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		Cal women finally get past ASU, Stanford's next By Morris Phillips March 12, 2010

	In order to make sure a pair of narrow, bitter defeats to Arizona State didn’t turn into a trio at the Pac-10 quarterfinals, the Cal women went to class. Coach Joanne Boyle demanded film study of the final five minutes of both losses, and constant discussions throughout the week regarding what went wrong late in each game. The result? Cal made better decisions and carried an aggressive approach into the final minutes as the Bears pulled away from Arizona State, 60-50. Now Cal gets its desired third game with Stanford, with an NCAA berth to be had if they can pull off the biggest upset in women’s college basketball this year. In a 57-50 loss two weeks ago in Tucson, the Bears (18-12) shot 1 for 10 and committed three turnovers in the final 6: 39 as a seven-point lead evaporated. The Bears’ narrow attack backfired as leading scorer Alexis Gray-Lawson took 23 of their 52 total shots, but missed 16 of them. Meanwhile, the Sun Devils got at least one basket from 11 different players, and were clearly the fresher team down the stretch. On January 30, the Bears were ahead or tied for the entire second half, but lost when ASU’s Danielle Orsillo hit a short jumper with two seconds left. In both games, the Bears’ approach wasn’t necessarily poorly conceived, but the execution disappeared down the stretch. This time, the Bears acknowledged their struggles with their offense, and focused on eliminating tough shots with the shot clock evaporating. “We just wanted to attack them, get to the basket a little bit more than we did earlier this season. We all knew we had to bring something, it couldn’t just be Lex,” Natasha Vital said. But ASU’s Charlie Turner-Thorne wasn’t caught off guard. With a pair of Elite Eight appearances in the last five years, the Sun Devils have forced a lot of teams to make adjustments. But Thorne was left bitterly disappointed, when ASU shot just 30 percent and committed 18 turnovers. Even more telling, Turner-Thorne felt her team backed down from the physical challenge put forth by the Bears by getting outrebounded and outmuscled in the paint. “To give up all those second shots was huge… and not play stronger,” Turner-Thorne said. In the opening half, both teams grabbed seven point leads, but neither lead lasted long. ASU fought back first with a 16-2 run that put them up, 24-17. But Cal, showing their new emphasis on balance climbed within one at the half with a 6-0 run that included baskets from Gennifer Brandon, Vital and Talia Caldwell. In the second half, the game was tied for the seventh and final time with 8:12 remaining. At that point, Cal, sparked by Gray-Lawson and DeNesha Stallworth, took off. The pair combined for 13 points in the closing run, as the Bears established a double-digit lead, 53-43, with 2:04 remaining. Cal will be trying to avoid a third loss to Stanford, but the challenge is a completely different, larger animal. The Bears were outscored by 15 and 21 points at Stanford during the regular season, and their difficulties scoring were magnified trying to shoot over Stanford’s big frontline or beat Stanford’s guards, who jumped any screens the Bears tried to set out front. Cal shot just 28 percent in last week’s home finale, and they’ve dropped 35 of their last 38 meetings with Stanford.