Wanted to make sure I had a prediction on record.

I think the Bears do better tonight than last week, but just don’t have the horses to keep up, particularly in Seattle.  However, I think we’ll be heartened by the effort and likely feel the Bears will likely be competitive in all their remaining games (things get much easier from here).

Bears lose 24-38

We’re finally starting to get to the point in the season where there are some (although not a lot) of meaningful results to look at.

A lot of people were high on Oregon after they beat Nebraska.  But then Nebraska lost to Northern Illinois the following week.  Then Oregon lost to Arizona State, who is now 2-2, confirming that Oregon is not an elite team.

But before we get too excited, Cal’s opponents are losing their luster every week.  North Carolina is 1-3, losing to Duke and Louisville.  Ole Miss had a bye last week, but has yet to beat a Power 5 teams.  And USC lost to WSU last night (although WSU is better than history would suggest IMHO).

The overall point of the above is that we’ve got two flawed teams coming together tonight.  From that perspective, either team could pull out the win with a good effort.  Who’s hungrier?  That might be the key question.  And to answer it, I’d suggest that both teams are VERY hungry.  Both teams have new coaches and both teams are looking to put the past behind them.  Both just came off disappointing losses where the game was very much in reach in the 4th quarter.

I think this game is going to come down to defense, although in asymmetrical ways.  Oregon hasn’t been held to less than 35 all season.  Cal will have a formidable task in front of them.  But who can think after watching the last few games that the Cal defense isn’t up to the challenge?  They’ve exceeded every expectation and I have to believe that they will confuse Oregon just like they have everyone else.

Oregon’s defense is supposedly improved, but they’ve given up at least 35 to all of the Power 5 teams they’ve played.  I don’t know that Cal’s offense is good enough to put up 35, particularly on the road in one of the loudest stadiums in the country, but one has to think they’ll find at least moderate success.

And so I’m going to go against the Old Blue in me that wants to call this one a loss, thinking about all the times Cal has gone to Eugene and lost a winnable game; the Old Blue that just can’t believe this defense can keep it up; the Old Blue who fears the offense will fall to pieces in Autzen stadium.  Nope!  I’m locking the Old Blue in the basement for this one.  The Cal offense will find its rhythm.  The run game will work enough to keep drives alive and keep the Oregon offense off the field.  And the defense will frustrate and confuse the Oregon offense.

Bears win: 31-23

The problem with predictions after a few games is you don’t really know how good the teams both you and your opponent played.  North Carolina is 1-2 having lost a not very close affair to Louisville before blowing out a FCS team.  Not the most impressive resume.  Ole Miss beat two pathetic teams before playing us, what does that mean?  As for USC, they’ve got a dominating win over Stanford under their belt (but the trees lost to SDSU as well) and a tight win over a supposedly mediocre Texas team, plus Western Michigan.

One can go in all sorts of circular logic loops with that data.  Out of all of them, I only have one thought I feel reasonably confident about:  Texas and Ole Miss would probably play a reasonably close game.  Thus, I think that the Bears are likely to at least be capable of beating USC.  But at the same time, I think Texas played up to USC as part of those two team’s mythical battle from the BCS title game over a decade ago.  So my gut says that USC would have beat them more soundly on average.

Here’s what it will come down to on Saturday… the trenches.  Can Cal’s young offensive line open enough holes and protect Bowers enough to score some points.  I think the Cal defense is maturing rapidly enough to keep USC in check.  But USC will score *some* points.  What I fear is that the Bears won’t be able to score many.

So, despite calling for a bunch of losses and having been wrong, I still think this massively improved team isn’t quite good enough to get it done.  But, compared to my pre-season prediction, I think it’s going to be a lot tighter.  Bears lose an offensively frustrating game that through late in the 3rd quarter the feeling is “if the Bears could just get some offense going”.

Bears lose: 13-23

How does one judge a team that has only played South Alabama and Tenn-Martin?  How does one judge a team that has an interim coach and self-imposed sanctions?  It’s a really difficult task.

Thus I’m going to end up making a lot of assumptions that I’d rather not make, particularly based on last year.  Ole Miss was a middle of the conference SEC team last year.  But even in the SEC, middle of the pack means big lines and relatively good speed.  Their QB, Shea Patterson is touted as being pretty good, having destroyed his 1st two opponents.  However, it is worth noting that his stats last year were not all that impressive,.  But for the 1st two games of the season about all they did is pass the ball, which is strange considering the competition (most schools stick to a conservative run game when playing weaker opponents) and shows they have a lot of confidence in Patterson.

As for the Ole Miss defense, they are a lot like Cal: A work in progress but with reasons to fear them.  From where I sit, I think this defense will be vulnerable if the Bears can hold their own on the line of scrimmage.  If Cal can find a respectable run game, that will open up the passing game and slow down the Ole Miss pass rush.  However, what we saw with Weber State gives me great pause in that department.  The offensive line that looked so good against North Carolina was exposed to have lots of gaps.

So as much as I won’t be shocked to see the Bears pull out a win, my prediction is going to have to be a loss because of two things:

1. The youth of the Cal secondary against a talented QB.
2. The Cal offensive line struggling against a big SEC-sized defensive line.

I expect the game to feel like the Bears could win if they could just get some consistency on offense, and every time it looks like the Bears are getting close, they’ll give up a big pass play that opens it back up for the Rebels.

Bears lose a frustrating, missed opportunity game: 24-35

As this post will make clear, I’m on the pessimistic side of the Cal fan-base this year.  I’m actually somewhat optimistic about the long-term with Wilcox at the helm and with the current state of the facilities.  But the reality for 2017 is that the talent cupboard was too bare and the new system Wilcox is putting in won’t be ready for prime time this year.   Here’s a game by game preview:

Cal at North Carolina: After having caught Texas at exactly the right time in its history the last couple years, it unfortunately is time for our comeuppance.  North Carolina is on the stronger side of their range right now and the Bears are on the weaker side.  I expect this to be a lower scoring affair than we’re used to, but the Bears offense will have trouble being productive.  Bears lose: 10- 24.

Cal vs. Weber State: If there’s one thing I have a lot of confidence in Wilcox in, it is his ability to win a game when he has the talent advantage.  In this way, he shares a lot in common with Tedford (who knew how to grind out a win whenever he had the advantage).  It will be interesting to see how much the offense can produce and how well the defense is gelling against a clearly inferior opponent.  My feeling is we’ll see spurts of it, but there will be portions of the game that are worrisome for there season-long implications.  Bears win easily: 38-13.

Cal vs. Ole Miss: This might be the toughest game of the season to predict.  Will the Rebels play up to their talent level or will their coaching/sanction chaos hamstring them?  Will they come to Berkeley expecting an easy win?  Perhaps if I wasn’t closer to an Old Blue than I’d like to admit, I’d be more optimistic.  Bears lose 23-42 (but it’s closer than that in the 4th quarter)

Cal vs. USC: When’s the last time Cal beat USC?  When the last time it was even close?  What makes you one think this is the year that changes?  Bears get dominated: 10-42.

Cal at Oregon: I’m of the belief that Oregon is on the rise.  However, Wilcox knows Eugene and will have Bears ready to play.  But the Bears best won’t be enough.  A single-score lead in the 2nd quarter is as close as the Bears will get: 20-31

Cal at Washington: I’m one who thinks Washington will take a little bit of a step back this year.  If the game was in Berkeley, I would at least toy with the idea of an upset.  But not in Husky stadium, which is even more intimidating in its new configuration. 23-35.

Cal vs. WSU: Here’s where the coaching staff will earn their salary.  After a  *very* tough start to the season, the Bears will be 1-5 with a number of losses they’d rather forget.  How much can Wilcox and Co. keep the optimism up with the players going into a much softer half of the season.  Sadly, WSU just keeps getting better and in my opinion will be the surprise team in the Pac-12 North.  While I’ll put this one on my potential upset list, I think the Bears still lose.  Their lone hope is the defense has matured a *LOT* through the first half of the season.  31-38.

Cal vs. Arizona: There’s only one team that got fewer points in the Pac-12 media poll than Cal and the Bears get to play them at home.  Some good scheduling karma!  (It’s about time.)  The Bears will look good in this one and will let out a lot of frustration on Arizona.  Win #2 comes in late October: 38-27.

Cal at Colorado: Colorado is the most over-rated team in the conference.  They got decimated by graduations last year AND got lucky the way the schedule fell.  Actually, technically, since decimated is only 10%, they got quadruple decimated.  But, this will still be an upset, particularly on the road at altitude.  Nevertheless, something in me says this is the game the Bears win that no one expects.  It will be a low scoring affair where the defense wins the day.  17-13.

Cal vs. Oregon State: The optimist would say that Cal has a good shot at this one.  But I think OSU is improving every year and will start to be firing on most of their cylinders by this point in the season.  It will be competitive, but mistakes will cost the Bears: 27-31

Big Game: The horrible streak continues but there will be signs that parity is closer to being restored than we fear: 17-24

Cal at UCLA:  At this point the Bears will just be playing for pride.  And to make matters worse, UCLA may be playing to get to 7-5 and ensure themselves a respectable bowl spot.  This is another one that at a different time and different place (Berkeley) the Bears would have more of a shot at it.  I tell you what, if Wilcox takes the team down there and pulls off the upset, you’ll never hear the end from me of how I’m on the Wilcox bandwagon.  As much as I’d like that to be true, I think the Bears peter out on this one: 17-35.

In summary, the Bears don’t get much schedule help and are in a tough spot talent wise.  If there’s some good news hiding in the schedule it is that most of the winnable games are later in the season after the team has had some time to gel.  If they over-perform my expectations, particularly if they can pull off a win against the Rebels, this team could go bowling and even reach 7-5 with wins over WSU, Arizona, Colorado, Oregon State and one of UCLA or Stanford.  That’s the high water mark in my opinion.

A month ago, I was pretty optimistic about the Big Game.  Stanford was struggling, had recently changed QB’s and the rushing game wasn’t working.  Also, the defense was looking softer than they had looked in a LOOONG time.  Oh what a difference a month makes!  Stanford has started to find their rhythm offensively (to their standards) and their defense has tightened up significantly.  Don’t get me wrong, this is still not the power-house Stanford of a few years ago, but they’re a lot more solid than they were a month ago.

If Cal was entering the game as the same team as last year, I’d have a lot of hope.  Even with Stanford improved, they’re still more vulnerable than usual.  But the problem is that Cal is on the ropes right now in just about every phase of the game.  The offense is sputtering, having failed to get to 30 points in any of their last 3 games.  The rushing game, that was a meaningful threat and kept defenses honest has mysteriously disappeared.  The deep passing game that both helped the Bears put up lots of points and ensured there was plenty of room for short and medium range passing is practically non-existent.  And Webb hasn’t looked like himself, particularly in the mid-range stuff, since the Oregon State game.

And that’s the better of the two units!

The defense is an absolute mess.  Any team that can competently pass the ball is going to destroy the Bear’s defense.  There’s just no other way to say it.  At their best point of the season they were acceptably mediocre.  But between offenses adjusting to their weaknesses and a rash of injuries that has left them decimated, they’re officially horrible.  The rush defense isn’t quite as bad, but is still in a pretty bad place.  I think they look even worse than they really are because the linebackers and safeties are so preoccupied with their suckitude as a pass defense, they’re not able to properly focus on the run game.

And that’s where the potential silver lining lies…

Here’s what I would do if I were game-planning today:  I’d put my corners on islands and tell me linebackers and safeties to play run-first.  Tell the defense it’s OK if they get torched through the air, but it is unacceptable to lose through a thousand cuts to Christian McCaffrey.  Force Stanford to prove they can beat the Bears through the air.  Put a lot of pressure on Keller Chryst.  Force Stanford to beat the Bears a way that is not very comfortable to them.

It might be that the Bears won’t be able to pull that off, but it’s the ONLY thing they have a remote chance of pulling off.

As for the offense, spread the field and focus on getting all four field spreading play types working:  Deep passing, short passing, inside running, outside running.  With the exception of the WR screens (which just aren’t working!), they should try to be VERY diverse.

But as one can obviously tell, I’m not sitting on a lot of hope that the Bears pull that off.  So while I think there is a path to victory, the opportunity is slim.  And thus my official prediction will be bleak:

Losing streak continues and no bowl game: Cal 17, Furd 42

(The theoretical win would look like Cal 45, Furd 38)

What everyone wants to talk about when previewing a Cal-WSU game is high scores.  But what those people seem to forget is that 2 of the 3 Leach-Dykes matchups had cumulative scores in the 60’s, that I suspect the under won, not the over.  Yes,  yes, 2 years ago the score was 60-59, we all know that.  But last year it was a more comfortable than the score indicates 34-28 Bears victory.

And if you look at the history not just of Cal-WSU but of most teams with high-scoring offenses that are of a similar nature, when they meet, on average the scores tend to be lower.  Why?  Because the defenses are very comfortable defending it.  They saw that offense (or something very similar) for all of Spring and Fall practice.

The problem with 2014 was that both teams had horrible defenses, and that overwhelmed the usual pattern.

Which brings us to this year.  Do both teams have a horrible defense?  No, only one does.  WSU’s defense is getting better every week and although it would be a mistake to overstate how good their defense is, it’s much, much, MUCH better than Cal’s.

Cal’s only hope, is that their defense has an unusually good showing.  And as I said already, going up against this familiar offense does make that more likely.  But unfortunately, the injury situation is so untenable, that I just don’t see it happening.  I was tempted to believe it was possible considering the larger problem this year has been rush defense, and WSU gives the Bears a bit of a break in this department.  But as loss to the Huskies showed, the injuries are plaguing the secondary even more so than the run defense.  So, the more I look at who is hurt and who’s replacing them, I just can’t believe this defense will have success.

And sadly, I do see it happening for WSU.  So as much as my heart believes Cal has a better shot at this than most people think, my head and my official prediction has to be that Cal loses a really, really tough one to take: Cal 31, WSU 59.

The Bears need to win 2 of their final 3 to go bowling.  Most people reasonably assume that the likely candidates are Stanford and UCLA.  But here’s my early prediction:  Cal always plays WSU tough and Dykes has the keys to the WSU air-raid.

Expect Saturday’s game to be a close one with a reasonable chance the Bears pull the upset.

(And if you’re wondering where the Washington post-game post is… I’ve said all I’m going to say.)

I must admit, I’m having a bit of cognitive dissonance with Washington.  Is this the same Washington team that Cal was up 27 to 7 over early in the 3rd quarter last year?  It’s not like they’ve had an influx of new guys.  It’s mostly the same guys from last year.  And this year the game is in Berkeley, not Seattle.  How is it possible the Bears are such underdogs?

But at some point you can’t ignore the evidence: The beat-downs of Oregon and Stanford.  The solid victory over Utah.  Or perhaps it is just as simple as 8-0.  There’s no doubt that UW is a vastly improved team.  And the way they’re improved is precision and consistency.  Turnovers are down.  Penalties are down.  Execution consistency is WAAAY up.

And let us not forget, UW turned the ball over 5 times against Cal last year.  We can’t expect that again tonight.

And then there’s the Bear’s struggles.  Last year the UW defense held Cal to 30 points, their lowest score in a win all season.  It frankly wasn’t the Bears best offensive performance of the season.  However, the defense played one of their better games.  The game ball deserved to be given to the defense, not the offense.  I don’t think I have to mention how much of a rarity that is.

So, this is what is going to happen this year:  UW will play a clean game and not give the Bears extra possession and free points.  The UW defense will frustrate the Cal offense enough that we won’t be seeing 40+ points on the Cal scoreboard.  Of the above statements I am nearly 100% confident.  The question mark, if there is one, is the defense.  Can they keep the Huskies in check and get the ball back to the Cal offense.  If they can repeat last year’s performance, the Bears have a chance to pull the upset.  More likely, they’re the rusty swinging gate that results in another painful loss.

Cal loses big: Cal 24 – UW 45

Cal hasn’t beaten USC since 2003 and frankly, haven’t come close in a long time.  Until Dykes took over, the previous time the Bears kept it to a one score game was 2007.  Between 2002 and 2007, Tedford had reasonable success trying to beat USC at their own game, pro-style power football.  He only won one of those, but the Bears were competitive in all but one of them.  After 2007, as the Tedford Bears started their decline, Tedford refused to try and beat them any other way and it got worse and worse and worse.

However, after the debacle in 2013, Dykes now has had two games in a row where he’s kept it reasonably close, sticking to his kind of game.  However, the scores are a bit deceptive.  Last year the Bears were down 7-24 and ended up putting up just enough points to get back in it.  I never felt like the Bears were threatening to win.  It was a similar story in 2014 with the Bears down 9-31 and 16-38 late and the best the Bears could do was to get it close late.  Again, I never felt like the Bears were threatening.

Which brings us to this year.  What is clear from the history of Cal vs. USC games is that two things need to happen for the Bears to win:

1. Cal needs to win in the trenches
2. Cal needs to start strong, leading early in the game

So, can they do that?

I actually think the Bears have a better chance in the trenches than in quite a while.  The offensive line is gelling and can both open running lanes and protect the QB reasonably well.  And while the defensive line has been a bit inconsistent, they’ve shown flashes of being pretty disruptive even against teams with pretty good offensive lines.

Starting strong will be the difficult part.  A Thursday night game, during mid-terms, on 6 days rest, playing a team on twice the rest they’ve had, coming off two back-to-back (kinda, there was a bye in there) overtime games, all point to a difficult/slow/tired start.  Add in that the LA Coliseum has been a very intimidating place for the Bears to begin with, and I’m just not feeling it.

I think there are two scenarios that are the likely ones:

1. Cal is just too tired and gets blown off the ball, losing the game in the trenches, and loses horrifically.
2. Cal has a slow start and can just never catch up.

Neither one results in a win.  Bears lose in heart-breaking fashion: 23-38

(And here’s hoping my reverse prediction mojo keep working!)

There are a number of things that set off red flags for me when looking at an upcoming game that the Bears are favored in:

1. The opponent had a bye
2. The opponent has been under-performing
3. The opponent has typically had our number (should have been a red-flag against Oregon State)
4. Cal has recently lost a game where their biggest strength was exposed
5. Cal has an under-appreciated injury (no Enwere is not one)
6. The game is not on Saturday (Cal is on a 7 game losing streak, the last win coming in 2005 at New Mexico St.)
7. The opposing team has a really good defense
8. The game is a road game

When 5 of my 8 red flags (1, 2, 3, 4 and 6) are going off, I’m going to be your source of doom and gloom.

The best case scenario is that Cal gets the offense back on track, manages to corral the Oregon rushing attack, but does it in a way that prevents the Oregon freshman QB (Justin Herbert) from finding his rhythm.  But I think if any one of those things goes wrong, the Bears are doomed.  Let’s take them one by one:

1. Cal gets the offense back on track: My hope here is that we really can blame the passing game troubles against Oregon State on Webb’s injury.  So far this season, press coverage on the Bears has not worked.  It was really surprising that it worked so well for OSU.  And while in the back of my head I know that this wouldn’t be the 1st time the Beavers showed the rest of the conference how to shut down the Cal offense, I’m going to believe that this is the least likely of the group to bite the Bears.
2. Cal manages to corral the Oregon rushing attack:  So who are the real Bears… the Bears that kept Utah in check or the ones that looked like a high school team against Oregon State?  Beyond that, how will the Bears do against their first real read-option team of the season?  The likely answers to both questions are concerning.  This is the one that is most likely to hurt the Bears.
3. Oregon’s freshman QB finds his rhythm:  Don’t under estimate this one.  The mid-season bye tends to be one of those moments that a freshman QB starts putting things together and the game starts “slowing down” for him.  There are two techniques that tend to prevent young QBs from improving: Get lots of pressure on them or throw lots of confusing pass protection schemes at them.  I haven’t seen much from the Bears this season that would suggest they could accomplish either method.  The counter to this is that this QB hasn’t exactly shown a lot of promise, so perhaps it doesn’t bite the Bears.  But don’t be shocked if it does.

If there is good news, this shouldn’t be a keep-away game for the Bears like the Utah game.  The Bears should have a fair number of chances to get the offense working.  But the risk is that it is a shootout and Cal just can’t keep pace.

And that’s what I’ve got to predict: Cal 38, Oregon 51

MAN… do I stink at predicting these games or WHAT!?!  I’m 1-4 this season.

Don’t get me wrong, I couldn’t be more thrilled to be wrong this weekend, but it’s clear I don’t have my finger on the pulse of this team so far.

I don’t have a lot of time to write a preview, but I did want to give a quick prediction.

Last year the Bears weathered a strong attack from the Utah lines and did much better than expected at it.  It’s not that they won in the trenches, they just made it so it wasn’t a huge advantage for Utah.  Unfortunately, Goff tried to put the game too much on his shoulders and threw a number of ill-advised interceptions.  It was without a doubt his worst game of the year.  Had he played better, Cal would have won, without a doubt.

So, can Cal be good enough in the trenches AGAIN to allow Cal’s superior offensive talent a chance?  My gut says it is possible, this year’s lines have been stout at time and have been getting better.  But I also fear that it won’t be enough.  I expect Webb to have  better game than Goff did (he won’t try to do too much), but when it comes down to the end,  Utah will have wore the Bears down too much and will control the game late.

Bears fall to a losing record: 23-31

I re-watched last year’s ASU game to help give me some better perspective on tomorrow’s game.  For those who don’t remember, Cal started off last years game very cold.  I mean that both metaphorically and physically.  It was freezing at last year’s game!

But in addition to us all freezing in the stands and on the field, the Bears spotted ASU a 24-3 lead in the mid-2nd quarter.  Nothing went right for the Bears early, including a botched punt reception that resulted in an easy TD for ASU.  Goff was uncharacteristically inaccurate, particularly on his long passes and the ASU blitz heavy defense kept the offense otherwise off balance.  It was ugly!

Luckily, almost the entire rest of the game went like this: Cal TD, ASU field-goal…  Cal TD, ASU field-goal… over and over and over.  Cal just didn’t have the man-power to stop the ASU running game without committing too many men to the box.  And when the committed too many men to the box, ASU beat them with the deep pass.  So Cal just kept everything in front of them until they got into the redzone and then forced ASU to settle for field goals.  On the other side of the ball, Goff got his accuracy back, and Cal torched ASU again and again and again for 6 TD drives in 7 possessions to finish the game (minus the field goal to win it as time expired).

So does that tell us about this year’s game?

ASU has their run game working just as well as last year, perhaps even better.  The difference is that Bercovici is no longer under center and Manny Wilkins is pretty inexperienced.  His stats thus far suggest he’s accurate with his short passes (66% completion percentage) but doesn’t rack up the yards (795 yards per game against pretty weak opponents).  This will allow the Cal defense to press a lot more and keep their men up in the box to defend against the run.

So here’s the question… how does ASU’s run game compare to Texas and SDSU?  There’s no doubt that Cal gave up a lot of rushing yards against those teams, but at the end of the day, I don’t feel like it was the run game that was the deal breaker for Cal.  SDSU got enough mistakes out of Cal that they could play out their rushing game hand and win the game, but if Cal doesn’t make the plethora of mistakes it made, Cal wins that one too.  And of course Texas put up a lot of yards too, but they couldn’t keep up with the Bears.

Is ASU’s rushing game that much more dominant?

I don’t think so, and that’s why I think the Bears are going to win this one.  ASU’s defense is pretty weak and Webb and company should be able to do their usual ‘Drop 50’ that they do when they face a susceptible defense.  But I don’t think we’re going to see the ASU offense dominate THAT much with the run game.

Cal wins by more than people would think: Bear 52, ASU 38

If so, go online to a betting website and put some money on the over for this weekend’s Cal@ASU game.  It’s only 82.5.  This game might approach that in the 1st half.  (now watch, it will be a defensive struggle.)

I must admit, I was pretty surprised this week when I saw just how many of the pundits believe that Cal is rightfully the underdog and is likely to lose the game this evening.  The betting line favors SDSU by 7 and there are pundits that are picking SDSU to win by more than the spread.

Are you kidding me!?!  Are people really saying that Cal has gotten so much worse and/or SDSU has gotten so much better than there will be MORE than a 35 point swing (the Bears won by 28 last year).   So I decided to re-watch last year’s game to see if there were some major things I missed from a relatively easy win for the Bears.  Here’s what I discovered:

• The Bears won last year’s game based on the big play.  The Bears were somewhat inconsistent at establishing drives, but they had a number of big plays that broke the game open.
• SDSU shot themselves in the foot in two ways:  Personal fouls that stalled drives.  And turnovers.
• Outside of the above, SDSU had pretty good success running the football against Cal, much better than I remember.
• That said, there was nothing overly explosive about the run game.
• SDSU’s QB was nothing to be afraid of.

So the scenario that would allow for an SDSU victory would be one where SDSU cleans up their act, they continue to run the ball well and keep the ball away from Cal, particularly if their QB has matured enough to keep the Bears defense honest.  Is that possible?  I must admit, it’s more possible than I would have thought before I watched last year’s game.

But I still think the sentiment is too skewed one way.  I’m not buying the 11 game win streak (uh, guess who’s a couple games on the other side of the streak… oh yeah, the BEARS!?!) as a sign of how things have changed.  You have to look at the quality of the competition and SDSU has not beat a power-5 team during those 11 games.  And we shouldn’t forget the big play ability of the Bears that will still be a threat while the Cal running game behind the more experienced offensive line should be able to do more damage than last year.

Cal struggles early but eventually has enough big plays to win: 42-31

We’re less than 36 hours away from the start of another exciting season of Cal Football!

First up is the Hawaii Rainbow Warriors (boy does that strike fear in their opponents…  Rainbows!?! Run for your life!) in a unique neutral site location: Sydney, Australia.

There are very few people who are giving Hawaii a chance to win the game, the Bears have to give 20 points on the betting line, and you won’t find me taking the ultra-pessimistic route.  Quite the opposite, I’m probably more optimistic than most about the outcome.  I expect Cal to win this one easily.

In these sorts of games, the way the smaller school from a lesser conference wins against a power-5 conference school is by having some combination of a weakness to exploit and/or a means to blunt the strength of their opponent.  Cal’s biggest weakness is its passing defense, with a decimated secondary and linebacker corps.  Hawaii will be starting a QB with limited experience and is generally a stronger running team than passing team.  So they don’t really have the means to exploit Cal’s weakness.

As for Cal’s strength, it will be its passing game.  Hawaii is switching to a high-risk attacking defense.  While that *may* result in blowing up the Cal offense on occasion, I suspect it will also mean that Cal will have a fair number of big plays as well.  I can’t imagine that Hawaii will be able to blunt Cal’s offensive onslaught.  And I’d think that even if Cal was starting one of their inexperienced QBs.  But with Webb behind center, a man who’s picked up more than a few blitz packages in his collegiate career, I doubly can’t imagine this working out well for Hawaii.

So expect to see Cal win big.

That said, within these sorts of games, there can still be a lot of interesting things to watch, that will give insight into how the season will unfold.  Here’s a list of things to watch:

1. Is Webb as advertised?  I generally tend to believe Webb was a key off-season acquisition and will make a sizeable difference in the outcome of this season.  But sometimes these things take a life of their own and they’re not nearly as true as the consensus believes (just look at the ridiculous expectations for UW this year…).  It will be very comforting if we see Webb come out of the gate strong.
2. Can Cal force Hawaii to be one-dimensional, relying on their throwing game?  If Cal can shut down Hawaii’s rushing attack, that will bode well for the future.
3. How well does Cal pick up Hawaii’s blitz packages?  Call me crazy, but I’m not buying the hype around the Cal offensive line.  They were moving from weak towards mediocre last year, but a great deal of that was having a QB who was exceptional at operating behind inconsistent line play.  That hid a LOT of their weaknesses.  It will be interesting to see how clean Webb’s jersey is at the end of the game.
4. How well can Cal grind out the clock as the game wears on using its running game?  Last year, the inconsistency of the running game was a significant liability.  (BTW, to bolster point #2, I think the running game inconsistency was far more indicative of the quality of the offensive line than Goff’s ability to make them look OK.)  This year Cal is going to need to take some pressure off the defense by holding on to the ball and grinding out the clock when appropriate.  I think this factor alone could result in a 2 to 3 game swing in the final record of the team.  While Hawaii isn’t the most daunting test, it might show us something.  If Cal struggles with consistent running against Hawaii, be very, very worried about the rest of the season.
5. Just how bad is the secondary?  This can be a tougher one to judge.  Dykes has been claiming the defense has much better depth than in the past and he expects far more consistent play this season even with the troubling number of starters lost.  Friday night will be the teams first chance to prove to us that the depth argument holds water.

No matter what happens with the above items, expect Cal to win big, with a few big Hawaii plays being their only glimmer of hope.  Final score: Cal 48, Hawaii 23.

ASU is a perplexing team, maybe even as perplexing as Cal.  It becomes most notable when looking at how ASU faired against common competition:

When Cal was hanging tough with USC, ASU was getting the crud kicked out of it.  While on the other side of LA, ASU absolutely destroyed UCLA while Cal was licking its wounds before halftime.  They held closer against Oregon than Cal did, but lost handily to WSU while Cal won that one.  We both beat Washington by a small margin.  And to finish off the list Cal held closer to Utah than ASU did.

So if we ignore the LA teams, the results favor the Bears.  If we include USC, it looks even a little better for the Bears.  But UCLA throws that all into turmoil.  (Maybe it’s UCLA who is the wildcard here?)

And unlike Oregon, Stanford or WSU, for whom we have a narrative to explain the discrepancies, it’s much harder to give one to ASU besides perhaps inconsistency.

Thus when I visualize this match-up, I see both the potential for a big Cal win and a disaster of a game that sends the program reeling.  ASU has potential.  One shouldn’t too quickly discount their performance at UCLA as an anomaly.  ASU can play that good.

What ASU needs to have that sort of a dominating performance is to get pressure with their defensive line.  Until last week’s victory over Arizona, the most points ASU had allowed in a winning effort was 23.  They won by being disruptive all game long and allowing their offense the time to find it’s rhythm and be productive.

I believe Cal would do better today in a shootout than a defensive struggle.

I also think Cal has the defensive chops to slow ASU.  There’s nothing particularly scary about their passing game (although it’s not bad either).  The key to ASU is traditional balance. I see more of USC and Washington in them than I see UCLA or Oregon.

So the question becomes, can the Cal offense be efficient and productive against ASU?  I think so.  I think Cal has enough different ways to deal with defensive line pressure to defuse that threat.  I also think Goff has turned a bit of a corner the last couple weeks and is focusing on taking what the defense is giving him, something that was lacking from Utah through Oregon.

The end result is that I see a game where Cal marches down the field, nibbling away.  Lots of dump-off pass plays, screens, QB scrambles, quick hitches and the such.  They’ll end up getting the defense tired.  So while I expect a close score through the 1st half, I see Cal extending the lead in the 2nd half.  I see the Cal defense overall doing a reasonably good job, but there’s also going to be a few too many plays (or even a drive or two) that will drive us nuts.  One or two of those scores will make it appear that the potential win could be in trouble.

But in the end, Cal will control enough of the game to win by a couple scores.

Cal finishes 7-5: Bears 37, Sun worshippers 23

This might just be the most important game of Sonny Dykes coaching career.  The Bears need to prove they can beat  the better teams in the conference, even if it is just occasionally.  A win over a struggling ASU isn’t going to cut it for that, so Stanford is the last chance of the season.  It’s put up or shut-up time.

The good news for the Bears is there are reasons for optimism.

As the previous post showed, the common opponent analysis suggests the difference in quality between the teams isn’t has high as their current records would suggest.  The unbalanced Pac-12 south schedule doesn’t allow a fair comparison.  While Stanford was off beating up on Colorado and Arizona, two of the three worst teams in the conference, Cal instead had to play Utah.  In contrast, in the Pac-12 north where the teams played an identical set of teams, they have the same record (3-1).

The second reason is that if one looks at where Cal has struggled, UCLA and Oregon, it is against teams the emphasize speed over power.  Against the better teams that emphasize power, Cal has held their own.  I remain convinced that if Goff hadn’t felt the pressure of trying to carry the whole team on his back against Utah, he wouldn’t have thrown 5 picks and Cal would have won the game.  As for USC, Cal had a shot to win in the 4th quarter, and I think we’ll see later today how good a resurgent USC team is when they play Oregon.  After all, they haven’t lost a conference game since the coaching change happened.

So here’s the blueprint for how to win this game:

1. The offense needs to have a mantra today: “Take what the defense is giving you.”  The team does not need to score 50 points.  30 will likely do.  They don’t need to be successful on every drive.  While it would be wise to *occasionally* take the shots down field to get some extra “free” points and to keep the defense honest, the key to victory for the offense is to be opportunistic and not let a few stalled drives get inside their psyche.
2. The defense needs to be VERY physical at the line of scrimmage while biasing towards stopping the run.  I think they have it in them.  They showed it against Utah and to a lesser degree against USC.  Make Hogan beat Cal with his arm.

If they do that, I think they have a 50/50 shot of winning, if not slightly better than that.

The big question is, will they?  And here’s thinking that they don’t. (Sorry to say)  I very much fear we’re going to see Jekyll and Hyde at quarterback, flippant at some times, and desperate at others.  There will be flashes of Goff’s brilliance, but I don’t think it will be consistent.

On defense, we’re going to see them be just barely not good enough.   There’s going to be a lot of long frustrating drives where the Bears appear to have it stopped every 3rd of 4th set of downs, but somehow Stanford keeps chugging along and getting 1st downs when they should have been stopped.

This will have the effect of shortening the game and reducing the number of chances for the Cal offense to find its rhythm.

Thus what I expect to see is a game where Cal appears to have a shot, where they remain in tantalizingly close striking distance, but are never able to put together enough drives, particularly at the crucial times, to win.

Bears lose a frustrating one: Cal 20, Trees 27

Although there is a possibility that the Bears continue their free-fall and lose to Oregon State, it’s not a high probability.  And no matter what the score is, assuming the Bears win, it will be hard to learn much about the Bears from the game.

More telling will be what happens across the bay.

The way I see things, Cal has only had two really bad games.  UCLA and Oregon.  Other than that it has lost close games with too many mistakes to pretty good teams.  At this point I’m willing to chock the UCLA loss up to a bad effort and poor preparation.

But the Oregon game really hurts if Oregon is as mediocre as we all fear.

The best possible thing to happen for the Bears outlook is to find out that Oregon is “back”, that they turned a massive corner in the last few weeks with the return of a healthy Vernon Adams and the rest of the team starting to click.  Then the Bears just happened to hit Oregon at the wrong time and their preparation was hindered by not having enough film on the resurgent version of the Ducks.

But the only way the above logic would make sense is if the Ducks go into Stanford Stadium on Saturday and stick it to Stanford.  That’s the best proof that the Ducks are “back” and for real.  Then all of a sudden, finishing the seasons with a few more wins won’t seem so unlikely.  Then Stanford will be more beatable, and ASU, who’s record (minus UCLA) in the conference is less impressive than the Bears, looks manageable with a strong performance in Berkeley.

But if Oregon gets dominated by Stanford, it’s hard to imagine the Bears getting a 7th win without a huge improvement.

(One more piece of good news: The Bears are done traveling.  They’ll stay in the Bay Area for the rest of the season.  Don’t under-estimate how much impact traveling has, particularly as the season wears on.  I’ve done a couple seasons of going to every game, and it really wears on you.  ASU is not going to be happy coming to Berkeley on Thanksgiving weekend.)