Cal Football Blocks Itself from a 4-0 Record

Cal stifles, wounds, and costs themselves in uninspiring loss to Florida State

They are what we thought they were, and we let them off the hook” - the late Dennis Green

Cal let Florida State off the hook in Tallahassee. The Seminoles were wounded, did not have an effective offense entering and exiting the game, and made some questionable decisions on several 4th downs.

But the Bears didn’t capitalize for a multitude of reasons. And unfortunately, you’re going to see a lot of references to prior analysis about what hadn’t bit Cal…..yet. Now, the team was technically playing with house money after their 3-1 start in an opening quartet where most people had them at 2-2. However, in what became an entirely gettable game, you just need to find a way.

The Bears unfortunately did not find a way. Here’s what stifled them in my mind:

Cloudy with a chance of penalties

The Bears have played in two tough road environments so far this season. In the pre snap looks, the offensive line has unequivocally failed their tests during both contests. The number isn’t exact but I believe Cal has had 10 false starts across the Auburn and Florida State games. This isn’t going to be the last time that they will play in a raucous environment, so Justin Wilcox, Mike Bloesch, and the players need to clean it up, and quick.

Postgame after the loss, Wilcox stated "We use crowd noise, the neighbors hate it, but the message isn't getting across. It's bad, its unacceptable, its bad football,” in regards to the pre snap issues.

During my FSU defense preview, here were my keys to the game

Those penalties may have not cost you the win in Auburn but were now directly correlated to Cal self destructing consistently on the plus side of the field and in the red zone. Pile them up as the flags came, and in a five point loss its easy to view this as one of the branches of failure against Florida State.

Passing on Protection

The offensive line in general needs to pick it up. Beyond the penalties, the pass protection has been a consistent weakness at significant points throughout the first four games. Rush Reimer, Nick Morrow, and Bastian Swinney have not found their footing and the fire continues to burn along the front five. FSU didn’t need to blitz like other opponents to force the offensive line to struggle, because they knew what their strength was and what the weakness of the Cal offense was.

Some caution I had going into the matchup

UC Davis and San Diego State constantly sent pressure to confuse the offensive line. The results were mixed but Fernando Mendoza is taking way too many hits. Can Mendoza get rid of the ball sooner in certain instances? Sure. Does the offensive line need to consistently give him even one more second? Oh you best believe they do.

FSU and Auburn only sent 4-5 defenders on the line and that was enough. Mendoza was sacked four times in the fourth quarter alone this past Saturday, and it almost felt as if anytime we blinked, Patrick Payton or Joshua Farmer were in the backfield. I do hate to pile on, but this offense will only go as far as this position group improves. It can add to a further discussion of whether bringing the offensive line together mainly through the portal is consistently effective, but that’s for another time.

A flare up of symptoms and the big picture

I can tell the prior critiques may sound a bit strong and one sided from this game. However, the theme that sticks out is that despite Cal technically being ahead of schedule, they still lose games in similar fashion against inferior opponents (in this case an unexpected one).

After the San Diego State game, I was unsure about what the kicking game could really give this team. Ryan Coe did go 3/4 yesterday (I’m taking out the blocked kick, I only count those against the kicker when its a low line drive) but is still having issues.

Coe is now 5/10 on the season under these pretenses. However as explained up above, he has not come through on kicks that need to be reliable. This particular musing may not have appeared at all had Coe made the 36 yard field goal versus the 51 yarder. 3 of his misses this season have come from distances of 25, 36, and 37 yards. You cannot consistently miss those types of kicks under 40.

To be clear, Ryan Coe is not the primary reason that the Bears lost to Florida State. Bottomline, Cal needs to get into the end zone and I believe its not complicated why the team could not do it the other day. However, when games get tight, I don’t know that I’m exactly looking forward to kicking unit running out there regardless of the circumstance.

Through the first four games, Cal did what they had to do. They set themselves up for a meaningful game at home against Miami. Yet, there is still some meat on the bone.

What type of team shows up in just under two weeks will tell me a lot about how much is different about this team compared to years past. Will the Bears slide? Who steps up and continues to lead when you face consistent adversity? How will Cal find a way to win a close game when the opportunity prevents itself? Time will only tell.