(Written by kencraw)

I managed to get in a re-watch of the game on TV yesterday evening. Here are my thoughts:

• The Bears didn’t look as flat as they did on TV as they did in person.  Perhaps it is because you can see a bunch of pre and post play stuff on the field that you can’t see on TV.  It was funny to hear them refer to Goff as “composed” when the Bears were down.  I saw it as troublingly unconcerned with his poor play.
• To some degree it speaks to how high of expectations we have of Goff that he thrown 73% completions on the day and we can consider it an “off” day.
• A really, really weird thrust of the announcers was their talking about it being a referee emphasis this year to penalize “Bush push” plays.  What is he NUTS?  In my entirely life I can’t think of a time I’ve seen that called and there have been plenty of times where I’ve seen it, including the WSU 4th and 1 TD.  For what it is worth, they didn’t call it in the UCLA game I saw on TV that evening either.  One wonders if the announcer is having conversations with ghosts, because I’ve never heard anything about it nor any indication of it on the field.
• On the other hand, the announcers did a good job explaining what was going on with the corners and the cover-2 schemes WSU was running.  It was definitely confusing Goff early in the game.  I think it would be wise for the Cal corners to watch film of WSU doing it.  The key to cover-2 is that the corner has to get deep enough and the safety has to play it shallow enough that the window the QB has to fit the ball into is small enough that it’s too dangerous to throw it there as the WR is passing through.  The other half, the part that makes it difficult for the corner, is they have to be able to break towards the line as soon as it is clear the play is going to come in front of them.
• I said this in the podcast, but it is worth repeating.  The pass protection of the OL was pretty dang good.  What turned this game was Goff realizing he had the time to survey the field and find the open receiver.  I think he’s so used to having to make a quick read he was too quick to pull the trigger in this one.  But as it became clear he would have time back there, he started to wait for the right guy to get open and the passing game came alive.
• Missed from the podcast was a shout-out to Cole Leininger.  He had 3 great punts, none better than the one with 20 seconds left.  Nothing better than a long punt that goes past the returner into the endzone, draining clock as it rolls.
• Who doesn’t deserve a shout-out is kicker Matt Anderson.  I had really hoped that the UW game was a turning point for him.  Instead we saw an even more shakey performance from him on Saturday than we’ve grown accustomed to.
• In fairness, the onside kick was executed to perfection.  Anderson did a good job of hiding it until very late in his run-up and then kicked it with just the right amount of velocity to get it past the WSU edge.  At first I thought he had kicked it a bit hard, as the Cal outside guy BARELY managed to catch up to it before it went out of bounds, but having watched it a few times, it was clear if he had slowed it down any, it was likely WSU would have been able to pounce on it before it got past them.
• Speaking of positives it was nice to see the WR’s back on their mojo.  Minus the Lawler fumble, they executed VERY well.  Lawler continues to make really impressive catches.  I actually feel sorry for the other guys because they’ve made some pretty impressive grabs, including Treggs 2-point conversion that he was almost denied, but Lawler’s highlight film is so over the top it’s hard for them to get noticed.  Mark my words, some NFL team is going to get a steal of a WR late in the draft (or even as a undrafted free-agent) because Lawler will get all the attention.
• One thing that didn’t impress me much was the kick returning.  I hadn’t thought much of it before this weekend because there just haven’t been that many opportunities to return kicks.  But it was a point of emphasis in the reporter blogs this week, so I guess I was paying more attention.  And what I saw was guys running to the wrong spots for where the blocking was setting up.  There’s no doubt these guys have speed and talent.  They’re fully capable of breaking a couple this year.  But they’ve got to use their blocking and get to the right spots to make that happen.
• And I’ll finish with the same subject I ranted on in the podcast: Muhammad.  I still don’t get why this guy hasn’t been getting more touches.  The supposed complaint of him by the coaches was he wasn’t hitting the right holes during the off-season (and perhaps back to last year).  I guess I can’t comment on that, but from what I’m seeing, he’s the only one hitting the right holes.  Lasco (and this is not a complaint, the guy is recovering from injury) just didn’t have it and looked a bit rusty out there.  Enwere is Mr. wrong hole.  The only one who explodes through the line is Muhammad.  He’s also the only one (while Lasco is down) who can be counted on to catch the ball out of the backfield.  He should be starting right now.  It’s rare that I don’t understand what the coaches are doing (sometimes I’ll disagree, but I get it), but in this case, call me flabbergasted.  And yes, I still feel that way after Enwere’s 42 yard run in the 4th quarter.  It was nice and I get the value of Enwere, but I bet Muhammad does just as well on that play, probably doesn’t get tripped because he’s 4 more yards down field of where Enwere was at that point, and finishes with a 1st down as well.  That play was mostly about the blocking and WSU being out of position.

OK, that’s most of my thoughts.  Expect more posts this week than usual, leading up to the big GameDay game at Utah.