It wasn’t pretty and at times it was down right ugly, but the Huskies improved to 13-4 on the season, beating the now 7-10 California Golden Bears, 66-56, Thursday night.
“I didn’t think we played well tonight,” Coach Mike Hopkins said after the win.
In what was a really sloppy game played by both teams, the Huskies turned the ball over 20 times – failing to solve Cal’s full-court pressure for most of the contest.
“It reminded me of an early season game where it didn’t feel like there was a flow,” Coach Hopkins said.”It was really ugly, we allowed pressure, we had bad turnovers. But we found a way to win, which I’m happy for. But I think there’s a lot of growth.. film, to watch after tonight’s game. But I’m not the happiest guy in the world right now.”
The Huskies made up for their sloppy offensive play with some quality defense. Washington held California to 42.3% shooting and forced 18 turnovers. Washington did struggle to stop freshman forward Justice Sueing who scored a game-high 27 points.
Foul trouble played a huge factor in the game for both teams. Noah Dickerson played just 22 pminutes after picking up his second foul under five minutes into the game. Matisse Thybulle picked up his fourth foul with just under 17 minutes to play in the game forcing him to play just 24 minutes.
California’s foul trouble might have been even more of a problem. Don Coleman, Cal’s leading scorer, fouled with 12:47 to play after getting a technical foul right after receiving his fourth personal foul. Coleman finished the night without making a field goal and scored just four points. Marcus Lee, the Golden Bears’ second leading scorer and top rebounder played just 17 minutes due to foul trouble and scored eight points.
The Huskies really had a chance in the first half to run over the Golden Bears but failed to get anything going on offense. Despite California going on a near seven minute scoreless drought and Marcus Lee and Don Coleman playing a combined 12 minutes, UW led just 28-24 at halftime. The Huskies shot just 10-24 and turned the ball over nine times – struggling to crack Cal’s zone defense.
The game really changed after UW went on a 14-0 run to take a 59-43 lead with 7:01 to play in the contest. It was a sigh of a relief for a team that played one of their worst games of the year offensively.
Washington was led by Jaylen Nowell’s 20 points. Nowell shot 6-9 from the field and made 6-8 free throws.
Despite Noah Dickerson’s foul trouble, the junior finished with 12 points and six rebounds.
David Crisp and Nahziah Carter each contributed 10 points.
Washington next hosts Stanford on Saturday at 5 p.m. The game airs on the Pac-12 Network.
