Cal jumped out to the lead over the front nine and hung on. Its even-par 292 was the second-best score of the day. Cal now stands at 3 under, and is two shots ahead of Stanford and Colorado.
Cal also counted a 2-under 71 from Maria Herraez Galvez on Tuesday, who is tied for 23rd.
"We had a really good round today to back up the 3-under round from yesterday," head coach Nancy McDaniel said. "We got some more people involved with Maria and Katherine both shooting 2-under. As a team, we have to finish a little bit better on the greens and we'll be in good shape coming down the stretch. We're looking forward to tomorrow and a really close field at Pac-12."
With such a tight leaderboard, much of Tuesday was just about jockeying for position and staying in contention. Stanford rose three spots to second, while USC, looking for a fourth consecutive victory, dropped from a share of the lead to sixth. The Trojans had 4-over 296, and even though there are more teams in the mix now, are only four shots off the pace.
Information from Cal Athletics used in this report