Key Highlights
- One wonders what it would have been like had he coached throughout the 1960’s against UCLA’s John Wooden. He also coached the 1960 Olympic team and won the NIT in 1949 while at San Francisco. Cal has had some good eras since and Jason Kidd’s team upset Duke in the 1993 NCAA tournament’s Sweet Sixteen, but it has never gotten back to that Newell level.
- Not many schools have ever been there though, to be fair. Currently the Bears are coached by Mark “Mad Dog” Madsen, who was an average but very intense athlete who won great respect from Lakers teammate Shaquille O’ Neal, who admired his tenacity. AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementCoaches personality tend to transfer to their teams, so you can reasonably expect an intense match from Cal, and while this is always true in 2o25 NCAA basketball, this is not the same team we saw in Cameron last year. Last season, Madsen’s first, the Bears were 14-19.
- This season, they’ve almost matched that win total already. Currently, Cal is 13-4 overall but just 1-3 in the ACC.
- It’s worth noting that of their four overall losses, three were on the road: one close loss at K-State (99-96), a 24 point loss to Virginia (84-60) and a narrow loss at Virginia Tech (78-75).
- The only home loss was to Louisville, 90-70. Cal’s roster includes some familiar names: Dai Dai Ames, who played at Virginia last season, Chris Bell, who was at Syracuse previously, John Camden, who was at Memphis and Virginia Tech before blossoming at Delaware, and two sons of NBA greats, Justin Pippen and Stephon Marbury II. AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementThe rotation consists of Ames (6-2 junior), Pippen (6-3 sophomore), Camden (6-8 senior), Lee Dort (6-10/245 senior), Semetri Carr (6-0 freshman), Rytis Petraitis (6-7 senior), Nolan Dorsey (6-5 senior), Milos Ilic (6-10/235 senior) and DeJuan Campbell (6-2 senior). Given what we know of Madsen, and based on his success at Utah Valley, where his last two seasons his teams finished 20-12 and 28-9, and what we’ve seen at Cal so far, the Bears will compete.
