Traveling cross-country for their first conference road trip, the Cal women’s dream start to the season was interrupted Thursday by a rude introduction to the ACC.

With a chance to secure the best start in program history and extend their winning streak to eight games, the Golden Bears (13-2, 1-1 ACC) instead let their first game against a traditional ACC foe slip away in the second half of a 69-58 loss inside Clemson’s Littlejohn Coliseum, roughly 2,500 miles from Berkeley.

The Golden Bears will travel approximately 18,015 miles over the course of their first season in the ACC, but the 3-point shooting that helped them earn the first top-25 ranking since 2018 didn’t make the trip. Cal, the NCAA’s third-most prolific team from beyond the arc with 150 3s in its first 15 games, made just 3 of its 19 attempts from distance (15.8%) and committed 15 turnovers, leading to 23 Clemson points, in only its second loss of the season and its first as a member of the ACC.

Senior center Ugonne Onyiah collected a double-double (13 points, 10 rebounds) and senior guard Ionna Krimili led the Bears with 15 points, but the Tigers (9-5, 2-1 ACC) pulled away for good with a 12-0 run over the final 4:30 of the third quarter. Outscoring Cal 25-11 throughout the entire period, Clemson turned a 36-35 lead at halftime into a 61-46 advantage by the start of the fourth quarter.

Cal travels next to Dallas, where the Golden Bears continue ACC play against SMU on Thursday (3 p.m.).

Stanford struggles continue >> With a 67-63 loss at SMU on Thursday, the Stanford women secured their worst start in conference play in nearly four decades.

Trailing 24-13 by the end of the first quarter, the Cardinal (8-5, 0-2 ACC) never climbed out of the early hole and fell to 0-2 in ACC play, the first time the perennial power has lost its first two conference games since 1985-86, Tara Vanderveer’s first season leading the program. The longtime coach retired this spring.

Baseball

Goldschmidt dons pinstripes >> Paul Goldschmidt went through a miserable first four months last year, including a career-worst 0-for-32 slide that ended with a May 11 ninth-inning single to avoid his first five-strikeout game.

“The feeling was just like, man, I’m better than this,” the former NL MVP said Thursday, three days after finalizing a $12.5 million, one-year contract with the New York Yankees. “But you got to go out and prove it. I mean, if you don’t perform, then you know you’re not going to be playing. And I think that’s just the truth in this game and in life.”

The seven-time All-Star and four-time Gold Glove winner spent his first eight seasons with Arizona and his past six with the Cardinals, slumping to a career-low .245 batting average last season with 22 homers and 65 RBIs. He revived his numbers late in the season, hitting .283 with seven homers and 25 RBIs from July 28 on.

“Some things that I did wrong that got exposed and just wasn’t hitting pitches that for most of my career I’ve been able to connect on, things that the opponents were doing, whether they were pitching me different or stuff like that,” he said.

Goldschmidt is a .289 career hitter with 362 homers and 1,187 RBIs for Arizona (2011-18) and the Cardinals (2019-24). He hit .317 with 35 homers, 115 RBIs and a .981 OPS in 2022, when he was voted MVP.

Goldschmidt went to Driveline Baseball in Kent, Washington, ahead of the 2024 season for two days of mechanical analysis. Still, he hit 6 for 47 (.128) in spring training and .224 with 22 RBIs in 52 games through May.

His upper and lower bodies were out of alignment on his swing. He got out of whack mentally, too.

“There’s times where maybe I was patient and pitchers were just getting ahead very quickly and I was just sitting there and an 0-2, 1-2 count,” he said. “It’s easy to look at somebody when they’re struggling and say what’s wrong. It’s not always easy to say how to fix it or for us to actually fix it or make those adjustments.”

Burnes contract details >> Right-hander Corbin Burnes’ $210 million, six-year contract with the Arizona Diamondbacks includes $64 million in deferred payments due from 2031-36, according to details obtained by The Associated Press.

Burnes gets a $10 million signing bonus payable within 30 days of the deal’s approval by the commissioner’s office and salaries of $30 million each in 2025 and 2026 and of $35 million in each of the following four seasons.

His deal, announced Monday and the largest in Diamondbacks history, includes $10 million in deferred money in each of the first two years and $11 million in each of the next four.

Burnes, the 2021 NL Cy Young Award winner and a four-time All-Star, has the right to opt out after the 2026 season.

He has a full no-trade provision through March 31, 2027. If he does not opt out, he can specify by each March 15 starting in 2027 a list of 14 teams he can’t be traded to without his consent.

Soccer

NWSL settles on 16th team >> The NWSL’s 16th team is headed to Denver for a record $110 million expansion fee, Sportico.com reported on Thursday.

It’s more than double the previous NWSL record for new teams and the largest expansion fee ever in U.S. women’s sports. Groups from Cleveland and Cincinnati were also finalists for the new franchise.

The winning group from Denver is led by IMA Financial Group CEO Robert Cohen, who would become the team’s control owner.

The NWSL added the Utah Royals and Bay FC last season. A Boston-based club will join the league in 2026 after agreeing to pay the same $53 million expansion fee as Bay FC.