitely can hang with with Le Moyne, those guys who beat Syracuse the other night. Bears lead is now 31-13. Christopher has 10 points. Chico State is shooting 1-for-9 from 3-point. Turnovers: CSU 10, Cal 8.
7:32 1st HALF: Cal 26-13. Bears are shooting 56 percent, Chico 37 percent. Monty is using a lot of 3-guard alignment. Turnovers: CSU 9, Cal 7. Still more than one a minute!
9:18 1st HALF: Cal lead is now 22-11. Randle just hit a 3-pointer. Amoke has two baskets. Monty already has used 10 players. Turnover totals: CSU 9, Cal 5.
11:58 1st HALF: Cal 15-11. Christopher hit the Bears’ first 3-pointer. Wildcats are battling, but this is very ragged. Combined turnover total: 10 in 9 minutes. Brandon Smith is playing the point for the Bears and Maz Zhang replaced Sanders-Frison at the post. Omondi Amoke and Jorge Gutierrez also in.
14:45 1st HALF: Cal 9-7 at the first timeout. Very sloppy. Five turnovers for Chico, three for Cal. Randle is 0-for-2 with an airball. Things will get better.
KAMP IN STREET CLOTHES: Not surprisingly, junior PF Harper Kamp will not play tonight. Still working his way back after surgery on his knee for the second straight offseason, Kamp’s status for Monday’s opener against Murray State remains unclear.
GETTING STARTED: Welcome to the new season. As we did last year, we’ll try to provide in-game updates on the Bears at this site all season.
Tonight’s game is an exhibition against Chico State, a Division II team that went 8-19 a year ago. I’m not expecting much drama, but it will be intriguing to see how the Bears, and especially their new players, look tonight.
STARTING LINEUPS: Cal will go with PG Jerome Randle, SG Patrick Christopher, SF Theo Robertson, PF Jamal Boykin and C Markhuri Sanders-Frison, in his first appearance with the team. Chico’s starting five . . . do you really care? Didn’t think so.
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November 5th, 2009 at 7:45 pm
frison reminds me of devon hardin. hopefully he’s not as lazy. looks like he has potential. bears look pretty sloppy so far. it’s just an exhibition, but you’d think they’d come out looking a little sharper and playing tighter d. i guess this way they avoid injury.
November 5th, 2009 at 8:57 pm
Hopefully MSF can have an impact like Jorge. At this time last year, no one really knew much about Jorge and all the talk was about DJ Seeley. He opened a lot of eyes with his hustle and high basketball IQ; I have a feeling under Monty’s guidance, MSF will exhibit the same traits.
November 6th, 2009 at 6:46 am
“Chico’s starting five . . . do you really care? Didn’t think so.”
I think some people might have, I know I was curious to hear it. A lot of Chico players are kids that played high school in the Bay…
“frison reminds me of devon hardin. hopefully he’s not as lazy”
Hardin wasn’t lazy. He simply was not coached up well by Braun at all. He often didn’t know where he needed to be – that’s very different from being lazy. I have no doubt Hardin would have been a stud if he played for Monty instead of Braun…going to Cal to play for Braun was the worst life decision Hardin ever made. Others who worked with him (like Pete Newell) had only good things to say about the kids work ethic and ability to learn and improve.
Have yet to see Cal play a game this year, curious why you think MSF is similar to Hardin? Hardin had the size/strength/explosiveness of a top level center in the NBA – I know MSF is supposed to be big and strong, but he’s not all that tall…is his overall athleticism really similar to Hardin? Or it more that he looks lost out on the court like Hardin…?
November 6th, 2009 at 7:11 am
his body looks a lot like hardin, maybe even a little bit bigger. similar post moves. baby hook shot that if he can get down, might really help. only saw a little bit of him. just first impression. sorry, but i really feel like hardin played way below his potential, and while i agree braun failed to get the most out of his players, you’ve got to expect the players to self-motivate, too. for as big as hardin was, he should have been pulling down 20 rebounds a game, and other than the power jam, he didn’t really bring much to the table on offense. and he even missed some dunks that cost us a couple of games by trying to really slam it down with authority. anyhow, i think msf will be a nice addition, but isn’t he a juco transfer? that’s not a lot of time. go bears.
November 6th, 2009 at 11:34 am
B- You are spot on about Hardin. He was not lazy, just kind of a spaz. Braun did him no favors, his fundamentals were the worst and they never improved. It was frustrating as a fan to watch and sad for him as his size and athleticism are NBA quality. I know a little about him personally and he is suppoed to be a great kid, good student. Again, it’s too bad Braun was so mediocre. If Montgomery would have been his ccoaqch, he would have been unbelievable.
And Rollonubears- you make some good points. But he did work hard. Look at his body. He has great genetics, but he worked hard. He wasn’t a natural BB player. His shortcomings on the court were not about not working hard. Braun’s coaching and program were horrible. I saw a lot of kids that didn’t live up to their potential under Braun. Devon was motivated and did the work. Don’t find it hard to believe Braun was that bad.
November 6th, 2009 at 11:41 am
If you are looking at a pool of ALL basketball players, you could make an argument that Hardin and MSF are similar, for they are both big black men. If you want to talk specifically about post men and what those two bring to the team, they are really completely different.
Hardin had slim hips, a torso like a triangle, and could jump big time. MSF is not round like a pear, but he’s got a big butt. I was expecting the pear, but he must have done a good job to lose all that weight that has been much discussed. Unfortunately, he seemed to play below the rim all night. Missed a couple chippies, but should settle down as the season goes along. Good effort and seems like a good head on his shoulders. Sometimes you see guys just look lost out there. That was not the case, and MSF will help us out this year for sure. But he’s not going to be a “factor”. This team is all about the guards.
Between the two, I would take Devon in a heartbeat. And, yes, he would have been more polished a player under Monty.
I came hoping to see that our interior problem was solved, and…. I don’t think so. But we’ll get by.
Max had a couple of balls stripped from him. And despite his height, the game went on all around him without him being to much of a factor. A couple blocks and a couple of altered shots, maybe – I’ll have to check the stats.