BERKELEY, Calif. – Justin Dentmon stood at the foul line with a chance to win the game for Washington when Ayinde Ubaka did whatever he could to distract him.
“I just tried to get in his head, get him thinking as much as possible, get a thousand things going through his head,” Ubaka said.
Dentmon only made one of two free throws in the final second of regulation to send the game to overtime and Ubaka took over from there, scoring six of his 13 points in the extra session to lead California to a 77-69 victory over Washington on Saturday.
Ubaka hit a jumper on the first possession of overtime for California (11-6, 3-2 Pac-10) and then scored off a perfect backdoor pass from Omar Wilkes to make it 71-67.
Washington (11-6, 1-5) turned the ball over on its first three possessions of the extra session and never threatened after that to drop to 0-5 on the road this season.
Ryan Anderson extended the lead to six when he rebounded an airball by Theo Robertson and hit a jumper as the shot clock was winding down. After another Huskies miss, Ubaka hit one of two free throws to make it 74-67 with 57.7 seconds left.
“Coach told me to be more aggressive in overtime and to make a play, whether it was a shot or a drive or another shot,” Ubaka said.
Spencer Hawes ended Washington’s overtime drought with a hook shot with 47.6 seconds remaining, but the Bears iced it at the foul line and the Huskies didn’t score again.
Hawes led the Huskies with 13 points, Dentmon added 12 and Jon Brockman and Ryan Appleby had 11 apiece. After starting the season 10-1, Washington has struggled in Pac-10 play.
The Huskies were swept in the Bay Area by Cal and Stanford after opening the conference season with losses in Los Angeles to USC and UCLA. Two of Washington’s conference losses were in overtime and a third was by just one point.
“We just need to get our work done earlier so it’s not close at the end,” Brockman said. “And if it is a close game, we have to finish.”
The game was tight the entire second half, with neither team leading by more than three points at any time. Eric Vierneisel hit a go-ahead 3-pointer with 8.8 seconds remaining to give Cal a 67-66 lead
“We answered every punch they threw and we didn’t back down,” Cal coach Ben Braun said. “That’s what I liked about our effort today.”
Dentmon then took the ball the length of the floor and missed underneath. But he got his own rebound and drew a foul away from the basket from Anderson with 0.2 seconds to go.
That’s when Ubaka started talking: “I got in his head and told him the adrenaline is pumping through his arms and he’s going to miss long. I told him he’s going to miss short. I told him to look at all the people through the backboard waving their hands.”
Dentmon missed the first foul shot after a Cal timeout and then Braun tried to ice Dentmon with another timeout. The referees told Ubaka to pipe down and Dentmon, an 84 percent foul shooter, made the second free throw to send the game into overtime.
Dentmon blamed himself for the loss but his teammates would have none of it.
“If he hadn’t made that one free throw we wouldn’t have gone to overtime,” Hawes said. “It’s definitely not his fault. One play doesn’t make a game.”
Cal, which had been outrebounded by more than nine per game since center DeVon Hardin went down with a knee injury, controlled the boards against the bigger Huskies. The Bears rebounded missed free throws twice on one trip in the second half and outrebounded Washington 47-36 for the game. The Huskies had been outrebounding the opposition by nearly 11 boards per game.
“Rebounding is a thing this team really needs, especially in a game like this against a really great rebounding team,” Anderson said. “That was something we focused on”
Anderson got the better of Hawes in a matchup of two of the top freshmen in the conference and showed he can play with the more heralded recruit.
“He’s a great player He’s scrappy and talented at the same time,” Hawes said. “He really rebounded well”
Robertson, who came into the game with 10 3-pointers on the season, hit three from long range in the first half on is way to a 14-point game. His third was part of a 7-0 run that gave Cal a 27-20 lead.
Washington responded with eight in a row and the game stayed close for the rest of the half with the Bears leading 35-33 at the break.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
