It’s Shattering: Cal Beats UCLA to End 25-Year, 52-Game Skid

BERKELEY —  The Streak did stop here Saturday afternoon, as expected. And the nets were cut down, and the fans ran onto the court, and the actual game ball was carefully saved. And the coach was carried off the court on the shoulders of the mob. And the band played on.

All as expected. Oh, yes, there was joy in Harmon Gym when The Streak came to an end.

After 25 years of losing to UCLA, after 52 straight frustrating games, Cal finally ended The Streak with a 75-67 victory over UCLA in a regionally televised game.

The celebration that erupted as the sellout crowd of 6,600 basketball fans spilled out of the stands was an indication of how much that victory meant after all these years.

Coach Lou Campanelli, in his first season at Cal, delivered to those hungry fans their first victory over UCLA since Feb. 24, 1961.

Incredibly, it was not an upset when Cal won for the first time in a quarter-century. Cal, 13-4 overall and a contender for the Pacific 10 title with a record of 5-2, was favored to beat UCLA, which dropped to 8-7 overall, 3-4 in the conference.

Both coaches had tried to downplay the importance of a winning streak while trying instead to stress the importance of the conference victory.

UCLA Coach Walt Hazzard had wanted to keep the pressure on the Cal team to worry about The Streak. Cal’s players couldn’t possibly ignore it. Not with the buildup and the anticipation here all week. But the Bruins could ignore it. They haven’t given it much thought, ever.

Campanelli wanted his team to realize that it wasn’t a now-or-never showdown. “I didn’t want it to become larger than life,” he said. “I didn’t want them to feel uptight. Even I was feeling the pressure to the point that I felt nauseous in practice yesterday.

“I tried not to jump on the officials during the game because I didn’t want to do anything to get our players unnerved. I wanted them to think that I was calm.

“I think our players handled it very well. They made a couple of runs at us and after that last run they made at us, I have to take my hat off to our kids for not letting the tension get to them. They could have folded. They did a very nice job of hanging in there and they built that lead back up again.”

When it was all over, Campanelli was, more than anything, relieved. “It’s going to be nice to lie in bed tomorrow morning with the Sunday papers and know it’s behind us,” he said.

“But as I told the kids, let’s not rest on this. Let’s go on and continue with the building process. This doesn’t get us into the tournament. It doesn’t clinch the (Pac-10) championship. What it does do for us is give us tremendous confidence. They should feel very good about themselves.”

The Cal player feeling especially good after the game was junior guard Chris Washington. He didn’t lead the team in scoring. Forward Dave Butler did that with 23 points (hitting 10 of 13 from the field). But Washington had 19 points and made the steal that turned out to be the play of the game.

UCLA had come back from a nine-point deficit to tie the score at 58-58 on a hook shot by center Jack Haley with 6:55 left, then had gone ahead, 60-58, on Haley’s turnaround jumper in the lane.

Cal’s Leonard Taylor tied it again, but Reggie Miller made two free throws to put UCLA up again.

It was at that point, with fewer than five minutes to play, that Washington drove along the base line for a layup. He followed that with a steal after UCLA’s inbounds pass under his basket and turned it into a quick dunk to put Cal up by two.

Hazzard said: “That was the turning point. It was a great play by Chris Washington. We went from up two to down two. . . . That happened after Montel (Hatcher) had been sitting for 14 or 15 minutes, and he came in cold.”

Hatcher had received the inbounds pass and was trying to get the ball to Pooh Richardson so Richardson could take it up the court. But Washington stepped between them for the steal.

After Washington’s dunk, Hatcher missed a quick shot from the corner, and when the rebound put the ball back in Cal’s hands, the Bears decided to slow the game down. The 45-second clock was running down when Taylor made a short turnaround jumper in the lane to give Cal a four-point lead.

Hatcher was 1 of 8 from the field and finished with a season-low 3 points. But he had not been sitting all that time because of his cold hand. He was sitting because he had four fouls in the first half. With Corey Gaines out because of a hip pointer, Hazzard had to start freshman Rod Palmer in the second half.

Hazzard showed restraint in not complaining about the officiating, despite a couple of calls in the final minutes of the first half that were costly to the Bruins.

Richardson picked up his third foul and had to be taken out with 2:14 to play in the first half. UCLA was up by four points at that juncture, but Cal scored the last nine points of the half to lead by five at intermission.

Hatcher picked up his third foul with 1:26 left in the half, and Haley picked up his third foul with 53 seconds left.

Cal kept making free throws, and the Cal fans kept getting more excited. UCLA, trying to stay under control and not rush a shot as the fans stood and created a terrible din, let the 45-second clock expire.

Cal had the ball back with seven seconds left in the half. Kevin Johnson tried to put up a final shot, only to be fouled by Hatcher. Johnson made both free throws.

As Hazzard pointed out, at halftime the Bruins had made five more field goals but trailed by five points. For the game, Cal made 21 of 29 free throws to UCLA’s 9 of 14.

But Hazzard made no further comment on that. He said: “It was a tough game. It was a very good basketball game. I thought we played well. I liked our effort. . . .

“Twenty-five years is long enough to have a winning streak. That’s a long time. Cal worked hard, they earned the ballgame.”

Bruin Notes

UCLA is 1-5 on the road. . . . Montel Hatcher was 3 of 12 at Stanford Thursday night for a season low 6 points but he lowered that mark Saturday afternoon. . . . UCLA has now lost three straight games. . . . Center Jack Haley, who played 29 minutes coming off the bench after losing his starting spot for the second time this season, had seven points, getting back-to-back baskets at a crucial time and also had 8 of the Bruins’ 29 rebounds. . . . Cal Coach Lou Campanelli was facing a horde of reporters and looking into about six TV cameras in his postgame press conference when the phone in the press room rang. “Tell Ron I’m busy now,” he joked, meaning President Reagan.