(Written by kencraw)

(We continue our hugely unpopular look at The Half Season Of Which We Shall Not Speak (THSOFWWSNS) with the Washington game. Go here for past posts.)

The pre-game Storyline:
The Bears had to come out of their hibernation eventually, right? Every Bear fan had to find some reason for optimism for the Big Game because, well, they just had to. The thought that a team that started the season 5-0 could end up 6-6 and potentially without a bowl bid was beyond comprehension. Luckily, Cal had Stanford’s number for the last 5 years. Washington had taken Cal to overtime in 2006 in Berkeley, so in retrospect, they were better than everyone remembered. But Stanford, Cal had laid the wood to them year after year. The Bears had to win this one, right?

The pre-game Reality:
There were two reasons the Big Game was not the same as the previous 5 years. The first was that Stanford was under a new head coach, Jim Harbaugh, who had significantly ratcheted things up in Palo Alto. The second was their new Stadium. The Bears had gotten used to a home field advantage even when the game was in Palo Alto in recent years, with 60%-70% of the fans in Palo Alto in 2005 being Bear fans. With the new Tin Bowl in Palo Alto, Cal would be facing their first hostile Big Game crowd in a long time.

The key plays:

• DeSean Jackson is unavailable for the game, still recovering from the leg injury he sustained in the Washington game.
• Moye and VanHoosen were in for Williams and Felder for disciplinary reasons (both had not performed well of late).
• Stanford has to punt after one 1st down, using Ostrander as QB.
• Hampton returning punts despite flub in Washington game.
• Longshore is sacked and fumbles on Cal’s first possession giving Stanford the ball on the Cal 35.
• Stanford WR Bradford is wide open on a crossing route and is able to turn up-field for an early TD. Bears continue the trend of going in a deficit early: 0-7
• Cal only returns kickoff out to 8 yard line. Hawkins is trying to do too much.
• Forsett and Montgomery go on a string of running plays to mid-field, loosening up Stanford pass defense.
• Longshore finds Jordan in the slot for an easy 50 yard touchdown. Bears tie things back up: 7-7
• Cody Jones gets a roughing the passer penalty, the first of many personal fouls against the Bears.
• Stanford attempts a pass out of a double reverse but the WR to WR pass comes up way short and is intercepted by Hicks.
• Forsett is dropped for a 2 yard loss on 3rd and 1 forcing the Bears to punt.
• Prichard comes in for Ostrander and runs the ball on a naked bootleg.
• Prichard continues to mix runs with underneath passes to get into the redzone.
• The Cal defense stiffens but the damage is done and the Stanford kicker who had missed his last 8 makes the short field goal. Bears back in a small hole: 7-10
• A personal foul on the kickoff puts the Bears inside their own 10 again after the kickoff.
• Forsett has a monster run breaking multiple tackles along the way for a 20 yard gain.
• After a couple pass completions gets Cal into the redzone, Forsett loses 8 on 1st down when he tries to extend to the outside instead of taking a 1-2 yard gain inside.
• A personal foul sets up 3rd and 33 from the 40 yard line, but a well designed screen play to Montgomery gets ball down to the Stanford 10 yard line.
• Unfortunately, that’s 3 yards short of the 1st down and Cal kicks the Field Goal. Score tied again: 10-10
• Stanford switches back to Ostrander. The switching seems to confuse the Bears a bit.
• Stanford goes for it on 4th and 4 at Cal 30 and makes it on pass interference on Syd’Quan Thompson.
• The Cal defense stiffens again and Stanford kicks their second Field Goal. Bears back down by 3: 10-13
• After Hawkins takes two consecutive passes down to Stanford 30, his drops a diving catch (a difficult one) on the goal line that would have given Cal their first lead just before halftime.
• Kay misses the 48 yard Field Goal attempt as time expires in the 1st half.
• Stanford brings lots of heat on Cal’s first possession of the 2nd half, forcing a 3 and out.
• A number of drives later (including two 3 and outs for the Bears) Stanford RB McGraw busts a big run outside down to Cal 1 yard line.
• Cal is fooled by play-action on goal line and Prichard completes the easy TD pass. Bears down by two scores: 10-20
• Cal goes 3 and out again.
• Stanford marches down the field again but this time the Field Goal attempt is wide left, saving the Bears from a near disaster. However the damage of the time taken off the clock is trouble enough as the 3rd quarter is over and the Bears have not completed a 1st down in the 2nd half yet.
• Bears 3 and out again.
• After a couple of Stanford stops (with another Cal 3 and out in the middle) Longshore attempts to complete a long pass to Jordan down the sideline but is grabbed as he threw and the now-short pass is intercepted.
• Cal gets the ball back after another Stanford punt and Cal finally capitalizes on a possession when a double reverse to Hawkins gets the ball down to the Stanford 35.
• A few plays later the drive stalls but Kay makes the 42 yard Field Goal. Cal back within a TD: 13-20
• Follett forces a fumble with a huge hit and Bears recover. It’s a good thing too because the Stanford running game was taking over to run out the clock. Nevertheless, the Bears have life yet.
• Cal is given a gift on 4th down when Stanford is offside, giving the Bears a second shot at the 4th down attempt, which Longshore completes to Jordan who manages to get a toe down.
• Hawkins drops a perfectly thrown ball from Longshore in the endzone.
• Hawkins can’t pull in a 2nd TD pass, this one a tougher one that went through his extended hands.
• Longshore makes a horrible read on 3rd down and the ball is intercepted just off the turf.
• Stanford goes play-action on 3rd down to get the one 1st down they need to effectively run out the clock.
• Cal forces a punt with 12 seconds left but it’s not enough to give a shot at a tying TD.

The forgotten

• Stanford switched between Prichard and Ostrander on every possession and it seemed to be confusing the Bears. Prichard was much more likely to run but Ostrander was a better pocket passer and Cal had a tough time adjusting.
• Stanford significantly switched their defensive philosophy at halftime and it completely stilted the Cal offense for most of the 2nd half. Cal didn’t get a 1st down until midway through the 4th quarter.
• Forsett again had a monster game AGAIN and it was yet AGAIN wasted. He was doing this despite the fact that the opponents were loading up on the run more and more.
• Penalties killed the Bears, particularly in the 1st half. Between stalling drives unnecessarily and giving Stanford lots of yards they didn’t deserve.
• The field was very slippery and also seemed to be cut long, taking away much of Cal’s speed advantage.

The post-game storyline:
The unthinkable had happened twice in one season. Sure, the Bears were going to play in the Armed Forces bowl thanks to Arizona being unable to beat ASU in their final game and so no longer bowl eligible, but many fans felt it wasn’t even worth going to that game, particularly because it was so far away.

The post-game reality:
In the end, it was the offenses inability to deal with the high pressure Stanford defense that killed the Bears. The defense, particularly as the game progressed, held up their end of the bargain. Anytime they hold a team at 20, the offense should be able to get the job done. But between the penalties in the 1st half and the inability to adjust to the blitz heavy defense in the 2nd half did in the offense.

The 2007 learnings:

• Mistakes were the Bears death. Penalties and turnovers in particular.

The conclusion
When I left Stanford stadium at the end of this game I was just if not more disgusted than after the Washington game. Watching it again, I was far more impressed with Stanford’s play than with UW’s. Yes, the Bears should have won this game, but I didn’t feel like the team had phoned it in, in advance. If anything, I felt like the coaching staff was not doing a good job of making mid-game adjustments while Stanford did an excellent job with that. I think this is an very visible example of why having Tedford call plays makes it more difficult for him to be a head coach and make adjustments. But the penalties were still infuriating as was Hawkins game tying drop and Longshore’s baffling effectively game-ending interception.

The regular season was over and nobody, myself included, really cared to see it extended by going to a bowl game.