BERKELEY — Cal overcame the dominance of Fresno State’s Orlando Robinson to hand the Bulldogs their first loss of the men’s basketball season, 65-57, on Sunday night.
Jordan Shepherd scored 15 of his 17 points after halftime, Andre Kelly finished with 14 points on 6-of-8 shooting, and California pulled away late.
Grant Anticevich added 13 points for Cal (3-4). The Golden Bears had lost back-to-back games against ranked opponents at the Fort Myers Tip-off, a 20-point loss to No. 23 Florida last Monday and a 62-59 loss to No. 21 Seton Hall.
Fresno State’s 12 turnovers led to 15 Cal points while the Bulldogs scored just four points off Cal’s 11 turnovers.
We didn’t play a mature game to be able to come out and get a win on the road in front of a crowd. We just didn’t get the job done tonight,” said Bulldogs coach Justin Hutson.
The Bulldogs were coming off of wins over Pepperdine (70-63) and Santa Clara (59-52) in the Venue Twin Southern California Challenge in San Juan Capistrano.
Robinson Scores 9 Straight in Second Half
Robinson scored nine straight points for the Bulldogs, capped by a 3-pointer that made it 37-all with 11 minutes to go. Cal’s Jalen Celestine and Fresno State’s Deon Stroud traded 3s to tie again with 10:34 remaining but Grant Anticevich answered with another 3-pointer to give the Golden Bears the lead for good and spark a 16-4 run that made it 59-45.
Robinson led Fresno State (5-1) with 25 points, nine rebounds, and four blocks. The 7-footer, in his third season with the Bulldogs, has scored at least 16 points in every game this season. He has topped the 20-point plateau in back-to-back games and three of the last four and is averaging 20.5 points and 9.0 rebounds this season.
Isaiah Hill added 10 points for Fresno State.
Next up for Bulldogs
Fresno State returns home to the Save Mart Center for two games this week. The Bulldogs host San Diego (4-4) on Wednesday at 7 p.m. and Cal State Northridge (3-3) at 4 p.m. on Sunday.
(Associated Press contributed to this article.)
