Tag: CAL

College football realignment: Dissecting that Notre Dame-Stanford conference proposal

Nothing brings out the takes quite like Notre Dame conference talk.

If you want to hear unfortunate opinions and brutal ideas then simply search “Notre Dame” on the app formerly known as Twitter whenever college football realignment conversations come up. Because Notre Dame is in a unique position with its football independence, fans and media members alike can’t keep Notre Dame out of their mouths.

Yesterday we looked at former Florida head coach Dan Mullen’s brutal thought that Notre Dame should have saved the Pac-12. Today we go to the land of Andy Staples for another Notre Dame thought.

Staples claimed on Thursday that Notre Dame wouldn’t ever do it, but it should create a football only conference with Air Force, Army, Cal, Navy and Stanford.

That’s not a joke, he actually did.  Below I break down a bit of what Staples had to say before reading some of the social media reaction to his post.

College football realignment: Why Notre Dame is pushing for Cal and Stanford to join ACC

College football is just weeks from kicking off the 2023 season but all the buzz is on conference realignment.

Reports that Notre Dame was pushing hard for Cal and Stanford to join the ACC came out Wednesday and left many wondering why. I was among those, but at the end of the day the answer was pretty simple – and one that will certainly ruffle the feathers of some.

It’s called “doing the right thing.”

Notre Dame athletic director [autotag]Jack Swarbrick[/autotag] told ESPN’s Heather Dinich on Thursday exactly why he was interested in those two joining the ACC.  In a college sports world that is run even more by money than ever before, Swarbrick sees a real problem.

“The notion that two of the very best academic institutions in the world who also play DI sports could be abandoned in this latest chapter of realignment is an indictment of college athletics,” Swarbrick told Dinich

I get that Stanford and Cal aren’t Oregon or USC in terms of football, but they aren’t Arizona or Colorado historically, either. We’re only a decade removed from Stanford being a Rose Bowl regular and national championship contender, while Cal under Jeff Tedford went to seven straight bowl games from 2003-2009.

The surprising part of Stanford being left in the dust is it may not be a football or men’s basketball powerhouse right now but when you go across all sports you’ll be hard-pressed to find a more successful athletic program nationally. The university competes for national titles in just about everything besides those two sports. How is that not appealing?

As absurd as the idea of having two of the top institutions in the nation, both of which who call the West Coast home, playing in the Atlantic Coast Conference is, I for one hope it ends up happening.

College athletics and the ACC will be better if it does.

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Mark Madsen hire proves one Pac-12 school wants to improve

Stanford failed to capitalize on the chance to hire famous alumni Mark Madsen as their next head coach, watching as rival Cal brought him in instead.

When the 2022-23 college basketball regular season ended, it seemed all but certain that multiple Pac-12 programs would move on from their current head coaches, yet only one – the California Golden Bears – actually did.

Stanford stuck with Jerod Haase despite years of mediocrity in Paolo Alto, while Oregon State is riding out the ill-fated extension for Wayne Tinkle and Washington isn’t ready to give up on Mike Hopkins despite another bad year in Seattle, and multiple hasty exits for players into the transfer portal.

Stanford’s decision remains the most questionable, especially since they had a very obvious candidate available for replacement in Mark Madsen – a beloved former player who also happened to coach Utah Valley to a 34-15 record in the last three seasons of conference play in the WAC.

Madsen instead inked a deal to replace Mark Fox at Cal, forcing Stanford fans to watch as one of the league’s most coveted mid-major coaches – and a fan favorite – starts his new career building up the program’s biggest rival.

Haase receive full confidence from Stanford’s AD after a season where the Cardinal went 14-19, bringing his overall record at Stanford to 112-109.

The team has done well recruiting, including landing Andrej Stojakovic for the 2023 class, but it hasn’t helped them climb out of the cellar in the Pac-12.

Programs like Oregon are impacted by the rest of the league failing to improve their basketball success, as it lowers the quality of competition and hurts resumes.

With UCLA and USC out the door after next season, it will be even more imperative for the bottom of the Pac-12 to improve on the hardwood – and failing to make obvious moves to improve the coaching staff is not going to keep this conference afloat even if they do add a solid basketball program like San Diego State.

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Super Bowl points scored by each college all time

Congrats to Alabama and Missouri who after SB 57, have finally scored on Super Bowl Sunday!

Over the Super Bowl’s first 56 editions there have been a total of 2,593 points scored.

Some of those points were scored by superstars; some were scored by incredibly unlikely heroes.

For every Tom Brady or Emmitt Smith there seems to be a Max McGee or Dwight Smith who had a huge moment or score to redirect the final outcome of a Super Bowl.

Have you ever wondered where all the Super Bowl heroes played their college football?

Super Bowl LVII had two new college programs finally get on the scoreboard. Jalen Hurts scoring three touchdowns and a two-point conversion were the first 20 points ever scored in Super Bowl play by a former Alabama player. The same goes for Missouri, which finally got on the Super Bowl scoreboard after Nick Bolton’s touchdown.

Two players also officially scored in the big game but didn’t play college ball.

So where did they all go?

Remember, touchdown passes don’t count in the record books as a touchdown scored for a quarterback – please don’t kill the messenger!

UCLA vs Cal Prediction Game Preview

UCLA vs Cal game preview, prediction, and breakdown for the Week 13 game on Friday, November 25

UCLA vs Cal prediction, game preview, how to watch. Week 13, Friday, November 25

UCLA vs Cal Prediction Game Preview

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– Contact/Follow @ColFootballNews & @PeteFiutak

UCLA vs Cal How To Watch

Date: Friday, November 25
Game Time: 4:30 ET
Venue: California Memorial Stadium, Berkeley, CA
How To Watch: FOX
Record: UCLA (8-3), Cal (4-7)
– Sign up and live stream college football on ESPN+

Why UCLA Will Win

Can the Bruins pick it back up after the painful 48-45 loss to USC? If so, there won’t be a problem against a Cal defense that’s not stopping anyone’s passing game and doesn’t have any sort of a ground game to worry about.

The 113 yards in the win over Stanford marked the first time since late September that Cal got past 100 yards on the ground, and it’s going to take something special to get there this week.

Again, if UCLA is into this, the balanced offense that should be able to move however it wants, there’s no pass rush whatsoever coming from Cal, and …

– Bowl Projections | Bowl Bubble: Who’s Bowl Eligible?

Why Cal Will Win

Yeah, 48-45 USC.

It’s not dogging UCLA in any way to suggest that it might have a hard time being too jacked for this. It went from being this close to beating its rival to make this a game to get into the Pac-12 Championship to now pushing for a better bowl game.

This is Cal’s bowl game. It’s been a wildly frustrating year, but the win over Stanford is something – it’s always something to win that game – and closing out to be 5-7 would be a nice finishing kick.

To do that, the passing game has to go off. UCLA has allowed over 220 yards to everyone but Bowling Green and Stanford, Cal’s Jack Plummer has been strong at connecting on the midrange throws, and the O should have an energy burst early on.

– Week 13 College Football Schedule, Game Previews

What’s Going To Happen

It’ll take a little while for UCLA to get going, but it’ll happen.

Cal will take the first quarter lead, but the Bruin lines will kick in, the running game will work, and Dorian Thompson-Robinson will lead the way to three straight second half scoring drives to pull away.

– Expert Picks College Week 12 | NFL Week 11

UCLA vs Cal Prediction, Line

UCLA 37, Cal 24
Line: UCLA -10.5, o/u: 60.5
ATS Confidence out of 5: 2
UCLA vs Cal Must See Rating (out of 5): 2.5
– UCLA vs Cal Experts Picks

CFN 1-131 Rankings | Rankings by Conference
Path to the Playoff: 7 teams still in the race 

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– Bowl Projections | Rankings

ESPN’s College GameDay picks winners for USC vs UCLA, Utah vs Oregon and more

Who do you have winning the big games today?

The top college football pregame show went to cold Montana, as they were in live from Bozeman for the matchup between Montana and Montana State. There aren’t a lot of big games this Saturday but enough with plenty of intrigue that Desmond Howard, Pat McAfee, Lee Corso (welcome back), Kirk Herbstreit and guest picker, the three-time winner of both the Open Championship and Masters Championship Sir Nick Faldo. That group selected who they believe will be winners during week 12’s action.

Cal offensive coordinator, who torched Alex Grinch’s USC defense, gets fired

Cal scored 35 vs USC and was then crushed by Oregon State. Justin Wilcox fired his OC. That and more in this #USC / #Pac12 notebook:

There is a lot to keep track of in the world of Pac-12 football after a crazy Week 11 and heading into a Week 12 which features two mammoth games.

“Showdown Saturday” gives the Pac-12 the two biggest games of the coming weekend in college football. USC-UCLA is the first game at 8 Eastern and Utah-Oregon is second at 10:30. We will preview those games as the week unfolds, but for now, let’s look back at Week 11 and offer some updates on Pac-12 teams plus sharing some rankings from analysts and commentators.

We start with the fact that California and head coach Justin Wilcox fired offensive coordinator Bill Musgrave just over a week after Cal scored 35 against USC. Cal was flattened by Oregon State this past Saturday.

Imagine what a team with USC’s offense and Oregon State’s defense would look like.

Let’s go into our Pac-12 and USC notebook:

Cal vs Oregon State Prediction Game Preview

Cal vs Oregon State game preview, prediction, and breakdown for the Week 11 game on Saturday, November 12

Cal vs Oregon State prediction, game preview, how to watch. Week 11, Saturday, November 12

Cal vs Oregon State How To Watch

Date: Saturday, November 12
Game Time: 9:00 ET
Venue: Reser Stadium, Corvallis, OR
How To Watch: Pac-12 Network
Record: Cal (3-6), Oregon State (6-3)
– Sign up and live stream college football on ESPN+

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CFN 1-131 Rankings | Rankings by Conference
Bowl Projections | Expert Picks Week 11
Week 11 Schedule, Predictions | Bowl Bubble
Path to the Playoff: 12 teams still in the race
Bowl Bubble: Every Team’s Bowl Situation
– Contact/Follow @ColFootballNews & @PeteFiutak

Cal vs Oregon State Game Preview

Why Cal Will Win

The Bears are in desperate need of a win.

On a five-game losing streak, the defense has crashed, but it’s more about the team not being able to break through with a lick of luck in several close games.

The offense and passing game keep on working with three touchdown passes in each of the last three games – Jack Plummer went off for over 400 yards against USC – and it all has to crank up against a leaky Oregon State defense.

Cal can’t stop anyone from throwing, so as long as Plummer is on – he’ll get time against an Oregon State defense that doesn’t have a pass rush – this will be a fight.

– CFP Rankings: Think, Know, Believe

Why Oregon State Will Win

Yeah, the Cal defense. It’s not slowing anyone down.

To be fair, it had to go against USC, Oregon, and Washington over the last three weeks, but everyone is throwing at will against a secondary allowing 300 yards per game.

Oregon State’s offense is coming off a rough day with just 262 yards in the 24-21 loss to Washington last week. It might not bomb away on the Bears, but the ground game will hit 200 yards and there should be a good balance to keep everything going.

– Schedules, Predictions College | NFL

What’s Going To Happen

Oregon State gets to have fun now.

It’s bowl eligible, it has a trip to Arizona State next week before dealing with Oregon, and it can play a little looser. However, it had all that last week and it didn’t work in the bad weather against Washington. Now the team is back home.

This week it’ll deal with a desperate Cal team that will get the O going, but won’t be able to get enough out of the defensive line to be disruptive.

– Expert Picks College Week 11 | NFL Week 10

Cal vs Oregon State Prediction, Line

Oregon State 30, Cal 17
Line: Oregon State -13.5, o/u: 48.5
ATS Confidence out of 5: 3
Cal vs Oregon State Must See Rating (out of 5): 3
– Predictions of Every Game

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– Bowl Projections | Rankings
– Schedules, Scores For All 131 Teams

Former Cal Golden Bear offers a simple reminder to anxious USC football fans

While most #USC fans focused on the defense’s collapse vs Cal, a former Golden Bear reminded @DonJamesSports that Caleb Williams is awesome.

It always helps to have a little perspective.

Yes, USC’s defense was terrible against Cal. However, the Trojans still won. Winning is the bottom line, after all. It’s why we play games. It’s why people care about the outcome.

Winning is the goal, more than style points or anything else.

USC won. Why did it win? Caleb Williams — that’s why.

Caleb Williams passed for 360 yards, rushed for a touchdown and threw two of his four scoring passes to Michael Jackson III, leading USC to a 41-35 victory over California.

We spoke with former Cal cornerback Darius Allensworth about the game Saturday night.

Trojans Wire: What did you think of the outcome Saturday night, with the USC win over Cal?

Allensworth: I think Jack Plummer and Cal fought hard and made a great run at the end but it was a little too late. Caleb Williams is explosive on offensive and they have so much depth on that side of the ball it’s damn near impossible to contain them.

*

We then asked Allensworth about a few other topics:

Trojans Wire: Who was your favorite player growing up?

Allensworth: “Beast Mode” Marshawn Lynch

Trojans Wire: What was your favorite play you made as a Cal Golden Bear?

Allensworth: It’s tied! A diving pick against Arizona State in 2016 versus my guy Manny Wilkins and a forced fumble against Washington in 2015.

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USC vs Cal Prediction Game Preview

USC vs Cal game preview, prediction, and breakdown for the Week 10 game on Saturday, November 5

USC vs Cal prediction, game preview, how to watch. Week 10, Saturday, November 5

USC vs Cal How To Watch

Date: Saturday, November 5
Game Time: 10:30 ET
Venue: Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, Los Angeles, CA
How To Watch: ESPN
Record: USC (7-1), Cal (3-5)
– Sign up and live stream college football on ESPN+

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CFN 1-131 Rankings | Rankings by Conference
Bowl Projections | Expert Picks Week 10
Week 10 Schedule, Predictions
– Contact/Follow @ColFootballNews & @PeteFiutak

USC vs Cal Game Preview

Why Cal Will Win

The Bears are still winging it around.

They’re not having a whole lot of luck winning, but they’re able to throw and throw some more, they’re decent at keeping secondary on their heels, and there aren’t enough turnovers to matter.

No, this isn’t the highest-powered passing attack in a strong Pac-12 full of big attacks, but it’s effective enough.

USC might have a terrific pass rush, but it gives up yards in chunks, and the D relies on a ton of takeaways – at least it did earlier in the season. They’re not going to get them in this.

However …

– Breaking down the CFP Top 25 rankings

Why USC Will Win

Yes, there’s a passing game, but Cal doesn’t do enough on third downs to keep things moving.

Can Cal do enough on the ground to take advantage of the okay USC defensive front?

Arizona made it fun last week in the 45-37 Trojan win by ripping off yards on the ground in chunks. Utah won by throwing for well over 300 yards, but it’s Utah – it averaged over four yards per carry.

The Cal ground game has gone bye-bye. It hasn’t hit 75 yards since it ran for 354 yards on Arizona, and it hasn’t been able to average three yards per pop since then.

– Schedules, Predictions College | NFL

What’s Going To Happen

USC will be its normal self. There will be lulls when nothing appears to be happening, and then the explosion will come at the right time to put this away.

Cal will have its moments, but there won’t be enough from the passing game to keep up, and there won’t be any takeaways – USC still has just one turnover – to help the cause.

– Expert Picks College Week 10 | NFL Week 9

USC vs Cal Prediction, Line

USC 41, Cal 17
Line: USC -21.5, o/u: 60.5
ATS Confidence out of 5: 3
USC vs Cal Must See Rating (out of 5): 2.5
– Predictions of Every Game

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– Bowl Projections | Rankings
– Schedules, Scores For All 131 Teams