NCAA Tournament March Madness

#66 California

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Projection: likely out

California looks like it’s on the outside because its resume contains a few high points but too many blemishes to overcome. The neutral-site win over UCLA and the road victory at Stanford along with wins over North Carolina and Notre Dame show the roster can beat respectable opponents, yet those positives are undercut by a heavy loss to Louisville, an ugly defeat at Virginia and road setbacks at Kansas State, Virginia Tech and Florida State plus a clear loss to Duke that expose inconsistency against top competition. A long list of nonconference wins came against low-level opponents such as CS Bakersfield, CS Fullerton and Sacramento so there are few signature victories to offset those damaging results, and while the remaining slate — including trips to Syracuse and Miami and home tests against Stanford and SMU — offers real opportunities to repair the case the team will need more road success against credible programs to move off the outside.

Date Opponent Ranking Outcome
11/3CS Bakersfield303W87-60
11/6Wright St142W77-67
11/10CS Fullerton186W93-65
11/13@Kansas St86L99-96
11/18Presbyterian277W67-57
11/21CS Sacramento285W91-67
11/25(N)UCLA39W80-72
12/2Utah114W79-72
12/6Pacific109W67-61
12/13Northwestern LA271W79-70
12/19Morgan St356W97-50
12/21Columbia164W74-56
12/30Louisville19L90-70
1/2Notre Dame79W72-71
1/7@Virginia16L84-60
1/10@Virginia Tech55L78-75
1/14Duke3L71-56
1/17North Carolina28W84-78
1/24@Stanford81W78-66
1/28@Florida St101L63-61
1/31@Miami FL3825%
2/4Georgia Tech12980%
2/7Clemson2941%
2/11@Syracuse7743%
2/14@Boston College14566%
2/21Stanford8167%
2/25SMU3744%
2/28Pittsburgh10073%
3/4@Georgia Tech12962%
3/7@Wake Forest7442%