BERKELEY - At one point, everything was going right for California against their Bay Area rival, but No. 18/19 Stanford took advantage of Cal's sudden scoring inability in the second half to take the first win of the Battle of the Bay series, 57-49, at Haas Pavilion.

The Bears (19-7, 11-4 Pac-12) and Cardinal (20-7, 12-3 Pac-12) entered the game tied for second in the Pac-12 standings with four games remaining, but the Cardinal have now taken a big advantage as teams jockey for Pac-12 Tournament seeding in the final weeks of the season.

"I thought that it was a great environment (and) this was a great rivalry; we are just disappointed," California head coach Lindsay Gottlieb said. " I think that we are way past the point of feeling good about a competitive game, feeling good about being close.  We want to win, and that's really disappointing."

After Cal went into the break holding a 32-23 halftime lead, the Bears saw their shooting form plummet from 42.9 percent in the first half to just 11.1 percent in the second half. Despite forcing Stanford into their Pac-12 high of 18 turnovers - nine in each half - while Cal committed a season-low 10 turnovers, it was the ice on the rim in the second half that ended Cal's bid for the upset.

No Golden Bear scored more than four points in the second half, and for the second consecutive game Cal was held to zero points from its bench.  

"This is a great win for us, coming in here," Stanford head coach Tara VanDerveer said. " I think that Cal is a tournament team. They are very talented, and I think for us our second half was really special.  We worked hard defensively, we limited them and I thought we had a great game from Brittany (McPhee)."  

Mercedes jefflo led the Golden Bears with 14 points, just her second career game leading the Bears in scoring as the sophomore has seen a dramatic increase in offensive confidence, averaging 15.0 points per game over Cal's last three outings.

Gabby Green added 10 points while Reshanda Gray nearly had her ninth double-double of the season with nine points and nine rebounds. Brittany Boyd added six points, five rebounds and six assists in a game that saw her and Gray crack the California all-time top 10 list for career games played at 126.

The Cardinal had a breakout game from freshman Brittany McPhee, who scored nine points and pulled down six rebounds off the bench.

Amber Orrange rebounded from a slow first half to finish with a game-high 19 points, while Lili Thompson added 18 points for the Cardinal.

Stanford won the rebounding battle, 43-27, and the teams combined for just 15 assists on the night in front of 5,039 fans.

The Bears close out the Battle of the Bay when they head to Stanford on Sunday, Feb. 22. Tip-off is set for 1 p.m. and will be broadcast live on ESPN2.