BERKELEY – California scored just 39 seconds into the second half to take a 1-0 lead in it its NCAA first round game against San Francisco on a rainy Thursday at Edwards Stadium. But the No. 21 Golden Bears gave up two unanswered goals to the Dons to lose, 2-1.
 
Cal ends its season with an 11-7 record, while the 10-8 Dons advance to take on fourth-seeded Louisville in the second round.
 
Senior midfielder Aravind Sivakumar scored Cal's goal, taking a short pass from junior midfielder Sam Ebstein and firing past USF goalkeeper Ruben Stuiver for his second goal of the season.
 
"It was a great play by my teammates," Sivakumar said. "Paul (Salcedo-Borrego), Josh (Morton) and Sam had great combination play on the right side. I was lucky enough to get open on the back post, and I did what the coaches have always talked about, which is crash the back post. Sam played a great ball right to my foot, and I was able to put it away. It was a great feeling."
 
But the 1-0 lead didn't last long. Sean Bowman assisted on USF's first goal – Bryce Kaminski's 15-yard blast – in the 50th minute and scored the gamewinner in the 79th minute from short range.
 
Cal sophomore goalkeeper Drake Callender made seven saves, while Stuiver made three, as San Francisco outshot the Bears, 17-10.
 
USF had more of the play in the first half, when it outshot Cal, 8-3. But Callender made four of his saves in the first 45 minutes, and the teams – playing in a near-constant drizzle – took a 0-0 tie into halftime.
 
Cal attacked more aggressively in the second stanza, when it took all four of its shots on goal.
 
"It was an exciting game today," Cal head coach Kevin Grimes said. "Both teams were obviously playing as hard as they could to get to the next game against Louisville. Our second half was excellent. It just took us too long to get to that level of play. We weren't on in the first half and uncharacteristically didn't play as well as we normally do.
 
"The second half, though, was excellent. We scored a goal 39 seconds into the half. Everything you would want to have in a second half started the way we wanted. It looked like we were going to get a second goal and maybe even a third; we were on the doorstep a lot. But it just didn't happen today."
 
"The goal was a boost," Sivakumar added. "But I think we realized the first half wasn't all we had to offer. We came out in the second half trying to impose our game on them, because we had the confidence to take it to them, which I think we did for much of the second half, even though the result didn't show it."