I don’t care who you’re playing, there’s nothing more disappointing than losing in overtime — especially double overtime. At the end of both regulation and the first overtime, the Bears had the ball and a few seconds left, but couldn’t win it either time. Ryan Anderson even missed a foul shot (which he very rarely does, being the leading foul shooter in the conference) with less than a minute to go in regulation; had he made it, Cal would have been up by 4, and ASU couldn’t have tied it on their last possession. Arghh, what might have been…

Some quick thoughts:
- This is not a bad loss, although ASU’s terrible RPI may make it seem so. The Sun Devils are legit, and you can’t call tonight’s loss anything but a missed opportunity. Still, the Bears have got to protect their home court, and that means winning the close ones against teams of similar talent.
- James Harden is doubly legit. Here’s hoping he goes pro sooner rather than later.
- Where is DeVon Hardin? Why isn’t he making more of an impact? Two blocks moves him into second all-time for Cal, but it just seems like his game presence isn’t there. Unsure what to make of him.
- I wasn’t at the game; was the officiating as terrible as Roxy Bernstein made it sound? There was even a Tim Donaghy reference towards the end there. If so, I’m really glad I didn’t have to watch that.
- This loss pretty much makes the Arizona game on Saturday a must-win, which you hate to do this early in the season. Still, if the Bears are going to make anything of this season, they simply can’t afford to get swept at home. Can’t let it happen, no way.

OK, I’m going to bed. Perhaps I’ll be less disappointed in the morning.

Well, we face ASU tonight.  The resident basketballogists (CBKWit, Ragnarok, Steven A. Smith) have been busy, so it has fallen to me to do a preview of tonight’s game.

Now, I know less about basketball than I do about football and I was the one defending Longshore for most of the year.  So, you know that this might not exactly be high kwality.  But then again, I can’t even spell quality right, so what do I know?  Let’s go for a ride:

Cal’s basketball team is good.  It has big players on it.  It has some small players on it.  Those players usually play away from the rim (or basket, it is where the ball is designed to go, unless you are AJ Diggs).  It’s their job to get the ball to the big and tall players (but not that big Asian one, let’s give him another year).  Once the big and tall players get the ball, they elbow the other team’s players in the face, side, and shoulder, and then lay it up.  Well, ok, that’s what Shaq does. 

Cal has some of those big, tall guys.  One is named Ryan, the other Devon.  They might be cast in a wacky buddy cop movie.  Ryan would be the wise-cracking black cop, while Devon would be the mulleted white cop. Or maybe it’d be switched, I dunno.  The experts on movie casting (Yellow Fever; HydroTech) are also busy.   

"This is where I wish I had photoshop ability." 

I’m not sure who would play the role of the short and angry Italian, Joe Pesci.  Unfortunately, AJ Diggs is no longer on the team.  And not Italian.  Otherwise, it was the part he was born to play!

So, we apparently need some of the short guys.  All of our good short guys (like Midgley and Uuuuuuuuuuuuuuubaka) have left us.  And our current good short guy is playing without a kidney, which is apparently an important organ to have in basketball.   I wouldn’t know.  The only sports my parents let me play growing up was competative dradle. 

 So, that’s Cal’s team.  Oh and we have a dude who looks like that dude from the Arrested Development.  The one who wasn’t emotionally ready to have pop pop up in the attic.  That one. 

So, as for ASU, they used to have Ike Diogu.  Just like the Dubs!  But now Diogu is gone and I don’t know if Harrington and Jackson play for ASU, too.  If they do, Cal stands no chance.  If they don’t, I have NO idea how Cal is going to do tonight.  But here are TwistNHook’s Keys To The Game:

1.  Project orange ball repeatedly into basket.

2.  Prevent other team from projecting orange ball repeatedly into basket.

3.  Do not listen to that short-haired man on sidelines claiming to be Coach.

4.  Let the tall Asian player do the Soulja Boy dance during the game.  It’ll inspire the team and bedazzle the other team into submission.

Let’s hope this works: