Bears Hold Off Syracuse, 75-69 in Berkeley

BERKELEY - It wasn’t always pretty but in the end, the Bears did what they needed to do in holding off a game Syracuse squad, 75-69 to run their record to 21-6 (9-5) with four games left before the ACC tourney.

Point guard Kayla Williams was stellar for the Bears, scoring 21 points on 7-for-13 from the floor along with 6 assists, 3 steals and just 1 turnover. Senior forward Marta Suarez added 16 points and 6 rebounds in the win.

"Happy to get another win," head coach Charmin Smith said after the game. "Saw some progress, some things we wanted to move forward from Thursday. So I'm really excited. You know, 12 turnovers in a game is excellent for us. So today was a day in which we're heading in the right direction."

The game was a back and forth affair, with several lead changes throughout much of the game and neither team leading my more than six points in the tightly-contested affair.

When the Bears took an early 14-9 lead on a Marta Suarez bucket, it looked like the Bears might be back on track after struggling in their last three games but the Orange came right back with a 13-2 run to go up 6 at 22-16 in what would be their biggest lead of the game.

The Bears answered with a 10-2 run of their own that featured back-to-back 3’s from Williams and guard Lulu Twidale to once again give the Bears the lead. Syracuse eventually took a narrow 35-34 lead into the locker room after a buzzer beating layup by forward Shy Hawkins.

After a Michelle Onyiah free throw knotted the game to start the 2^nd half scoring, Syracuse took the lead back three times in the opening minutes before an Onyiah layup tied it and a Twidale 3 put the Bear in the lead for good.

Onyiah picked up her fourth foul early in the 4^th quarter and sat for several minutes but was able to avoid fouling the last six minutes of the game as the Bears managed to hold off a game 10-15 (4-10) Syracuse team to preserve the win and the home sweep.

Smith was also asked about her pre-All Star game conversation during dinner when she had a few minutes to connect with NBA Hall of Famer and TV personality Charles Barkley the other day.

"Yeah, I think it's really great," the head coach said. "We were at dinner with a recruit and Charles came in with his crew and sat next to us, at the table next to us. So I think the people at the restaurant let them know who we were, and he was kind enough to come up and initiate the conversation and I told him about us and how we're trying to make the tournament for the first for the first time,since 2019 and I asked if he'd give us a shout out if we did, and he said he'll give us our flowers. And he said, if we get a win in the tournament, he'll really give us our flowers. So if we want him to keep talking about us, we got a lot of work to do. But that's fun, right? 

"I went to All Star Saturday night and saw the dumk contest, the 3-point contest, and as soon as you guys finish with your questions, I'm going to head back to chase to watch the game, so I'm happy it's in the bay and just like to support our bay area teams and hope that it then comes back to us and people who support us. Really excited to see Marshawn here at the start of the game, and grateful for his support and his love for our program."

The Bears will be back in action on road Thursday at 4 pm PT in Charlotteville to face the 13-13 (5-9) Cavs this week.