California 84, Washington 81

3/12/2008 9:23 PM

By JOHN NADEL
AP Sports Writer

LOS ANGELES (AP) -Patrick Christopher scored 25 points, Ryan Anderson had 22 points and 16 rebounds, and California rallied for an 84-81 victory over Washington on Wednesday night in the first round of the Pac-10 tournament, giving the Golden Bears another shot at UCLA.

The ninth-seeded Bears (16-14) and top-seeded Bruins (28-3) meet in a second-round game Thursday - five days after UCLA won a controversial 81-80 decision in the regular-season finale.

Jerome Randle added 14 points for the Bears, who snapped a five-game losing streak.

Quincy Pondexter led eighth-seeded Washington (16-16) with 23 points and nine rebounds. Ryan Appleby added 12 points and Artem Wallace had 11 points and nine rebounds for the Huskies.

Washington star Jon Brockman, averaging a team-leading 17.6 points and a conference-leading 11.5 rebounds, missed his first game of the season because of a sprained left ankle.

The Bears led 75-68 before Pondexter scored six straight points to move Washington within one point with 3:35 remaining.

The Huskies got within one point two more times before Anderson made a 3-pointer as the shot clock was running out to give the Bears a four-point lead with 40 seconds left.

After Appleby missed a 3-pointer, Anderson made a foul shot with 21.3 seconds left to give the Bears a five-point lead. Venoy Overton's 3-pointer made it 83-81, and Eric Vierneisel's foul shot with six seconds left completed the scoring. Overton's 3-pointer as time expired wasn't close.

After a scoreless first half, Appleby made three 3-pointers in the first 2 1/2 minutes of the second half to spark a 13-4 run that gave the Huskies a 53-41 lead - largest of the game for either team.

That seemed to awaken the Bears. With Anderson scoring 11 points and Christopher adding six, Cal outscored Washington 23-4 for a 64-57 lead.

Washington shot 45.3 percent to Cal's 40 percent, and the Bears outrebounded the Huskies 43-34.

The Huskies took advantage of poor shooting by the Bears for a 40-38 halftime lead. Washington shot 16-of-35 (45.7 percent) in the first half to Cal's 12-for-37 (31.6 percent).

Anderson, averaging a conference-leading 21.5 points and shooting 49.4 percent from the floor, shot 2-for-7 in the opening 20 minutes. Christopher, Cal's second-leading scorer, was 4-of-12.

Pondexter, a 6-foot-6, 210-pound sophomore averaging 9.5 points and 4.6 rebounds, had 11 points and four rebounds in the first half to compensate for the absence of the 6-7, 255-pound Brockman.

The game figured to be close, since the teams split during the regular season with Cal winning by four points and Washington by three.