Cal Football 2025 Preview: Tight Ends
A look into one of the larger uncertainties surrounding Cal's offense
It’s been said before, but I will repeat it. The 2025 California Golden Bears will be a completely new team with a completely new approach to offensive coaching. The Tight Ends room in Berkeley will be no stranger to this notion, as Cal’s offensive hybrids have been shaken up from top to bottom.
For starters, walk-on Redshirt Sophomore and Danville, CA native Jack Endries announced his commitment to Texas after departing from Cal via the transfer portal back in April, after starting in all 13 games for the Golden Bears in 2024, where he led the team with 56 receptions and 623 receiving yards. That was only an improvement from his already impressive R-Freshmen season, where Endries earned First-team College Football Network honors, second-team The Athletic honors, and an honorable mention College Football News Freshman All-American honors after leading the nation’s tight ends with playing 859 snaps, while starting in all 13 games for the Golden Bears; thus earning him Cal's nominee for the Burlsworth Trophy which is awarded to the most outstanding FBS walk-on player. A shake-up has left a huge hole at CMS, and it is not from the Hayward fault.
While Endries’ departure makes headlines, Cal’s tight ends room also saw the departures of graduates and developing players, such as:
Simon Mapa (Transferred to New Mexico) On January 8th, 2025, Simon Mapa announced his commitment to California after two seasons at the College of San Mateo. The Golden Bears had landed three other San Mateo players in the transfer portal after the Bulldogs went 12-1 last season, besides Mapa, securing a huge connection of players close to home. A three-star transfer, Mapa enrolled at UC Berkeley on January 30th, but entered the transfer portal again on April 17th, and committed to New Mexico on May 25th. In his Sophomore season at CSM, Mapa made 15 receptions for 159 yards.
Corey Dyches (Graduated). Dyches, who played in nine games for the Golden Bears in his 5th year, collected 17 passes for 181 yards and a touchdown against San Diego State.
Nate Rutchena (transferred to UC Davis). Rutchena saw limited usage at TE in 2024 after making the switch from the LB position. Rutchena played for four seasons at Cal and transferred to UC Davis as a graduate student with 25 career games played, 63 total tackles (35 SOLO), and three interceptions.
Camden Jones (In the transfer portal). Jones did not see any action in his 2024 Freshman season out of Maranatha High School (Pasadena), where he signed with the Golden Bears over Miami. He is currently in the transfer portal as a Redshirt Freshman (via 24/7).
J.T. Byrne (Transferred to Georgia Tech). J.T. Bryne came to Berkeley in 2023 as a Redshirt Sophomore after appearing in nine games off the bench for the Oregon State Beavers in 2022. In two seasons with the Golden Bears, Bryne made two assisted tackles in 16 appearances before announcing his departure from the team and commitment to Georgia Tech for his 5th year and Redshirt Senior season.
Second of all, former OC Mike Bloesch is gone. Cal’s offense in 2024 was an obvious two steps back from the step forward created in 2023, but not much can be said about how that will translate to 2025, as this represents a blank canvas with a new OC at the helm. Bryan Harsin was announced as the Golden Bears’ new offensive coordinator on December 10th, 2024, and the portal exodus followed with questions surrounding his ability to understand and adapt to the culture around him.
While a quarterback in his playing days, Harsin’s first coaching job at the NCAA level was with his alma mater (Boise State), where he served as the TEs coach for four seasons before taking over as offensive coordinator and beginning his head coach tour. Harsin and Wilcox have a history at Boise State, and Harsin stated that he will look to implement a physical downhill running game that will be mobile and utilize pre-shift snaps to try and match players up in the best situations per play. For the tight ends, this will require a lot of physicality and constant shifts to balance the run and quick pass plays. Tight ends see heavy usage under Harsin’s playbook, with his time at Boise State consisting of two TEs ending with double-digit receptions per season, with four of them ending with at least 20 receptions and three of those four finishing with 30 receptions during his seven-year tenure as HC.
Auburn also saw a similar spike in usage of the tight end position under Harsin, where TE John Samuel Shenker saw back-to-back seasons of 20+ receptions and 200+ receiving yards in Harsin’s two turbulent seasons as head coach.
Mike Saffell is returning for his second season as the Tight Ends Coach under Justin Wilcox. Saffell played four seasons with the Bears on the O-Line, where he played in 28 career games before joining the staff as a student coach and then a graduate assistant the season after.
So, where does this leave Cal’s TE room now? To backfill the departure of the starting TE Jack Endries, Wilcox and Co. had recruited and retained the likes of Jeffrey Johnson, Jack Olyphant, and Ben Marshall, with Johnson appearing in nine games off the bench last season and bringing in two receptions for 13 yards, and Marshall playing in all 13 games for the 2024 campaign, but purely on defense where he made five total tackles.
Johnson was also named to the 2025 Wuerffel Trophy Watchlist, which recognizes a college football player for their community service work, along with their athletic and academic achievements. With the transfer portal additions of Landon Morris and Mason Mini, and the addition of three-star TE Jacob Houseworth, the role that Cal’s tight ends will have this upcoming season is a bit of a mystery. Write For California’s
raised the possibility of Cal running a four-man wide receiver set in his offensive preview, due to a lack of on-field production, and he brings up a valid thought:Landon Morris began his college career enrolled at Syracuse, where he participated in their Spring 2021 practices before he transferred to Utah and redshirted as a Freshman after seeing no action as the Utes went 10-4 and won the Pac-12 Championship game that season. At the end of 2022, he entered the transfer portal and enrolled at Temple on January 27th, 2023. In 2023, Morris was not allowed to participate in any games due to the NCAA’s double-transfer rule and was granted an extra year of eligibility after the NCAA’s settlement with players regarding multiple school transfers.
In 2024, Morris took the field for the first time and made his college debut for the Temple Owls against Oklahoma State, and appeared in nine games across the season. He averaged a huge 15.7 yards per reception and brought in one touchdown on 16 receptions while tallying 251 yards. He had four receptions and 97 yards against Tulsa, where he also made a career-long 58-yard catch.
Morris will likely take command as Cal’s TE1 in the depth chart after receiving praise from Devin Brown during the Cal Football Fall Camp, which leaves incoming transfer Mason Mini on the bench as a substitute.
Mason Mini played in only three games for his 2023 true Freshman season, and Redshirted in 2024 while with the University of Idaho Vandals. In his 2nd year with the program, Mini played in 12 games, where he brought in five receptions for 61 yards, averaging 12.2 yards per carry. With such limited playing time at the FCS level, Mini stands at 6’4” and 240 lbs, and participated in Cal’s viral physical transformation posts on X, where he showed his offseason progress since coming to Berkeley and training under Head Athletic Performance Coach Jason Novak.
A Pacifica native and Terra Nova High School alum, Mini joined Cal in the Spring of 2025 as a three-star transfer after committing to transfer to Michigan State, and will begin the 2025 season as a Redshirt Sophomore with the potential to fill in the TE position that does not have many expectations or much to prove under such drastic shifts in leadership and weapons.
This leaves our “Cal Football 2025 Preview” of the Tight Ends room with a bit of a head-scratcher and a sense of uncertainty. With what felt like an up-and-coming, so close but no cigar, and a potential star-studded cast last season on offense being gone, especially with the departure of Jack Endries, it may be a bit of panic mode for stat-lookers to see California’s offense ranking 89th in the FBS and 12th (of 17) in the ACC in Yards/Play, 72nd in the FBS and 11th in ACC in Yards/Pass attempt, with an overall Success Rate of 41%, 87th in the FBS.
Cal’s tight ends seemed to stumble late on blocking along with the offensive line, which collapsed on Saturday nights with late-game penalties, a lack of protection for Ott and Thomas, and put their QBs at risk with every 4th quarter snap. With an improved offensive line portaling in this offseason that includes four FBS starters from last season, Cal’s edge blocking ability at O-Line and TE still may be its biggest weakness. But perhaps Harsin has a plan for the TE position, as he historically has.
I will miss Endries, but heck, that is just how it is these days. On the other side of it, I bet the tight ends will be better blockers this season. That will be a welcome change.