Injury status of UCLA’s Prince Ali for Thursday game vs. Cal

Senior guard Prince Ali is a question mark for the UCLA Bruins’ Pac-12 Tournament quarterfinal game on Thursday against the Cal Bears. He is dealing with a back injury and appeared in one of the team’s last five games with two minutes against the Arizona Wildcats on Feb. 29.

UCLA needs all the help it can get during the Pac-12 Tournament because the Bruins find themselves squarely on the bubble. UCLA had been on a roll, winning six of seven games before losing to USC in the regular season finale.

UCLA and Cal matched up once this season, a 50-40 home victory for UCLA on Jan. 19. Ali did not appear in the game, and Chris Smith led the Bruins with a game-high 17 points.

Ali is averaging 6.8 points per game with 2.3 rebounds and one assist over 26 games played this season. The winner of this game will move on to play either the Arizona State Sun Devils or the Washington State Huskies.

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