72 Comments
Dec 5, 2021Liked by Rick Chen

"California fans may find solace in triumphing over rivals USC and Stanford in the same season for the first time since 2003." This California fan certainly will. Since '48-50 we've done it four times, '70, '73, '03 and '21. I

It was a great night at Memorial Stadium. The students showed up and overall attendance was better than most expected. The defense bent but didn't break and the offense did just enough to win.

Four really good wins in the second half of the season. It was ultimately a woulda-coulda-shoulda year but I'll always look back on it fondly for winning the Axe and beating U$C.

Expand full comment
Dec 5, 2021Liked by Rick Chen

I’m proud of our guys for not just giving up on the year when we were 1-5. I recall how the team just kind of gave up in Tedford’s last year, and this could not be more different. Great job staying with it, and hope Chase returns! By when does he have to decide?

Expand full comment
Dec 5, 2021Liked by Rick Chen

Thanks Rick - good article!

Expand full comment
Dec 5, 2021Liked by Rick Chen

Always great to beat USC - no matter the circumstances or how poor the USC team is. (I do wonder, however, if the outcome would have been different had the teams played when scheduled and USC was healthier)

Expand full comment

My emotion after this game is one of relief. A sincere thank you to U$C for rescheduling the game and then gifting us the win multiple times during the game. Fortunately our defense held it together just enough to seal the victory.

Now we are onto the off-season. How many lads transfer out? Which lads opt in for an additional season? Do we hold onto the current commits? Can we successfully navigate the transfer portal to bring in immediate talent for next year?

Wilcox: does he shake up the staff? Will he commit to developing an O that can run the fucking ball when it wants to and score 30 points? Will he move off of the mark of "we will win ugly" (such a shitty philosophy when it comes to sport or life in general)? Will he and the O staff stop playing players that aren't productive re: Daltoso / Nikko? At this point I'm in the "hope" mode cuz I'm seeing him act like a lot of CEO's / managers that either don't see or refuse to see that things aren't working and continue to do the same thing expecting different results.

The biggest off-season change has to be Wilcox himself. So, hopefully his advisors are advising him and he actually listens. He needs to make changes and quickly.

Expand full comment

Go Bears, the good guys prevailed and took the winter. I don’t remember the last time there were more $C band members than $C fans at Memorial, but I’ll take it.

Expand full comment

Damn you Wazzu....that's Cal's Sun Bowl bid you bastards.

Expand full comment

Perhaps the play of the year was Hearns' INT that wasn't due to an offside penalty. That one-handed INT was pretty sweet!!

Expand full comment

The UCLA game disabused me of the idea that we were some secretly good team that had some unlucky things happen. We were what are record said we were, a slightly below average team.

Expand full comment

Some positives from the season:

1. Hearns looks like a future star

2. Team didn’t quit after the 1-5 start which speaks to the the culture Wilcox has built

3. Defense looked a lot more like what we expected as the season progressed

Questions and concerns:

1. Is the most we can expect from Wilcox (at cal) 5-8 win seasons?

2. What will the future look like at qb?

3. Is Musgrave’s style compatible with our personnel (or even modern cfb in general, for that matter)?

Expand full comment

Cristobal and Miami in “deep negotiations” according to sources

https://www.miamiherald.com/sports/college/acc/university-of-miami/article256316637.html

Expand full comment

Joe Brady out as OC at Carolina....does he show up in Eugene?

Expand full comment

Good game Bears. At least we won. Oh what could have been if we had not lost all those close games.

Expand full comment

Wow. Always a pleasure to beat those guys, though I have little doubt they’ll be monsters very soon, and quite possibly next year.

The real question: when’s the last time we beat both usc and Stanford in the same year, but still finished with a losing record?

Expand full comment