LOS ANGELES, Calif. - With a close meet coming down to the last swim of the day, the No. 2-ranked Cal men's swimming and diving team came up just short at the wall as No. 12 USC won the final race by four-hundreths of a second and the Bears fell 149.5-148.5 at Uytengsu Aquatic Center. 

Cal took a narrow lead into the final race of the day, the 200-yard freestyle relay, but the winner of the race held the key to whichever team would finish first in the final standings. Freshman Kyle Grissom closed the gap for the Trojans on the final leg and narrowly won the race to the wall, finishing with a time of 1:20.32 to edge Cal's 1:20.36 and give USC the overall victory.

When it came to winning races, Cal actually held the edge Friday with eight victories in 14 swims. The 200 medley relay team of Ryan Murphy, Connor Hoppe, Justin Lynch and Tyler Messerschmidt got the day started with a win and Murphy added to the lead with a win in the 100 backstroke. Andrew Seliskar pulled away for a convincing win in the 200 butterfly and, when the teams took their first break, Cal led 64-47.

USC began the second segment of racing in the lead after 1-meter diving results were added but a win by Murphy in the 100 freestyle, Jacob Pebley in the 200 backstroke and Josh Prenot in the 200 breaststroke helped re-establish Cal's momentum. USC's Pawel Furtek won the 500 freestyle but a 1-2 finish by Lynch and Seliskar in the 100 butterfly sent Cal into the second break with a chance at the win.

With USC leading by five points heading into the final two events, Cal re-took the lead thanks to a strong effort in the 200 individual medley. Prenot pulled away for the win, Pebley took third and Mike Thomas finished a valuable fourth to put the Bears back in front. But, with the 11 points earned from a win in the final freestyle relay, USC made up that ground and edged in front despite Cal finishing 2-3 in the last event of the day.

Cal, which had won its last 28 dual meets entering Friday's competition, will return to the Bay Area and focus its attention on the final dual meet of the season as it prepares to face Stanford on Feb. 20. After that, it's on to the postseason for the Bears with the Pac-12 Championship and NCAA Championships taking center stage in March.