Cal focused on 'bouncing back' vs. Florida State in ACC Tournament

Cal’s 80-73 regular-season-ending loss at Wake Forest on Saturday, like its 72-56 home defeat to Pitt seven days prior, was brutal.

However, there are still games to be played, meaning the Bears’ 2025-26 campaign — which still stands as the program’s best since 2016-17 — is not over.

The ACC’s eighth-seeded Cal (21-10) will face ninth-seeded Florida State (17-14) on Day 2 of the win-or-go-home conference tournament, on Wednesday at 4 p.m. PT from Spectrum Center in Charlotte, with much to play for.

“We need to start by winning this game against Florida State,” Cal coach Mark Madsen said Monday morning over Zoom. “And that's the task ahead of us. And if we can beat Florida State, yeah, there's a pathway to the NCAA Tournament.”

The pathway Madsen mentioned would probably consist of running the table, or, in other words, getting past the top-seeded Duke, who awaits the winner of Bears-Seminoles.

But that conversation is for another day.

Right now, Cal is preparing for a rematch with a hot Florida State team that won their previous matchup, 63-61, on Jan. 28 in Tallahassee. That game was the first of seven that Bears starting center Lee Dort missed due to injury, but Cal still had its chances.

“The biggest task ahead of us is playing a really good Florida State team that has been really one of the best teams in the conference in the second half of conference (play),” Madsen said. “They kind of changed their style of play early in the early part of conference. And so this is a tremendous opponent.

“They do a lot of things really well, and, you know, we had a great film session, walk-through and then practiced earlier this morning. So, really all of our focus — the rest of the tournament, can't even come to pass unless we can play really well and hopefully be in a position to win a game in the second half against Florida State.”

Cal’s previous dance with Florida State was grimy, as the Seminoles led for 78 percent of the game, and each team shot under 40 percent from the field. In fact, Cal scored just 23 points in the first half of the previous meeting, and then, when the game was tight down the stretch, the Bears couldn’t muster a point over the last 2:30.

Justin Pippen led the Bears with 19 points on 5-for-13 shooting with eight rebounds, and Chris Bell followed with 13 points on 5-for-11 shooting. The Seminoles, meanwhile, were carried by forward Chauncey Wiggins’ 18 points on 5-for-10 shooting.

The key difference in that game, though, came in the paint. Without Dort — and with much pressure on Miloš Ilić and some make-shift, small-ball lineups — Cal allowed 32 paint points while scoring just 14.

With Dort available this time, Madsen discussed what makes Florida State a threat ahead of the rematch.

“I think Florida State is very well coached,” Madsen said. “They move the ball. They have the ability, especially certain guys on their team, to be explosive from the 3-point line. You look at (senior guard Robert McCray V), he's a guy that can get downhill, get into the paint. They're long, they're athletic. They try to force turnovers. You know, they do a lot of things really well. 


“They have particular things that they do in baseline-out-of-bounds situations and sideline-out-of-bounds situations. And so you have to be prepared for that. And they change defenses, they switch in and out of man and zone. And so these are things that we were prepared for the first time we played them; it was a one-possession game, and Florida State did a good job of beating us at their place. We played well at times in that game, and at times, we did not. We had a lot of turnovers in the first half against Florida State that hurt us.”

The loss sure did hurt, and it came against a Seminoles squad that entered with a 1-6 record in ACC play; Florida State, improved as Madsen mentioned, now enters the rematch as winners of nine of their last 11 ACC games.

But fortunately for the Bears, the past is the past, and they somewhat have an opportunity to right their wrongs — especially after the devastating loss in Winston-Salem.

“Now it's about bouncing back,” Madsen said. “You know, we studied the film, we walked through the things that went wrong to correct them, and now, we're preparing for the next game.”

It’s do-or-die time for the Blue and Gold, in what’s been the most fun Cal men’s basketball season in recent memory. 

And it’s up to the Bears to decide how long they keep playing, and if they’ll embrace the madness of March.