Cal Beats Illinois-Chicago in NIT

Cal prolonged its 2025-26 season by beating Illinois-Chicago 91-73 in a first-round National Invitation Tournament game Wednesday night at Cal’s Haas Pavilion.

Cal’s Chris Bell scored 31 points on 10-for-12 shooting, including 7-for-8 on three-pointers in what would have been his final college game if the Bears had lost.

This was Cal’s first national postseason tournament game since 2017 and the Bears first win in a postseason tournament since 2014 when Cal won two games in the NIT.

Cal lost in the first round of the 2017 NIT and the first round of the 2026 NCAA tournament.

The Bears improved their record to 22-11 and will host  either Colorado State or Saint Joseph’s in the second round on Sunday at 6 p.m.

UIC slipped to 19-16.

Both teams shots 50 percent from the field in the first half, which ended with Cal holding a 39-35 lead.

UIC led for the most of the half and led by nine points at 15-6 less than six minutes into the game.

Cal got back into contention and finally took the lead at 34-33 with 1:48 left in the half on an alley-oop dunk by Chris Bell on a pass from D.J. Cambell. 

That was part of a 9-0 Cal run that gave the Bears a six-point lead with 1:00 to go before halftime. 

A Cal turnover enabled UIC to score the final bucket of the half and trim the Cal lead to four.

Bell led all scorers in the first half with 13 points on 5-for-6 shooting, including 2-for-3 on three-pointers.

Cal shot just one free throw in the first half and made it, while the Flames attempted 10 free throws, making six of them.

Justin Pippen did not score in the first half, and Dai Dai Ames had just four points before halftime and picked up his third personal foul late in the first half.

Fifteen of Cal’s 32 first-half field-goal attempts were three-pointers, and the Bears made six of those long-range shots.

NOTES

---Cal was a 6.5-point favorite in Wednesday’s game according to FanDuel and a 5.5-point favorite according to DraftKings. ESPN Analytics gave Cal a 78.2 percent chance to beat UIC.

---UIC finished tied for third place in the Missouri Valley Conference with a 12-8 conference mark. The Flames reached the title game of the MVC tournament before losing to Northern Iowa in the finals.

---Cal was the first team from a Power Five basketball conference that UIC faced this season. (Power Five conferences are the ACC, SEC, Big Ten, Big 12 and Big East.)