The California women’s basketball team secured a 61-52 victory over Wake Forest at Haas Pavilion on Sunday. The Golden Bears, now 10-8 overall and 1-4 in the ACC, limited the Demon Deacons to just 14 points in the first half, marking their first conference win of the season and extending their winning streak against Wake Forest to three games.
Sakima Walker led all players with 17 points on 7-of-14 shooting and contributed three blocks, her 11th game this season with multiple blocks. Mjracle Sheppard recorded a career-high 10 rebounds, while Lulu Twidale hit four of Cal’s eight three-pointers. Naya Ojukwu added eight points in the fourth quarter. This is the sixth time this season that California has held an opponent to 52 points or fewer.
California started strong by forcing turnovers early and taking a 10-2 lead halfway through the first quarter. Gisella Maul scored seven of those opening points for the Bears. Twidale’s three-pointer as the shot clock expired put Cal ahead 13-4 late in the first quarter, and they ended the period up by seven after holding Wake Forest to just 23% shooting from the field.
The Bears opened the second quarter with five unanswered points, prompting a timeout from Wake Forest. Twidale made her third three-pointer to extend Cal’s lead to double digits. By halftime, Cal led 26-14 behind nine points each from Twidale and Walker.
Wake Forest responded in the third quarter with a run that cut Cal’s lead to five before Sheppard hit a wing three-pointer. After both teams traded three-pointers late in the period, Maul’s long-range shot as time expired gave Cal a six-point cushion entering the final frame.
Twidale connected on her fourth triple early in the fourth quarter. Despite another push by Wake Forest that trimmed Cal’s lead to five, Ojukwu answered with a key three-point play off an assist from Twidale and scored eight points during a two-and-a-half-minute stretch that helped secure California’s win.
Mary Carter led Wake Forest with 14 points and seven rebounds.
“We’ve been battling, competing and playing really hard, so it’s nice to actually have it pay off in the win column,” said Cal head coach Charmin Smith. “We just had more of a sense of urgency and we were able to really take advantage of the big lineup. Things were very different for us in terms of our effort and how badly we wanted to win. We were able to feel good tonight and get some more confidence. We’ve been getting confidence because we’ve been playing with NC State, playing with North Carolina, playing with Duke, but the confidence you get from actually winning a game is even more. We need that because Syracuse is playing really well. They’re a really good team, and we got to try to win on the road.”
California will next face Syracuse on Thursday at 3 p.m Pacific Time.
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