12:30 PM: Hello, ABC. You’re not going to show that last play from last week, are you? You wouldn’t do that, would you?

Oh. You would. Well, thanks a bunch.

12:32 PM: Sounds like Longshore’s going to start.

12:35 PM: I would write a paragraph describing just how lousy the broadcast looks because ABC cheaped out and didn’t bother buying enough equipment to air these midday Pac-10 games in HD. But I won’t, because Ken wants this to be a family-friendly site and the only word I can use to describe how my picture looks is not particularly friendly.

12:39 PM: Dan Fouts is giving Troy Taylor advice on how to broadcast. I’m laughing because I remember Fouts when he was the anchor on KPIX. Not good.

12:39 PM: Three and out and Longshore’s not looking so hot with the bad ankle. He was pressured and couldn’t really move or plant or throw. Is Kevin Riley warming up in the Enterprise engine room?

12:42 PM: Three and out for UCLA. If you’re not watching for some reason, here’s the link to ESPN Gamecast.

12:46 PM: Forsett just limped off and was replaced by Montgomery. Can we get some wheelchairs out there, please?

12:49 PM: Forsett back in after two consecutive plays for Jahvid Best out of the backfield. Best sure looks good — he fights for yardage, which your usual track-to-football guy doesn’t do.

12:52 PM: Longshore hits Jackson for a gain of 12. Jackson’s defender fell down, but Longshore threw the ball low, forcing Jackson to basically sit down when catching it. Otherwise that was a huge gain for Jackson.

12:54 PM: Touchdown Bears! 21 yards, Longshore to Stevens over the middle, Stevens catching it just in front of the goal line. Stephens lined up right, broke inside, had nobody covering him, and walked in. The classic TE pass play. Cal 7, UCLA 0.

1:00 PM: Cowan tackled by Alu’alu’s butt. Seriously.

1:03 PM: UCLA putting a pretty nice drive together here.

1:09 PM: 3rd and 6 from the 13 yard line for UCLA. Follett catches Cowan from behind for a slight loss. Kicking time for UCLA. End of First Quarter. Cal 7, UCLA 0.

1:13 PM: UCLA Field Goal good. Cal 7, UCLA 3.

1:21 PM: Great third-down completion for 16 yeards to Jackson near midfield.

1:23 PM: Cal is really struggling to get the running game going. Two straight runs to Forsett for minimal gain. Good pressure on Longshore forces a punt.

1:24 PM: A rare lousy punt for Andrew Larson. 18 yards. Yuck.

1:27 PM: Kahlil Bell with a gigantic run of 64 yards, right up the middle and then gone. Stopped by DeCoud at the 2.

1:28 PM: Touchdown UCLA. UCLA 10, Cal 7.

1:29 PM: Is this the “break and don’t bend” defense I’m seeing here? Wow.

1:32 PM: Apparently Karl Dorrell doesn’t understand the concept of forward progress. He’s on the field asking for a ball to be spotted way back because the Cal receiver allowed UCLA defenders to push him back. Read the rulebook, Karl.

1:35 PM: Longshore to Jackson, touchdown! Beautiful pass, and D-Jax was wide open. Play action, fake end around motion, and Jackson took it in. Cal 14, UCLA 10.

1:40 PM: Huge completion for Cowan, exposing some pretty lame secondary coverage by Cal. The Cal secondary is playing like they’re hopelessly overmatched, including by my count three Pass Interferences so far.

1:45 PM: UCLA Field Goal good from 28. Cal 14, UCLA 13.

1:50 PM: Forsett is down again. Running off now, but he’s banged up.

1:52 PM: Good third-down pass to Jackson for a good gain and a first down. Jackson gets shoved on his way out of bounds and complains, but (unlike the call against Cal last week) the ref wisely decided to let it go. Next play, a long pass to Jackson that was so obviously a touchdown that the UCLA defender had to face-guard and PI in order to prevent the TD.

1:55 PM: Terrible pitch from Longshore, fumbled by Best, kicked around, recovered by UCLA. Terrible, terrible, terrible, terrible, terrible. Cal was in the Red Zone, and now it’s UCLA ball. So, Cal, do you want to play in the Emerald Bowl? You’re playing like it.

2:01 PM: Worrell Williams rips the ball out of the hands of a UCLA receiver. Somehow, inexplicably, recovered by Cal.

2:02 PM: Incomplete pass, lame screen pass, and it’s third down just like that. Toss in a false start to boot, and it’s third and long.

2:03 PM: Pass complete for a first down with :03 left. Cal had two time outs left but didn’t take them for fear of, what, giving the ball back to UCLA? As a result, there’s no time left to run more than a single play. Oh well. Kay has to come in instead. 44 yard attempt no good. Halftime. Cal 14, UCLA 13.

2:05 PM: Seriously, UCLA was beaten senseless by Utah and beaten by Notre Dame. If Cal can’t beat UCLA… well, if they can’t beat UCLA they’re not nearly as good as people thought they were.

2:27 PM: And we’re back.

2:30 PM: Backup QB, backup RB… and UCLA keeps moving the ball. They’re almost at the 50.

2:33 PM: Did they listen to the announcers when they suggested that there would be a fake end-around pass later in the game? Obviously the announcers saw them practicing it. It worked. Touchdown UCLA. UCLA 20, Cal 14.

2:37 PM: If this is how Cal plays in the Rose Bowl maybe we don’t ever want to win the Pac-10 championship.

2:39 PM: Three and out for Cal’s offense. Punt almost blocked. But the UCLA player goes for Larson and not the ball, giving Cal five yards and a re-kick. Net result is a 20-yard difference in field position for UCLA. A lot more if you figure he should’ve blocked it.

2:47 PM: UCLA fumble recovered by Alu’alu, Cal ball! Every time I start writing about how disgusted I am with Cal today, something positive happens. I need to do that more often.

2:50 PM: Another failed trick play. DeSean Jackson runs around in the backfield. Hey, DeSean, you’re the QB. Throw it away! Don’t take a loss.

2:53 PM: And now a pitch to Best, can’t get around anyone and gets a tiny gain. The running game is doing nothing and it’s another third and long for Longshore. Third down, UCLA defender pulls it away from Hawkins for the interception.

2:54 PM: I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this before, but because of a prior work-related travel commitment, I’m going to miss the Washington State and USC games, and most likely the Washington road game unless they play it at 7 p.m. It pains me to be far, far away (and without even reliable Internet) during Cal games, but the way they’re playing right now maybe it’s a blessing. If Cal keeps playing as they’re playing right now, it’s time to write off this season. Boo.

3:00 PM: Three and out for UCLA. Good play by the defense there.

3:04 PM: Blatant roughing the passer on UCLA, and called by the officials. Gives Cal the ball at midfield with a first down.

3:05 PM: Draw to Forsett for nothing. The Cal running game today has simply not been there. Third and long yet again.

3:06 PM: Another third-and-long pass completion! This one to Jackson. Can’t say how impressed I am with Longshore’s third-down throws today.

3:07 PM: Nice catch by Cunningham, playing for Jordan today. His second catch of the season. First down at the 20. Screen pass to Forsett, and it works! Forsett to the 5. One of the only plays all day that has worked with the ball going short. So much of Cal’s progress today has been based on 10- or 15-yard passes, often on third down. The run simply has not worked so far.

3:10 PM: Second and Goal, UCLA stacks up in the center and they hand off to Forsett up the middle. Didn’t we learn our lesson last week, Bears?

3:11 PM: Longshore to Jackson in the end zone for an apparent touchdown. UCLA defender bumped into him and then stripped him in the end zone after the TD was clearly made. Official call: defensive PI, stole the dead ball out of Jackson’s hands… which is what it was. Touchdown Bears! Cal 21, UCLA 20.

3:13 PM: Now that’s what you have to do on a third and goal when you’ve got Cal’s receivers and a defense that’s playing the run up the middle.

3:14 PM: Slater runs the kickoff back across the 50 and is tackled by Larson. And did Dan Fouts just refer to the conference as the Pac-8? Wow, Foutsie, welcome to the ’70s.

3:16 PM: Offensive PI on UCLA. Crazy game, crazy officiating.

3:18 PM: On 3rd and 1, Cowan slides a yard short of the first down rather than going head-first and getting the first down. I assume he just didn’t know where he was on the field (since alas, in the real world there is no electronic first-down stripe on the field), but that was the wrong time to do that. Timeout, UCLA, as they consider going for it on 4th down.

3:19 PM: Hey, we’ve been lumped in with talk radio! Talking about Dorrell being criticized “on talk radio and on the blogs.”

3:20 PM: Dorrell tries to draw off Cal, takes the penalty and punts. Dan Fouts is critical of Karl, and really, can you blame him? Boos from the fans. What can you say? Karl Dorrell is a terrible, terrible coach. I weep for the day when he is inevitably fired, because UCLA may replace him with someone competent who will make UCLA into a force to be reckoned with year in and year out, a real contender for the Pac-10 title. Unlike the inconsistent, underachieving team that they’ve had the past few years.

3:22 PM: End of the third quarter. Cal 21, UCLA 20.

3:25 PM: Forsett for a 10-plus yard run. That was the best run of the day.

3:25 PM: For those of you wondering at home, no, my son has not peed on me at all today. That was apparently a one-time Cal game occurrence. My couch and I are both grateful.

3:27 PM: 2nd and 18, and… Forsett runs up the middle? Eh?

3:31 PM: Another run by Forsett, for a gain of 8. Yeah, on 2nd and 18? I don’t like that call at all. Come on. How much success has Cal had on third down passing today?

3:34 PM: On third and 7, Cal doesn’t get much pressure on Cowan but he throws it high and it’s almost picked off on the deflection. UCLA punts, ball down at the 22. Another flag, this one on Cal for holding on the punt. Sigh.

3:40 PM: Another three and out, and a bad Larson punt and it’s first down UCLA at the 50. I’m not liking this.

3:45 PM: 3rd and 3 for UCLA. Huge play, and UCLA makes the conversion. It was easy to miss — this huge play in the game was derailed by a conversation on ABC about the medical condition underlying “turf toe.” Wow, great timing, guys. What this one-point game in the 4th quarter needs is filler! Anyway, a big gain on first down and UCLA has the ball at the 20. Cal is almost certainly going to have to come from behind with less than five minutes to go. Ugh.

3:49 PM: Third down and UCLA passes, to the ten. But really, that’s a terrible call. You’ve got the field goal for the lead. Why are you passing on third down? You risk ending the game on a pick. Bad call, Karl. In any event, the 27-yard field goal is good. UCLA 23, Cal 21. Cal has three timeouts and 3:08 to answer.

3:52 PM: Jahvid Best, huge kick return! Rambling left, rambling right, bringing it back 54 yards. He was hit out of bounds, by the way, but unlike last week (in a very similar situation), no call this time.

3:53 PM: Forsett rushes for four yards on first down. Second down, Forsett runs for basically no gain. Third down.

3:54 PM: Cut to Jordan Kay on the sideline. No, no, no… do not put this on the foot of Jordan Kay.

3:56 PM: Longshore throws for the first down to Jackson and UCLA steps in front and runs it back all the way. That’s two consecutive games where Cal had the game to win with a field goal and gave it away. UCLA 30, Cal 21. That’s the end of this season, as far as I’m concerned. Nowhere to go but down from here. Keep reaching for that Sun Bowl!

4:00 PM: If you lose to a bad team, you are a bad team. Two conference losses in a row, and two games squandered. Lots of good excuses last week. This week? None. Cal can’t even beat this terrible UCLA team, a team coached by a moron.

4:02 PM: Turns out I’ve picked the right year to flee the country during multiple Cal games after all.

4:04 PM: Cal will fall to 5-2. Hey, is Steve Mariucci coaching? It’s got that feeling. Riding high at 5-0, and then… face plant.

4:07 PM: Game over. UCLA 30, Cal 21. Who needs to play in the Rose Bowl in 2008? Maybe the 50th attempt will be the charm.

For the first time since the Colorado State game I won’t be in person to watch the Bears… something I loath. TV coverage is designed for the ‘lay watcher’ not for someone who actually wants to understand what’s going on in the game. It’s REALLY frustrating to me to watch pass plays because I’m forced into this artificial suspense because I can’t see the coverage. All I can see is whether a sack may be coming, an unlikely occurance with the two pass-rushes matched up on Saturday. This was supposed to be the year I went to a bunch of away games but my wife’s pregnancy and her master’s thesis have taken presidence, as they should. Nevertheless it is frustrating to see my brother go on the road to the Rose Bowl while I get to watch at home. I’ll make sure to text message him during important plays with “important” info that’ll keep him distracted just to spite him (Hey Bro: your roommate called me… is there supposed to be a big scratch on the side of your car?).

Luckily, I don’t think I’m going to miss an exciting game. Either the Bears are going to win this one in a walk or it is going to be one of the most boring upsets in Cal/UCLA history.

Perhaps I just don’t have enough confidence in UCLA head coach Karl Dorrell’s ability to manage injuries, but I’m 95% confident that Pat Cowan, the announced starter for UCLA will be a non-factor in this game. Yeah, at the post-Thursday practice Dorrell was all grins and giggles saying that Cowan did a “tremendous job” at practice this weeek, but call me skeptical for one of three reasons:

1. He won’t play at all because the injury isn’t healed
2. He’ll play but be hobbling around because the injury isn’t healed
3. He’ll get re-injured because the injury isn’t healed and/or their offensive line stinks

I mean, something is up at UCLA with their quarterbacks. They have WAY too many injuries and it seems to happen every year. Heck, they make Stanford look like the safe place to play QB. I mean in that same post practice interview Dorrell also went so far as to name a backup to the backup saying “Osaar Rasshan will be our third if need be.” What kind of confidence is that!?! When one puts that all together my gut says that Cowan’s backup Bethel-Thompson, otherwise known as “the lawfirm of McLeod, Bethel and Thompson” will be playing the majority of the game. For those of you who didn’t see the UCLA vs. Notre Dame game (remember this was Notre Dame’s ONLY victory), Bethel-Thompson was HORRIBLE. I’m not talking about a put my brother back there and see how bad it is… no this is far worse… this is I sure hope that lawfirm pays the bills awful.

Add in that their starting running back, Chris Markey is injured putting junior Kahlil Bell in the starting role against Cal’s stout run defense (Markey may get some playing time) and I’m pretty confident that Cal will win this one with either Riley or Longshore behind center. Heck, even if Cowan plays and plays his best, I still think either Riley or Longshore will out duel him. Cowan has only played in one game this season and wasn’t exactly brilliant in either that game or his playing time last season.

The lone area of risk for the Bears is whether their running game can get the job done against the supposedly stout UCLA run defense. While I’m not as confident about this as I am about the above topics, I’m still not worried much about it. I’ve been through too many “this run defense is going to be tough” games where Forsett put up his usually terrific numbers to be concerned about it. Forsett is on track for a 1500 yard season plus whatever he could do in a bowl game. Forsett had 60 yards on 11 carries last year in relief of Lynch in the UCLA game, against what is basically the same defensive personel.

So call me Mr. Confident: 35-13 (revised up Cal offensive score from 24-13 beginning of season prediction)

My weekly statistical preview article for the Bears is up at Rivals: Crunching the Numbers: Cal at UCLA

As a bonus, this one is yet again available without a Rivals subscription.

This one was posted a couple days ago, but I forgot to link to it from here: Bears take one as a team.

Just an FYI. Both myself and Ragnarok from The California Golden Blogs will be on tonight’s episode of the BruinShow. It airs from 6-7 PM. You can listen to it from here:

http://bruinshow.com/?p=17

I guess we’ll be up in the 2nd half of the hour.

OK, I’ll admit it, I’d never heard of BleacherBloggers but once I took a look, they seem pretty impressive. Well, guess who gets a mention on today’s show:

Yeah, that’s me alright! And might I add that they zoomed in WAY too much on me and my brother. Nobody should have to see my ugly mug that zoomed in.

For all who are visiting this site through the link at BleacherBloggers, welcome and make yourself at home. I hope you’ll visit often.

The more I read people’s comments, the more surprised I am about how little so many people know about the Rose Bowl selection process. So here goes:

1. The Rose Bowl selects the winner of Pac-10 and the winner of the Big-10.
2. The Pac-10 champion is determined by whoever has the highest winning percentage in their Pac-10 conference games (or said another way whoever has the most Pac-10 wins (assuming everyone plays their full Pac-10 schedule)).
3. If two teams are tied for the highest winning percentage, the winner of their matchup wins the tie-breaker.
4. If three or more teams are tied, if one team has beat all of the others amongst the tied teams, it wins the tie-breaker.
5. If three or more teams are tied and none of them has beat all of the other tied teams, the team with the best record against the tied teams wins the tie-breaker. If two or more teams are tied for the best record, the lower teams are eliminated and tie-breakers number three and four are re-tried. (BTW, this tie-breaker only really matters if 4 or more teams are tied (assuming everyone plays their full Pac-10 schedule) so it can likely be ignored).
6. If the above tie-breakers still do not break the tie, whoever lost to the highest place team in the Pac-10 is eliminated and the above tie-breakers are re-tried. (This one is best explained by an example: If Cal, USC and Oregon are tied because Oregon beats USC but losses to Washington and Cal loses to USC, whichever of Stanford (USC’s loss), Oregon State (Cal’s loss) and Washington (Oregon’s loss) finished higher in the Pac-10 will determine who is eliminated from the tie-breaker. If Stanford was that team, USC would be eliminated and Cal would go to the Rose Bowl based on the head-to-head tie-breaker over Oregon.)
7. If after all of the above tie-breakers are exhausted, the team with the highest BCS ranking goes to the Rose Bowl.

I have ignored who goes to the Rose Bowl in the case that the Rose Bowl has an at-large berth due to one or both of the Big-10 and Pac-10 champion going to the BCS championship game… perhaps I’ll do that in another post if it looks like it will at all be of issue down the road.

The key things to remember off the top of your head is that it is still the Pac-10 champion who goes irrelevant of low BCS rankings (although a top-2 ranking of course changes things) and the tie-breakers for the Pac-10 representative in the Rose Bowl when there are co-champions are the traditional ones (head to head matchups first). If you don’t remember all the complicated 3-way and beyond tie-breakers, I wouldn’t worry about it, but people need to know the simple stuff.

The final note, and the reason I felt the need to write this, is that assuming no Pac-10 team goes to the BCS title game, it’s very unlikely at this point that the BCS rankings will determine who from the Pac-10 is in the Rose Bowl at this point particularly since the teams expected to be on top at the end of the season have lost to different teams down in the Pac-10 standings.

(For those who are interested, the Pac-10’s document on how the Rose Bowl representative is picked can be found here.)

Here are my thoughts after having re-watched the game:

• Here’s a beginning of the game statement that nobody would make anything out of until the final play of the game: “It’s game management issues that Tedford wants to protect his young quarterback from.”
• I had completely forgotten that Forsett had ripped off that long run on the 1st play from scrimmage… boy would that have been nice if Kay could have converted on that FG (and man was that close) or if the offense could have kept moving forward because that would have really set a different tone for the game.
• Although OSU “evened” things out with that early fumble. Need I remind everyone that this was OSU’s lone turnover and it was already “pre-evened”?
• The one thing that OSU kept shooting themselves in the foot with was the dropped passes, the first of which really looked like a catch and fumble from the stands but pretty clearly never under control on TV.
• How hilarious was it that Jordan’s first catch of the game, the catch that tied the consecutive games with a catch record, was a 2 yard loss? I mean Jordan had great catches later in the game so it’s not like the record is minimized… but it’s still not a catch you want to be celebrating.
• What a rough fumble for Forsett… that defender had some amazing arm strength to pull that ball out. Notice as well that it was on the first play of the drive, putting the defense right back on the field already in their own redzone. How can anyone hold that against the defense?
• And even still, the defense forced a 4th and goal… OSU just was able to punch it in: 0-7
• As a note, I wasn’t the least bit nervous at this point in the game. The defense had been doing such a good job that I was confident Cal would eventually get their offense working.
• The fullback running plays, which have been so effective this season, really didn’t work against OSU. I couldn’t really see why other than the O-Line wasn’t getting a good push.
• I was WAY under appreciative of Forsett in my podcast. He had a great game, even by the 2nd quarter he was established.
• Notice that the very first drive that Tedford really took the shackles off of Riley in his play-calling Cal marched right down the field for a tying TD: 7-7
• That punt by Larson still amazes me. WOW. 74 yards! Not only did he get it over the returner’s head, he had enough air under it that the gunners caught up to it shortly and would have been there to stop it from rolling into the endzone if for some reason it had another 8 yards on it.
• Not that this takes any guts to say this but I still stand behind my statement that the defensive line was the worst unit on the field yesterday. They got ZERO pressure on Canefield all day and I think a big part of the reason he didn’t throw any interceptions was because he was never rattled by the defense. Getting pummeled tends to lead to mistakes.
• What a rough interception… see a pattern here? About the only thing Riley did wrong was sit in the pocket a little too long.
• That reverse by OSU had SOOOO many blocking in the back penalties… Oregon got away with that crud too two weeks ago. I think Pac-10 refs just aren’t looking for block in the back stuff when on offense.
• This same defense that everyone was criticizing managed to hold OSU to a field goal on that short field. 7-10.
• Just to re-iterate: 10 points so far, all 10 of them on short fields from turnovers.
• One thing I didn’t touch on in my podcast but bugged me all game was how weak our kickoff runbacks were. The worst one of the game was this late 2nd quarter one where it was kind of like a reverse but it had more the feel of a handoff after a huddle and a break for a cup of coffee. It’s no wonder that the defense was able to get down field and stop Cal on that one. It was an incredibly slow developing play.
• This TD drive toward the end of the 2nd quarter was the most impressive of the game for Cal. They established the run game, and pounded OSU over and over and over. Add in a great on the run pass by Riley and this looked to be the turning point for the Bears: 14-10
• And then the squib kick… definitely just poor execution. The goal of that kick was to get it deep but on a bounce. It’s done all the time and it just didn’t happen. Another place where we’re missing Schneider?
• Another missed penalty, one that I could see from my corner seat, was the Canefield throw pass the line of scrimage. He was a FULL 2 yards past the line of scrimage. Those yards (and it’s a loss of down penalty, not that it mattered with the clock) would have killed that field goal attempt.
• In any case, Serna kicks another great field goal: 14-13
• And while we’re at it, we’re up to 13 out of 13 points that shouldn’t be counted against the defense.
• Going into the 2nd half, this first drive for OSU was every bit as bad as it seemed in person. The defense was just getting manhandled by OSU. No intensity what so ever.
• Speaking of which, I’d much rather have Cal down by 1 than up by 1 at halftime of a game like this. When the team is still up, the adjustments and motivation that happens at halftime just isn’t there like it is when the team is down, even if it is just by 1.
• Whatever the situation, there’s no excuse for the defense coming out of the break that flat. They just didn’t bring it on that touchdown drive, OSU’s only full field drive: 14-20
• Yeah, my mediocre feeling about the run game was totally unmerited. They did great. The next drive was a continued dominating performance by Forsett.
• Another thing I forgot in my podcast was it was Stevens who caught that incredible pass from Riley. Riley was practically wrapped up and managed to throw a bullet between two defenders to Stevens and then Stevens managed to drag half the OSU team another 10 yards. I had remembered the great throw by Riley but I forgot about Stevens and was fairly critical of his low impact in the game. Well, that was a huge impact play that he made happen (after Riley gave him the great toss).
• I’d better make sure I’m fair. I went through the 4 goal line runs by Forsett and the refs got it right. None of them crossed the goal line… and I went through 1st and 3rd down frame-by-frame. My seats are on the opposite corner so I don’t get a very good view of the far endzone particularly depth perception wise. For us 2nd down looked like the winner, but it wasn’t even close.
• Nevertheless, there is no excuse for not scoring there. The offensive line had been moving the pile for the last two drives they had the ball and they, along with the tight ends and fullbacks, needed to make a hole for Forsett who was given no chance and did everything in his power to make something out of nothing.
• This was the turning point in the game if you ask me. Yeah Cal would take the lead again later, but this was the moment OSU could look themselves honestly in the face and say: “if we can pull stops like that, we can win this game.” This was also the first point I really got nervous. I was troubled when Cal’s defense crumbled on the previous drive but I held out hope they’d get it back together and the offense would continue to make strides forward. At this point, I wasn’t so sure either side was going to get it done.
• But the defense stepped it up again. The kept the Beavers punting from their endzone (after a 3 and out) and that was huge for allowing the Bears to not only work a very short field (their only one of the game I might add) but also to go back at it against a tired defense.
• And Cal was able to execute on just those grounds: 21-20.
• The first 3rd down of the ensuing OSU drive was the first time I was disappointed with the secondary. There’s no way they should have let that receiver come free and the forced punt would have been huge for momentum.
• Follet missed a pretty important tackle later on that same drive that turned it from a 3rd and 6 to a first and goal. Follett had a good game so I’m not criticizing him, just pointing to the frustrating moments of the game.
• For those who want to beat every decision to death, the 1st Cal timeout was called on 3rd and goal of this drive with the ball at the 1 yard line. The Bears held on 3rd down forcing 4th down.
• Following up on my podcast, the refs explination for the 2 timeouts only counting as one was “Oregon State will now ‘utilitize’ their timeout”. That doesn’t sound right to me, but in fairness to OSU, it looked like they only grudgingly used it. The refs effectively made them take the timeout.
• On that two point conversion, Hampton made a huge mistake the sprung the receiver free. I think it was worried about the QB running so he cut back for just a moment allowing the receiver to sprint away. That was a bad decision for two reasons: 1. There was a line backer in front of him who would be responsible for that and 2. there was no one else to cover the receiver: 21-28
• Best’s fumble on the kickoff run back… they don’t a good angle on what happened. What happened there?
• That personal foul was just ridiculous. Horribly ridiculous. If Bernard was out of bounds, it was only by a millimeter and there was no way the Cal defense could know not to hit him. That was completely unfair and it put the Beavers in field goal range.
• But notice that the defense held. Add 3 more points to the total that doesn’t belong on the defenses shoulders bring us to a grand total of 16 of their 31 points. Heck, even the previous TD was on a medium field because of a long kickoff runback to about mid-field. In any case, OSU up by 2 scores: 21-31
• If there was an offensive possesion that was disappointing it was the 3 and out with 6 minutes left. That series wasn’t even close to converting a 1st down. I must admit that when Cal punted that ball away, I was sure the game was lost and seeing the light stream of people who started leaving, I wasn’t alone… good thing I NEVER leave early.
• But this defense, the one that was supposedly so bad, held OSU to 3 and out. Giving Cal a desperate opportunity for two scores with just under 4 minutes left.
• That crossing route that went for a TD was open WAY too much on Saturday for it not to be used that often. It was a huge mistake for OSU to leave it so open at that point in the game and Hawkins speed made a huge difference in getting to the endzone: 28-31
• I completely agree with the call to go for the on side kick. There’s little value in field position at this point when 1 first down seals the game. So give your team two chances to get the ball back in both the onside kick and the 3 and out using all the timeouts. Oh and by the way, assuming everything else plays out the same (which is unfair) Cal would have had a timeout to forgive Riley his mistake at the 12 yard line.
• And it was a great on side kick. That ball was a complete jump ball which is all Cal could ask for. The bounces in the hand just happened to go OSU’s way.
• And that horrible defense held OSU to another 3 and out. How dare they!?!
• Riley started off the drive again showing off his elusiveness and ability to throw a pretty good ball despite being harassed… it was just barely out of bounds to an open DeSean. (and more importantly avoided the safety)
• Hawkins took the team on his back here late in the 4th. Not only did he get open, he eluded three tacklers to get the extra 4 yards he needed to get to the first down.
• And then Riley throws that SWEET ball to Jordan. This was just an amazing set of downs and anyone who is ready to complain on a bad break… just didn’t appreciate how much good had just happened.
• THROW THE BALL! THROW THE BALL! THROW THE BALL!… ugh that is soooooooooooo painful to watch. Why would I subject myself to watching that again?
• But watch the Cal reaction… there’s your hope. There a very upset Tedford who regains his composure after hucking his headset and refuses to condemn his young QB. There are a bunch of teammates who go up to Riley to let him know that they stand behind him. THAT’s a team I enjoy rooting for. A team with integrity. A team that played a pretty darned hard game but had a lot of bad breaks and some unfortunate errors. Trust me… this is a team that will rebound.

Wrapping up the day, yeah, mistakes were made, but there’s no one unit you can pin this on. It was a tough loss against a team that is a lot better than most people want to give them credit for.

Check over on the podcast page for my latest podcast.

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OK, let me make one thing clear. I’m not going to get into a ranking debate with anyone:

• I’m not going to discuss whether our loss is higher quality than other top 10 teams.
• I’m not going to discuss whether our wins are higher quality than other top 10 teams.
• I’m not goint to discuss why Cal is #14 in the computers.
• I’m not going to mention how Cal should be in front of Oregon since we BEAT them and are both 5-1. (OK, maybe that one I’ll make my point just once, but that’s it)

Nope, consider this a ranking debate free zone. All I want to discuss is whether the Bears have what it takes to beat ASU and USC as well as take care of business versus UCLA, Washington, WSU and Stanford… because that’s all that matters for going to the Rose Bowl.

I’ll have more detailed thoughts later as well as a full review of the game but I just wanted to get some quick thoughts out on the following topics:

• This loss has very little impact on the Bears in the Pac-10 title hunt
• The Beavers are better than we give them credit for
• The Beavers did everything I said they needed to do for the upset
• While it was a tough loss, I’m full of optimism
• Finally, the difference in the blog versus message board content is why I’m a fan of blogs

First of all, ignoring for a moment any concerns that Cal won’t be good enough to win their big games coming up, Cal still controls their own destiny in the Pac-10 and they’ve got their main opponent coming to Berkeley. Yeah, the National Title hopes seem pretty dashed at this point, but did anyone really think that was a shoe-in? I always saw it as a pipe-dream and I’m not too concerned that it seems to over (although with all the losing this year it might not be as over as everyone things… but I digress). The short term goals for Cal have always been a Rose Bowl and upgraded facilities. Both of those hopes are still very much alive, at least by the numbers.

But I think what really bothers soms is not that mathematically things are fine, their fear is that the Bears aren’t a good enough team to win the games they need to win to get to the Rose Bowl. I think that’s just foolish.

As I said in my previews both here and in Rivals, the Beavers are a pretty good team, just a mistake prone one. If you look at how they competed with everyone so far, and they’ve played some very good teams, it was their turnovers and mistakes that killed them, not their lack of talent. They’re not a Stanford or a Washington State or even an Arizona or Washington talent wise. Sure, they don’t have the talent of Cal, but they are well coached and have enough talent that a couple lucky bounces of the ball puts them in the hunt with just about anyone.

And all of those bounces went the Beavers way yesterday. In my previews I said the Beavers needed to do two things to win: 1. slow the Cal rushing game. 2. not make mistakes. Guess what? That’s exactly what they did. They had only 1 turnover, and it came at one of the best spots of the field for a turnover, if there is such a place. It wasn’t deep in their own territory, giving Cal some free points and it wasn’t deep enough in Cal territory to be missing out on some guaranteed points. As for the rushing game, having a new QB for Cal played right into their defensive hands, particulary their load the box philosophy, and Cal wasn’t able to stretch the field like Longshore would have done and as a result they weren’t able to control the flow of the game.

So when one puts together that the Beavers are a pretty good team and that everything went their way, I think we shouldn’t fear that the Bears aren’t any good. In fact, call me full of optimism for the future. Riley showed me a lot of positive stuff yesterday and the young guys who continue to get playing time due to injury continue to impress. Even if this season doesn’t turn out as we hope, the future is bright if you ask me. 2008 and 2009 look even better (lone unproven area: receivers).

But back to 2007, Cal took a dangerous Pac-10 team who got all the bounces and breaks right to the limit… and they did it with a backup QB. Longshore will be back for UCLA, an infinitely beatable team. Cal has proven they can go on the road and win against good teams in the most hostile environment and I give them an 90% chance of returning to Berkeley unscathed after taking down an exposed UCLA and an untested ASU. After a quick romp over WSU at home, the game that will determine the Bears fate will be before us. I’m looking forward to it and thing the Bears have an excellent chance of winning that game. If they do, with the rest of the Pac-10 likely beating up on each other, Cal need only likely win one of the Washington or Big Game to be Rose Bowl bound.

So cheer up campers!

All of that said, I’m frankly proud of all of us bloggers and blog commentors this morning. While there was the ocassional doom and gloom sentiment, for the most part people had perspective enough to not do what the message board freaks are doing. There’s been no stream of deleted comments about literally feeding Riley to the lions, firing Tedford (or one’s favorite scapegoat assistant coach) or denying all belief in the God who has spurned up. Call me proud to be Cal blogger this morning:

Full of optimism despite a very tough and heart breaking loss and proud to call all of you fine gentlemen (and ladies) my compatriots.

Oh, Kevin Riley. We laughed when you commandeered the Enterprise’s engine room and sang “I’ll Take You Home Again Kathleen” as the ship spiraled down into planet Psi 2000. We felt the pathos when you were poisoned for being one of the last living people to see Kodos the Executioner. And we wept when you failed to throw the ball away at the end of the Cal-Oregon State game.

Wait, I’m mixing up my Kevin Riley trivia here.

This Kevin Riley is not the occasional Star Trek navigator of my youth, but rather the redshirt freshman who was forced to take over the Cal offense today. And while I think it’s fairly safe to say that if Nate Longshore played this game (and was healthy in doing so), that Cal would have won it easily, I don’t think it’s fair to say that Kevin Riley lost it.

Yes, Riley’s brain-cramp at the end lost the game. But he had managed to maneuver Cal to the doorway of victory, something that had seemed impossible not five minutes before. For Cal to come all the way back after Jahvid Best’s fumbled kickoff return put OSU up by two scores required about 10 improbable things to happen. Riley was one of the reasons that nine of those things happened. Sadly, the tenth didn’t happen and the Bears lost.

For example, Jahvid Best. When he lined up to receive the kickoff I actually thought to myself, “God, I hope he doesn’t try to win the game singlehandedly here.” I’m not saying that it was what he was trying to do, because perhaps he wasn’t, but the end result is that he fumbled in absolutely the worst possible situation and it’s a miracle that the game wasn’t over then and there.

There was some bad officiating in the game, but in the end I’m not sure it affected the outcome. A bogus late-hit call cost Cal 15, but OSU might have scored anyway. One long Oregon State run should have been called back due to some egregious holding, but the refs swallowed their whistles. I can’t say I think the officials did a good job, but I don’t think Cal’s loss can be laid at their feet whatsoever.

I’d complain about the lameness of Cal’s failure to score on four straight runs on first and goal from the 2 yard line, but in the end Cal forced an OSU punt, got the ball back in Beaver territory, and punched it in, so that was a wash.

Who can I praise? Justin Forsett ran really well, especially considering that the Beavers had to know he was going to bear the brunt of the offensive load. The Cal defense performed decently, I thought, and gave up two first-half scores directly as a result of offensive misdeeds. The defense’s one major failing seemed to be a complete lack of a pass rush. The wide receivers deserve some praise for making plays for their shaky quarterback.

I’ll heap some scorn on the fans, who giddily cheered the LSU defeat. Hey, I was happy LSU lost too, but my frame of mind was much more that we would be next, not that we would be #1. Guess some other Cal fans are also fans of pre-hatched chicken counting.

But in the end, I’m not quite sure what more can be said. Cal’s starting quarterback couldn’t answer the bell. The redshirt freshman QB who replaced him probably ended up playing better than he had any right to, especially in the last five minutes of the game. Yes, if he threw the ball away Cal could kick a field goal and take it to overtime, and he blew that. But this defeat was not an orphan: it had a thousand fathers.

I will say that in all my years of watching Cal football, I’ve never seen a game end like this. We literally stared, stunned, not believing that it was over. What a terrible way to end — and just moments after everything seemed so promising.

On the bright side, no more silly talk about national championships. Can we all agree that Pasadena is a prize well worth shooting for?

Sorry this has taken so long to post. As I said in an earlier post, I’ve been pretty beat the last couple weeks since the trip and while I occasionally can sneak in a blog post or two from work, I couldn’t sneak in this one because of all the pictures… makes it pretty obvious to the boss I’m not working. 🙂

I left Roseville (suburb of Sacramento where I both live and work) on Friday at 1 PM after having come home from work (as a quick aside, I thank God daily I have a 5 minute drive to work… I literally just have to drive around the block to go to work.) to get packed up and ready to go. The plan was to meet my brother in Vacaville who was coming with his room-mate from the Bay Area.

They were running a bit late so I got a chance to checkout the new children’s play area that substitutes for the old Nut Tree. Boy was I impressed. Not only did they have the old train back in business, but they also had a mini-roller coaster and a bunch of other kid/toddler friendly rides. For those with little kids who are looking for a good mid-trip stop, this place is as great as the Nut Tree ever was.

In any case, the bro arrived around 2:30 and after having a late lunch at Fentons (yes, it’s the same as the one in Oakland) got on the road around 3:30 PM. The trip up to Oregon was pretty uneventful, sans getting a call from a good friend who had just found out he was having a boy. Other than that, we knew we had to give Oregon credit for rolling out the red carpet for the Cal fans visiting including setting up replica cities of where us Cal fans grew up:

We arrived in the booming metropolis of Cottage Grove, a town where we could get a good deal on a Holiday Express room, at 10:30 PM. Despite being twenty miles from Eugene it was sold out because the Ducks were playing. Luckily my brother’s roommate was a Oregon alumni and knew to book the room early.

Despite my pleading, I couldn’t talk my companions into waking up at 5:00 AM and heading over to Eugene for the GameDay festivities, so we hit the sack without having to set an alarm. We work up just in time to catch the show on the in-room TV and checkout the creative signs. I was glad to see that “Les Miles – More Tedford” got to a prominent spot on the field and was very visible.

But we did make it over to Eugene well before game time. After my brother did a left hand turn from the right lane to get into the parking lot, thereby cutting in line of about 200 Ducks fans, we found our way to the press parking lot:

From there we headed over to the GameDay site which was just across a small creek from both the stadium and the press parking lot:

The setup for the GameDay show is pretty simple. They’ve got a big field behind a raised stage where they shoot the show from:

Of course at 10:00 AM the show was long since over so all we got to see was the left over trash:

And the left over signs:

My brother and I aren’t sure if the sign shown has the same impact when it’s being held by a woman, but oh well, it was the only big sign left behind.

After we left there, we headed over to the training facility for the Oregon football team. On our way there, guess who we ran into:

Continuing on to the practice facility, on game days they convert the facility to be a large pre-game lounge:

They cover up the field with a roll out surface so that they can setup tables and booths without harming the high grade artificial surface:

In addition to concessions and a band, they also had TV’s setup all over the place to watch all the other football action around the country:

Of course, taking a step back and looking at the facility as it is used during the week, it’s clearly an awesome setup that attracts a lot of recruits. The one aspect I found odd was all the billboards around the field. Maybe they take them down mid-week, but if they don’t, I can’t see how it won’t over inflate the ego’s of the players on the billboards. I made sure to take a picture of all 6 of them:

And if billboards aren’t your style, you could always go for the inflatable duck:

After I was done touring the practice facility I headed up to the pressbox to get settled in and say hi to a lot of the guys I hadn’t seen since last season:

Down on the field, it was not long before the Cal band showed up:

After the teams came out of the field, I saw a sight that was definitely worth taking a picture of… my only fear was that my camera would break in half trying to take a picture of this much power in one frame:

After the pre-game warmups the Oregon band came out onto the field. At first it seemed like they were going to pull a Stanford as they came out in a very disorganized sense. Luckily any fear of that was quickly erased when they dropped into regular formations (I call this one the ‘subscript “O”‘… I guess I can’t change lenses as quick as I hoped):

Then they did the team entrance:

Finally they did the national anthem and they had this pretty neat setup with banners:

At this point I had to put down the camera and cover the game, and we know how well that turned out. The lone aspect of the game worth writing about here was the end. Usually the normal sequence of events for a reporter is to make their way down to the field about 5 minutes before the game is over so that they can be on the field for post game interviews right after the game. I got so caught up in the game that I completely lost track of time and that my cohorts had left.

At that point, I figured it was better to hold out to the end of the game so that I didn’t miss what happened in transit. I did that and then did my best bulldozer impression fighting my way against the exiting crowd. Luckily Crawford’s are well suited for this kind of activity. It also helped that it was a dejected crowd that was willing to make a hole.

While I wasn’t able to get to the field before all of the players had headed into the locker room I was able to get to the press staging area for post locker room interviews (that’s where the meaty interviews are). This was the lone area where I was unimpressed with Oregon’s facilities. They had just the one press interview room that was used by the Oregon reporters. Us Cal reporters did our reporting out on the field which was very difficult with the Cal fans left around us celebrating. It was pretty hard to understand what Tedford was saying amongst all of the “Tedford! Tedford! Tedford!” chants.

After going back up to the pressbox after the interviews, which were moved into the tunnel to give us at least SOME sound isolation, I made my way to campus where my brother and roommate were waiting for me. The path from the stadium to the campus takes you through this wonderful grove of oak trees:

And then across a foot bridge across the Willamette river:

And the river itself (this picture would have been 10 times as awesome if I had my tripod with me):

From there the 3 of us went to dinner and then back to our hotel room. In the morning we got up at a leasurely pace and got on the road around 10:00 AM. We stopped in Medford to go to the original Harry and David store (my brother is a big fan of their pears) and then to get lunch. We went to the Black Bear Diner in Medford just across the freeway from Harry and Davids which was a big mistake. We literally waited 45 minutes for our food.

We got back on the road around 2 PM and made it back to Roseville around 7 PM for congratulatory high fives with my boys who were too small to make this trip, but I’m sure will be accompanying me on future trips when they get older.

I was channel surfing this evening when I came across the Hawaii at San Jose St. game on ESPN. It was early in the 4th quarter and SJ St. was up 35-21. Could this be the final nail in the coffin for the final non-BCS team that still has a shot at a BCS game? I mean, I’m fairly confident that Hawaii will trip up at some point this season and won’t be able to pull a Utah or Boise St. but it’s always nice to see that happen sooner rather than later.

So I got pretty excited.

Well I don’t know what SJ St. had done earlier in the game to be up in the 4th quarter (actually, I do: 4 Hawaii interceptions), but what I witnessed was one of the most pathetic yet predictable collapses in recent memory. How does 3 and out, give up a surprisingly easy TD, 2 and fumble, give up a surprisingly easy TD and then completely lack the ability to get in field goal range before going to OT where you give up another surprisingly easy TD and then throw a INT two plays later, sound to you?

I wish I hadn’t seen it at all because I hate getting my hopes up only to see them dashed in a, and sorry for lacking better vocabulary but these are the most appropriate words, pathetic yet surprisingly easy and predictable collapse.

Yesterday was the final day of the court hearing before Judge Miller to decide the fate of the Cal training center. Here are links to the articles I’m aware of:

• SF Chronicle article by Carolyn Jones
• AP article at SFGate.com
• ABC/KGO article
• CBS article
• Daily Cal article

Sadly, Chris Avery has not put up one of his excellent articles on the final day of the hearing and it looks like perhaps he wasn’t there. UPDATE at 9:10 PM 10/12: Turns out Mr. Avery was just taking his sweet time to write his wrap up article… I’ve never done that 🙂 .

There’s nothing in those articles that we didn’t already know because the seventh and final day of the hearing was closing arguments. In other words they were just saying what they had said before in summary form. The only thing I noticed in the closing arguments was a slight change in emphasis for the plaintiffs spending more time on environmental issues like the trees and the indian burials (how long do we have to listen to this crud) and less time on the two versus one building stuff. That says to me that the plaintiffs are less confident in their previous strategy and are looking for new avenues to emphasize and hopefully (for them) win with. More UPDATE at 9:10 PM 10/12: I find it very interesting that Mr. Avery’s article give a completely different feel about the issues, much more reflecting the previous points that I had heard from earlier in the hearings. One of two things is true: One, Mr. Avery has a very different take on things than his peers in the media or two, the media is obsessed with the stupid Oak trees and things like Indian burials. Call me crazy but I tend to lean towards number two.

The only other interesting things is some of the quotes that came out of it that you can find in the articles. The one that I thought was the most interesting was the sophmoric statement by tree-sitter lawyer Stephen Volker:

Volker said he would accept the offer to replace mature trees with saplings only if the campus would agree to put 3-year-old trees on the field for their next football game.

What interests me about that quote is it is the first time in all of the proceedings we’ve heard the lawyers for the plaintiffs lose their cool. So far to date they’ve been very tempered making their arguments like good lawyers should. However, once the University brought in its lead lawyer from the firm it hired who was much more biting in his comments, there’s finally a crack in the lawyer’s good behavior. Perhaps the University should have done this earlier as to get the plaintiffs riled up earlier and let Judge Miller see their true colors.

In any case, there won’t be a ruling for a minimum of two weeks because Judge Miller has given both sides that time to submit their final briefs and arguments. It seems clear that it’ll take her a minimum of a couple more days after that to parse the final documents and write her decision. That puts a decision at the earliest the week of the WSU game around the 1st of November and more likely the week of the USC game. At the rate this is going, I’d prefer the ruling to be held until the Monday after the USC game to prevent any further issues at the stadium, particularly during the USC game which will likely still be a HUGE game despite USC’s stumbling against Stanford last Saturday.

More UPDATE at 9:10 PM 10/12: Some final thoughts on Mr. Avery’s article… I’m glad to hear the University lawyers make clear to the judge that the City has no right to tell the University what to do or where to build its facilities. All they can do is ensure that the EIR was complete so that the UC Regents, yes the Regents not the City, could make an educated decision on the project and follow all of the laws associated to the APZ. The city has no right to tell the University that Golden Gate fields is a better place for the facility. Finally, it’s stupid to nitpic the EIR to death when the Regents are going to make the same decision after those nitpics are resolved. Hopefully the judge was listening to all of this because the University’s lawyer summarized for Mr. Avery what we’ve all known to be the case:

Some CEQA lawsuits have resulted in rulings by judges that particular items in an EIR had to be improved.

He said that if that happened, UC could follow the judge’s instructions to amend those items – and to hold public hearings about the changes if necessary, and to then recertify the EIR.

We asked whether – in that instance – it would be harder for the plaintiffs to file or support a subsequent lawsuit. Olson strongly agreed, but said he fully expected plaintiffs to sue again on whatever grounds could be developed.

Hopefully Judge Miller will see the plaintiffs for the obstructions they are and won’t let that happen.

It’s that time of the week where I can let loose and give my prediction for the Bears upcoming game.

But first, and I’m sure you all needed reminding of this, let’s look at Cal’s last game and whether my prediction was accurate. While I’m sure you’re all willing to grant me a moment of crowing about that, I feel obligated to remind everyone that I not only picked that score in my pre-game prediction, but also in my August season predictions AND also all the way back in my post Spring practice predictions on May 10th. Put that in your pipe and smoke it! 🙂

OK, down to business…

OSU is a hard team to predict because you never know which OSU is going to show up. Is it going to be the OSU that upsets a pretty good USC last October, or the one that got crushed by both Boise St. and Cal earlier in the same year? The same trend continues this year with them laying down a woodshed beating of Utah, the same team that took UCLA to their own woodshed out back, as well as Arizona and a 61-10 beat down of Idaho State but also getting creamed by UCLA 14-40 (if one ever needed a proof of the ridiculousness of A>B>C arguments, there’s an ideal candidate OSU>Utah>UCLA>OSU, and each of the games were blowouts) and a 3-34 loss to Cincinnati that would be very troubling if Cincinnati wasn’t 6-0 with a victory over Big East darling Rutgers and ranked 15th.

I mostly stand behind what I said in my Rivals article, that all of OSU’s hopes rest on a dominating run defense and playing a mistake and turnover free game, with two additions/clarifiers (as a quick aside, writing an article is a much more difficult proposition than a blog post because it needs to be concise with only two or three themes at the most and must tell a “story”… none of these asides or anything… so I often have to leave out aspects that I would include in a blog post):

1. OSU will have to successfully defend the passing game of Cal. Last year Cal demolished OSU by going over the top and beating them through the air. They didn’t have to beat their run defense. OSU needs to not only have a dominating run defense but they can’t have a repeat of last year’s pass defense. If for some reason Longshore doesn’t start that may be just what OSU needs, or it may turn out that they get burned just as bad by Riley. In either case, Cal is too balanced to be beat by OSU’s usual strategy of loading the box like it’s a telephone booth outside a frat house and challenging the offense to beat them with all of the heat coming. OSU will have to do better than that, particularly with Longshore behind center.
2. OSU’s run defense isn’t as good as the numbers indicate. While I think they are a good run defense, perhaps the best Cal has seen so far, there’s two big pieces of misleading info in OSU’s impressive 43.3 yards per game allowed. First, the offenses they’ve faced are only rushing for 125 yards per game themselves. While that’s not horrible, it’s kind of mediocre and a good run defense should be able to shut them down. Second, OSU has gotten a ton of sack yardage which subtracts from the run total. The worst example is that Arizona had 84 yards of rushing that shows up statistically as 9 yards because of the 75 yards off of sacks. Without the sacks, OSU would be giving up 80 yards per game, which although still good, isn’t nearly as impressive considering they did it against teams rushing for 125 yards per game. Said another way, if OSU holds Cal to the same 2/3rds of their average rushing total that they held their other opponents, Cal will still get 140 yards on the ground. So, while I still think this is a key to OSU having a shot at the upset, what I’m saying is that I don’t think it is as likely as both my article and the numbers suggest.

So, yes, I’m predicting a Cal victory but I’m going to revise my pre-season prediction (21-16) and predict a 31-16 victory.

Just a quick self congratulations to Jason and I: We’ve reached 100 posts! …and it only took 66 days to do so.

Here’s to hoping that we’ll be toasting our 1000th post in a couple years and still going strong.

I don’t know anything beyond what other reporters are reporting (I haven’t been going to the press-conferences this year), but it seems from what I’ve read that Longshore is going to start. In fact, I think the only reason there is any doubt is because Tedford loves playing mind games with his opponents. But just to be comprehensive here are the various words on the street:

Jonathan Okanes – CC Times:

Tedford said he may have quarterback Nate Longshore do a little more in practice today. Longshore has just been participating in the mental side of practice since suffering a sprained ankle against Oregon. I asked Tedford how much Longshore would have to test out the ankle before Saturday’s game against Oregon State.

“It’s getting better every day,” Tedford said. “We just don’t want to have a setback. He’s taken every mental rep. He’s calling every play. He’s staying ready.”

Chris Nguon – Rivals:

Longshore took a handful of reps early in practice and seemed to step into throws just fine.

Despite his ankle still being a little sore though, Tedford mentioned that he expects Longshore to be ready come Saturday.

“His ankle is getting better everyday,” Tedford said. “We just don’t want to do something stupid to set him back again.”

Rusty Simmons – SF Chronicle:

coach Jeff Tedford still isn’t sure whether he’ll be able to play against Oregon State on Saturday.

“He’s making progress,” Tedford said. “It’ll go right up to game time. We’ll see; I really have no idea.”

Tedford said pain and mobility will both be taken into account. The biggest problem the iffy right ankle can cause a right-handed quarterback is planting and pushing off the foot on throws.

Longshore, who maintains he’ll be ready, appeared to handle all of those aspects OK. After gingerly walking down the stadium steps to get to practice, Longshore showed off his footwork to Tedford while the rest of the team stretched.

Longshore was a little hesitant on some of his drops, but he threw crisp passes. He had been throwing regularly, but he got his first five snaps with the first-team offense in nearly two weeks.

My guess is that not only will Longshore start, but that we’ll have no idea he was ever injured once he takes the first snap. Tedford has been really conservative with injured players the last couple years after too many players were hampered by injuries for the whole season when rushing back too quick in his first few seasons as head coach. As such, he spends a lot of time telling everyone how unlikely it is that players will be playing when they’re pretty likely to be starting. I will say this, if Cal opens up a sizeable lead and Longshore is experiencing any pain, we may get our first real glimpse of Riley. Let’s hope he looks better than he did in his VERY limited action to date (and I want to be clear that it is unfair to judge him on so few throws).

I had intended to write a Oregon trip recap blog post with pictures and stuff from the trip including a bunch from the GameDay site. I didn’t have the energy for that either. Are people still interested in that or is it too late? I’ll do it tonight if I get sufficient comments desiring it.

Some may have noticed that I didn’t have any articles published in the last couple weeks since the Oregon game. That’s because I ran out of gas. The Oregon game was so exciting that I left Autzen just exhausted. By the time I got home after having published my two articles I had nothing left in the tank. I was only able to get my podcast posted on fumes. Being a father of two young children with a third on the way, while working a full time engineering job for HP, once my tank is empty, it’s hard to get back on track. Add in that last weekend was “do everything I should have been doing on my weekends for the last month” and I was unable to write either a post-Oregon analysis article or a bye week ‘state of the team’ article, both of which were in the plans.

The good news is that I think I’m finally back on level ground and was able to write my Oregon State preview yesterday: Crunching the Numbers: Oregon State Preview. The other good news is that this is a non-subscription article as well so everyone can go read it.