This post was updated Nov. 25 at 10:28 p.m.
SAN FRANCISCO — Tyler Bilodeau was missing Tuesday night.
And the Bruins felt it.
Powered by the opponent’s 50% 3-point clip, No. 18 UCLA men’s basketball (5-2) collapsed against its northern rivals, California (6-1), 80-72 at the Chase Center, marking the second time it has fallen to its former Pac-12 rival in the two teams’ last 14 meetings since 2017.
“Congratulations, they kicked our ass,” Cronin said. “I don’t look at the score; the score is different. I know you guys do, but we had 20 deflections. It’s a low, maybe a five-year low.”
The senior forward’s absence from the California duel marked his second consecutive missed game after spraining his left knee in practice on Thursday. Coach Mick Cronin gave a one-to-two-week timetable for the return of the team’s leading scorer.
Without the team’s offensive leader for the past two seasons, the Bruin arsenal sputtered. Senior guard Donovan Dent – the reigning Mountain West Player of the Year and AP All-American honorable mention pick from last season – knocked in just one shot for three points – his lowest output since March 2024.
Despite Dent’s season-low performance, Cal coach Mark Madsen gave his flowers to the New Mexico transfer.
“Donovan Dent is an outstanding player,” Madsen said. “He is truly one of the best point guards in this country. We studied film on him. You can see him making passes through seams where it doesn’t even look like the seam is there, and he does that consistently. We tried to take away vision, and we tried to take away space. At times, it worked a little bit. At times, it didn’t.”
Dent struggled to get anything going offensively, despite averaging 12.6 points and a team-leading 6.6 assists entering the affair.
He failed to effectively drive downhill – his bread and butter offensively – and could not seem to find an offensive rhythm, shooting 1-for-8 from the field, missing three of his four free throw attempts and his lone shot from beyond the arc.
Even when it came to facilitating the offense, Dent garnered a team-leading seven assists Tuesday night but negated his output with six turnovers.
“Not a very smart team though,” Cronin said of his 2025-2026 squad. “Those older teams are smarter, and we’re struggling with that. … (I’m) disappointed and surprised … it’s easy when life’s going well, when you’re winning by 20, it’s easy. …You have to learn how to play in a real game and make real game decisions.”
In the final moments of the game, Dent went down with a non-contact lower leg injury that kept him out for the remainder of the contest, further adding to the Bruins’ injury issues and lack of offensive prowess.
And while the Bruins’ engine stalled, the Golden Bears’ offense went full turbo.
Chris Bell knocked in 22 points on the Bruin defense on a 6-for-11 shooting night in the Bay. The forward lit up the Bruins from beyond the arc, consistently hitting corner and wing 3-pointers off the drive and opposite pass.
“It was us in the way we were playing defense, being able to get out and run, and our guards are very dynamic, so being able just to play off those guys,” Bell said of why the team was able to excel offensively. “I feel like in our starting lineup, we have five people who can get 14 to 20 points a night, so it’s very difficult for other people to guard us.”
Bell was central to two separate scoring runs – one that took over the Bruins’ 8-0 run to start the game – and a second that put the nail in the coffin.
“We’re just not good enough right now,” Cronin said. “I know that nobody wants to hear that, but you’re not good enough. They did not get lucky. We’re not good enough. We’re not good enough to stop a team from getting 80 points. Not good enough.”
Bell and guard Justin Pippen combined for 10 points on a 13-2 run from 15:53-13:08 remaining in the second half to put the game out of the reach for the Bruins – a lead the Golden Bears would keep until the final buzzer.
The fireworks to the Golden Bears’ celebration were a step-back 3-pointer hit by Cal’s leading scorer heading into the game, guard Dai Dai Ames, who put Cal up eight and took the contest out of UCLA’s hands.
“They made 15 threes in two of their last three games,” Cronin said. “They ran exactly what we went over to a tee. Their attitude was better, their toughness was much better, their execution was better, and that’s because their attitude was better. They came to get a big win. Our guys thought it was going to be a walk in the park.”
With Bilodeau out and Dent struggling to find his footing, junior guard/forward Eric Dailey Jr. continues to be the shoulder Cronin’s squad leans on. Dailey led the Bruins in rebounding and ranked second in scoring, notching 17 points and seven rebounds on 7-for-15 shooting from the field.
Sophomore guard Trent Perry also stepped up off the bench to notch his fourth double-digit scoring affair of the season. The former McDonald’s All-American finished the night with a team-leading 19 points on 6-for-10 shooting on the night.
But with Bilodeau out for what could be another week and Dent out indefinitely, the questions and concerns about injuries, depth and who is going to lead the team in scoring arise.
However, UCLA has a little over a week until its next matchup against Washington – the first conference game of the year – set to tip off Dec. 3.
“At the end of the day, we didn’t get the job done,” Dailey said. “I think that’s the most important part. However we walked in – I felt like we had good energy coming into the game – but obviously the results didn’t show that, so the results really speak for itself.”
