CAL'S LATE RUN PRODUCES ROUT

By JOHN AKERS
Mercury News Staff Writer

OAKLAND -- The Ivy League met a top-25 team Wednesday night, and the first 30
minutes were predictable.

The No. 14 Cal Bears eventually wore down lightly regarded Columbia, winning
by a misleading 79-43 to advance to tonight's championship game of the Otis
Spunkmeyer Classic. The Bears (7-0) led only 43-36 with 9 minutes, 52 seconds
remaining, before going on a 15-point run that began the rout.

Ivy Leaguers such as Penn and Princeton routinely throw scares into big-time
programs. Visions of Wisconsin-Green Bay, the deliberate team that eliminated
Cal from the 1994 NCAA tournament, must have haunted the Bears through much
of the first half.

''I think it was just . . . tonight,'' Cal Coach Todd Bozeman said. ''I'm not
going to put it on Ivy League teams or anything like that. It was just
tonight.

''The only two good things about this game is we got a W and nobody got
hurt.''

Cal's opponent tonight will be Alabama, an 83-64 winner over Texas Christian
in the opening game. The Bears should get another huge offensive test against
a Crimson Tide team that is holding teams to just 61.1 points per game.

Bozeman went deep into his bench looking for an answer to his team's problems
against Columbia. The starters logged a combined 71 minutes, with center Ryan
Jamison playing only two and forward Alfred Grigsby eight.

''Those guys responded better than the guys who started or were early subs,''
Bozeman said.

Freshman forward Tremaine Fowlkes, who had 18 points and nine rebounds, was
the only Bear who scored in double figures.

The Bears also made only 12 of 25 free throws and, in general, struggled
against a team that lost 103-56 in its previous game to a mediocre Seton Hall
team and was without starting point guard Claude Crudup, who was sent home.

''Every team has a bad game,'' Bozeman said. ''This is as bad as I hope it
gets. This is not a crisis moment, or a turning point in the season or
anything like that.''

The Lions, who are 2-5 and were 35-point underdogs, turned the Bears into
victims of a series of well-run offensive sets that resulted in back cuts and
open layups. They led for most of the opening 10 minutes, before giving way
on a three-pointer by Monty Buckley that gave Cal a 14-13 lead with 10:35
remaining.

Columbia even handled Cal's defensive pressure fairly well, better than many
teams that have faced the Bears. Though they turned the ball over 34 times,
many were unforced. The Lions' deliberate offense generally led either to a
turnover, from one pass too many, or a basket. They took only 39 shots but
made 19.

Jack Rohan said. ''When the dam broke, they just poured through.

''It's like the Far Side cartoon, where the Indian is arm-wrestling with the
buffalo, and the other Indian is saying, 'Don't let him get into your kind of
game, Vic.' ''

In the opener, the superiorly talented Crimson Tide (6-2) chose to slow
things down and play in a half-court game. They held the Horned Frogs (5-3)
to their season-low point total, a far cry from the 99.9 they were averaging
or the back-to-back school records of 119 and 120 in their first two games.

The Horned Frogs trailed by only 63-58 with nearly eight minutes remaining,
but the Crimson Tide pulled away in the final minutes.

Center Antonio McDyess and forwards Jason Caffey and Eric Washington were too
much for the Horned Frogs to handle. They combined for 62 points and 41
rebounds, 16 on the offensive end. Caffey, making his first start since
breaking his right foot, had 25 points and 17 rebounds. Washington, a
6-foot-3 sophomore who normally comes off the bench, had 25 points and 10
rebounds. McDyess added 12 points and 14 rebounds.

Alabama held TCU's star center, Kurt Thomas, to 16 points, nearly 14 under
his average. Thomas, the nation's leading rebounder at 16.3 per game, still
grabbed 13 rebounds.