That was much needed. There is a part of me that doesn't really believe Cal will be all that good this year, but the Bears certainly aren't bad, and we need them to do as well as possible from now on. One of the Bears' wins so far this season came against Missouri, so they would likely be among the top half of the teams in the Big 12.
Beyond that, Cal has some very talented players on its team. The Cats had fits trying to stop Ryan Anderson, who dropped 24 points and grabbed 11 rebounds. Fortunately, foul trouble forced DeVon Hardin to sit a long stretch of the first half, and he was limited to seven points total.
Now, on to our Wildcats. A big welcome back to Bill Walker, who appears to be getting comfortable in his role with this team and thus playing more aggressively. Anytime you score 30 points you've done something right (unless you had to toss up 30 shots to get it; Walker took only 22). We all know Walker is not going to be a consistent threat shooting the jumper at this point, but he did a great job of getting to the rim and making free throws. In fact, kudos to the entire team for shooting a respectable 70 percent from the charity stripe.
A solid game as well for Michael Beasley, who had 19 points and 11 rebounds. I still would like to see Beasley get a little more aggressive, as he only took 13 shots today. But as I mentioned before, I like the fact that we're getting the other players a chance to take shots at this point in the season, so they don't develop an excessive reliance on No. 30.
That's about all I can offer in terms of review, because I wasn't able to watch the game (it wasn't on TV down here in southeast Texas) and I missed the radio broadcast in the second half. I'm sure readers mystman and ksubailey will be able to offer more insight, and I invite all the readers to contribute their thoughts in either the comments of in a diary.
From what I've heard, the attendance was quite a little bit off today, with the athletic department Web site listing actual attendance at 5,247. I recognized this as a potential problem in the open game thread, posting links to weather information in case anybody needed it. Considering a lot of the worst road conditions were between Manhattan and Kansas City and Manhattan and Wichita, it's not too surprising a fair amount of season ticket holders wouldn't be able to make it. A lot of our alumni live in those two metro areas, which were 120 treacherous miles from Bramlage Coliseum today. But I've also read the student section was about half empty, which is very disappointing to me. Bramlage isn't right down in the heart of campus, but it's not like it's miles of congested freeway away, either. And yes, I realize finals are this week. I'm studying for graduate school finals, too, and I would have been at the game today if I lived in MHK. We have the best player in the country and were playing a 6-0 Pac-10 team.
Anyway, now the team gets a week off for finals, and will next play in Kansas City, against Florida A&M, at the Sprint Center. I'm personally excited for that game because I will be in attendance to see this team live for the first time this year, not to mention I can't wait to see the Sprint Center from inside.
Two more days and I will be done with finals, at which point I should get back to much more regular posting, not to mention more in-depth analysis.
Go Cats!