BERKELEY - A battle for East Bay supremacy provided the fuel and the Cal men's basketball team brought the spark to ignite a great Saturday crowd inside Haas Pavilion as a 3-pointer by Jabari Bird with 17 seconds left made the difference in a 63-59 victory over visiting Saint Mary's.
Ivan Rabb led Cal (8-2) with 15 points and 11 rebounds for his fourth career double-double. Jordan Mathews and Bird each added 13 while Jaylen Brown finished with 11. Evan Fitzner led Saint Mary's (6-1) with 15.
Tied at 55 with less than three minutes to play, Cal took its first lead since just over the 13-minute mark on a free throw by Brown. Saint Mary's re-claimed the advantage on the next possession thanks to a Dane Pineau layup, but Brown countered with a bucket down low of his own to make it 58-57 Bears with just under two minutes to play.
Joe Rahon swung the pendulum back towards the Gaels with a driving layup, and a stop by Saint Mary's put Cal in need of a good defensive possession with less than a minute left. The Bears got what they needed, but an offensive rebound by Pineau gave the ball back to the visitors before Rabb blocked Rahon's attempt for another driving score and gave Cal a chance to draw up a play with 19.4 seconds left. The play that ensued gave point guard Tyrone Wallace multiple options for a good look, he found Bird open on the wing and Bird's third 3 of the game hit nothing but net, putting Cal up 61-59 with 17 seconds left.
"The way Saint Mary's was playing the game, they were sagging in trying to stop Tyrone (Wallace) from driving," Bird said. "I waited for my turn, had my feet set, Tyrone made a great play, I got the ball and shot it."
Saint Mary's got its last chance when Rahon drew a foul near mid-court with 1.7 seconds left but his first free throw hit back iron, Brown secured the rebound and the freshman made both free throws to ice the game.
"I thought both teams played at a high level. I don't know the numbers, but they're one of the best if not the best 3-point shooting teams in the country," Cal head coach Cuonzo Martin said. "We knew they would make shots. They play hard, they play together. It was a fun game to watch. I might not say so when I watch film but I thought it was a great game to be a part of."
Leading by 11 at the start of the second half, Cal had to weather a Saint Mary's run to start the final 20 minutes. Three 3-pointers by Fitzner set the stage for a comeback and Saint Mary's eventually launched a 12-0 run to make it 49-44 Gaels with 10:32 to play.
Saint Mary's maintained a slim two-point lead by the under-8 media time out, with Cal chasing a 50-48 deficit. A block by Rabb out of the time out led to a thunderous putback dunk by Bird, and after a bucket by Jock Landale put SMC back in front, Rabb tied it again with a putback of his own. That's where the score stayed until a 3-pointer by the Gaels' Calvin Hermanson with 3:59 left but Bird answered with a trey of his own and the teams remained deadlocked at 55 with 3:27 to play.
"We had a chance to separate a little bit," Saint Mary's coach Randy Bennett said. "We were up five and if we'd done a little bit better job defensively, maybe we could've gotten home without it coming down to the last shot."
Each team launched runs to capture momentum in the first half Saturday, but it was Cal that had the last laugh to take a 37-26 lead into halftime. An 8-2 run right off the bat gave the Bears the early lead, but Saint Mary's countered with an 8-0 run of its own to take the lead and quiet the crowd.
Neither team did enough to pull away for a long stretch of the first half, which was more a credit to Cal's resillience than anything. The Bears couldn't quite find a groove from the floor, shooting just 35 percent by the under-8 media time out, but even with Saint Mary's shooting 56 percent over the same stretch, Cal still owned a one-point lead.
That's the point at which Cal made its move to ignite Haas and take control on the scoreboard. A dunk by Rabb followed by a steal and transition layup by Mathews made it 24-21 Bears, and after an airball by Pineau at the other end, Mathews stopped and popped a pull-up jumper with a man in his face to grow the lead. By the time the Bears were finished, the run sat at 15-2 and a Mathews 3-pointer from the wing left Cal up 35-23 with 2:07 left in the half.
Saturday's game was the second in a three-game home stretch for the Bears, who return to Haas Pavilion on Dec. 19 at 4 p.m. against Coppin State. That game will be televised by Pac-12 Network. From there, Cal hits the road for a cross-country trip as the Bears travel to take on Virginia on Dec. 22.
