What to look for in Cal Olympic Sports this Fall
Several Cal Olympics Sports have already started their seasons
We interrupt the extensive Cal Football coverage to remind you that there are other Cal student-athletes needing your support this Fall.
Outside of Cal Men’s Water Polo winning the NCAA National Championship last Fall semester, the rest of the Cal Olympic sports all fell short of merely making their respective postseasons in 2021. Then again, all those programs had to undergo a very different kind of year of completing two seasons in just one calendar year due to the pandemic-effected schedule. The 2022 season will be a return to almost normalcy for these Cal teams with both proper spring training and team activities/bonding without social distancing. An optimistic Cal fan might believe that these changes will drastically change the final results of Cal Olympics Sports programs this year.
Below, I have grouped the various Cal Fall Olympic sports by their realistic best-case scenarios in 2022.
National Championship or Bust:
Men’s Water Polo
2022 Record: N/A (Season starts on September 3rd)
2021 Record: 22-4
Cal Men’s Water Polo is the unanimous No.1 team this preseason, and they are a good bet (on paper, at least) to repeat as NCAA champions this December. Golden Bears are led by the reigning Peter Cutino Award (AKA Collegiate Water Polo’s Heisman) winner Nikolaos Papanikolaou (led MPSF with 68 goals and 35 steals) and fellow ACWPC First-Team All-American Jack Deely (led MPSF with 103 points and 54 assists to go with 49 goals, 3rd-best). Also returning to the defending champions are Second-Team All-American goalkeeper Adrian Weinberg, who helped the United States to a silver at the FINA World League Super Final this summer. Head coach Kirk Everist’s squad will also feature a pair of super Spanish sophomores in Roberto Valera (MPSF Newcomer of the year who tallied 45 goals and 34 assists) and Max Casabella (44 goals, 26 assists).
On top of the returning talent, Cal is also favored to repeat because the 2022 NCAA Men’s Water Polo Championships will take place in Berkeley (December 3rd-4th). The Cal Golden Bears will look to extend their lead in NCAA Men’s Water Polo championships to 16 this season.
Of course, the level of play among the top-4 of collegiate men’s water polo is always very tight. Any one of Cal, USC, UCLA, and Stanford can win the championship. However, there is only room in the NCAA Championship field for just three teams (the delayed 2020 season was a special circumstance where all four teams made the championships because certain conferences did not play). Stanford was the odd team out for the 2021 championship as the 4th ranked team in the country, by being the 4th best team in the MPSF, at NCAA selection time.
Best Case: Cal repeats as NCAA Champion and possibly even flirts with a perfect season. Nikolaos Papanikolaou becomes the first Cal Bear to win multiple Cutino Awards.
Worst Case: Cal suffers a weird midseason loss or two and places 4th in the year-ending MPSF tournament to miss the NCAA Championship by being the 4th best team in the country.
A Return to NCAA Postseason:
Women’s Soccer
2022 Record: 2-1-0
2021 Record: 8-7-3, Pac-12 4-6-1
Despite having the No.1 ranked freshman class in the country and some quality early non-conference results, Cal Women’s Soccer had a losing Pac-12 record and did not get an at-large bid into the 64-team NCAA Championship field.
There is no denying that Cal has a very talented squad. Although Cal graduated defender Emily Smith (a big part of last year) and forward/midfielder Emma Westin (final season marred by injury), the expected maturation of the underclassmen should be more than enough to make Cal an NCAA-quality side.
Golden Bears did add three players in the return of defender Kailee Gifford, freshman keeper Teagan Wy, and transfer Mya Daily. Gifford, who was her high school football team’s kicker, graduated from Cal before graduate transfer to Pepperdine last year. Thanks to the extra year of COVID eligibility, Gifford has returned to Berkeley to boost the backline. Wy, who probably will not get much playing time behind senior Angelina Anderson, is the heir-apparent for the keeper position. Wy and teammate sophomore Ayo Oke represented the United States U-20 national team this summer. Wy now joins two-sports star Makena Smith (the Cal Softball superstar who famously played goalkeeper in a pinch for the Bears last year) as goalkeeper depth. Transfer Daily has a ton of center-back experience playing for Long Beach State last year.
Despite outshooting their opponent, Cal lost their season opener at UC Irvine 0-1. The Bears then drew against the Chinese National Team 2-2 in a well-attended friendly in Berkeley before winning their last two matches.
Cal registered their first win with a 2-0 win at St. Mary’s College. This was Angelina Anderson’s 21st clean sheet in her collegiate career.
Offensively, the Bears got two late goals from Karli Lema and Alexis Wright.
Keely Roy scored a brace (converting a penalty and the late game-winner in the embedded Tweet below) to lead the Bears over UCSD in their most recent match.
Best Case: Cal has got the talent on the roster to make a deep run in the postseason. Could the Bears make it to the College Cup (AKA college soccer’s Final Four) for the first time since 1988?
Worst Case: Cal head coach Neil McGuire is still the guy behind the recent controversy. Although he survived those abuse allegations, perhaps there is a simple underlying reason for why his Cal teams have often underachieved and faced early postseason exits. The well-being of the student-athletes is more important than the results on the field.
(Special Tier) Road Warriors:
Field Hockey
2022 Record: 0-2
2021 Record: 10-7, America East 5-3
Most Cal fans probably missed the fact that Cal Field Hockey had a winning season last year. Despite a winning season, achieved mostly on the road, Cal needed to win the America East tournament to earn a bid to the NCAA Championship. The Golden Bears fell short.
Thanks to Stanford saving their field hockey program at the last minute (after planning to cut 11 sports during COVID), Cal will still have two West Coast foes in UC Davis and Stanford for the foreseeable future. Still, the Bears will have to travel to other time zones to play the majority of their matches.
Bears opened their 2022 season with a pair of 1-3 losses at No.24 Miami (Ohio) and Ohio. Their home schedule starts this week from Underhill Field. It bares repeating that Cal took away Maxwell Field and rendered Cal Field Hockey to play all of their “home” matches at Stanford several years ago. Underhill was also not a viable option due to Field Hockey requiring a water source for their artificial turf until it suddenly became one, conveniently after a Title IX lawsuit from members of the team.
Head coach Shellie Onstead’s road warriors do have plenty of experienced seniors, but they did graduate scoring leaders Maddie Cleats and Brynn Zorilla. For 2021, that duo took over the scoring load from Megan Rodgers after Rodgers, on pace to be Cal’s 2nd all-time scorer after three fantastic seasons, opted to skip the COVID delayed season and graduate. Rodgers is now on Team USA, hoping to help the Americans qualify for the 2024 Paris Olympic Games by winning the Pan American Games in 2023.
Best Case: Cal finds ways to win enough tough road matches to return to the top-25 rankings as the ~20th best team in the country. Even then, Cal will need to defy the odds and beat one or two top-15 teams to earn the America East automatic bid into the NCAA Championships.
Worst Case: Should the evolving collegiate sports landscape allow schools to cut women’s teams without violating Title IX, that could be the end of west coast field hockey.
Being competitive in conference play/championship:
Men’s Soccer
2022 Record: 0-1-1
2021 Record: 3-9-3, Pac-12 1-6-1
Even with UCLA struggling in the last few years by their lofty standard, Cal has to face one of the toughest schedules in the country with home-and-home against top-5 level Washington and Oregon State in recent years. Stanford has also spent a decent amount of recent times as a top-10 squad in the country. If you are optimistic, you might say that the Bears have been much better than their recent record.
New Cal head coach Leonard Griffin has taken over the program from the retiring Kevin Grimes. Griffin is still searching for his first official Cal win after a weekend of action.
The Bears drew Villanova 1-1 after falling 1-3 at Cal State Fullerton. Prior to that, the Bears did get a perfect three wins in preseason play.
Golden Bears have an experienced keeper in Collin Travasos. Travasos split time in front of the pipes last year but will likely be the main guy for the Golden Bears in 2022.
The striker to watch is newcomer Nonso Adimabua who was recruited by Griffin to USF before Griffin made a quick stop at Grand Canyon last season. Adimabua tallied three goals and five assists last year and made the preseason national forward watchlist. Adimabua has now crossed the Bay to join forces with Cal’s returning top-scorer Japanese sophomore Shoei Honda who also scored three goals last year.
Best Case: Griffin gets Cal back to the NCAA postseason after achieving that feat at Grand Canyon last year.
Worst Case: Leonard Griffin simply did not have enough time to build this Cal team to his plan. 2022 becomes another painful rebuilding season.
Cross Country
2022: The season starts this Saturday at the USF Invite
2021: 0 representative at the NCAA Championships
Cal should have several impact newcomers to improve the cross country (also track and field distance running) group. On the men’s side, reigning California state cross country champion Caden Carney is one of five newcomers who will join some experienced runners. For the women, Cornell transfer Lucy Hale and California state 3rd place finisher Georgia McCorkle lead an even bigger group of newcomers to the Cal women’s team.
Best Case: Cal qualifies both men and women as teams for the NCAA Championships.
Worst Case: Golden Bears again get shut out of the NCAA Championships yet again.
Volleyball
2022 Record: 2-1
2021 Record: 7-24, Pac-12 0-20
Cal Volleyball cannot mathematically do worse in conference play than last year. If the first tournament down at San Diego State is a true indicator of 2022, Cal will throw their freshmen to the fire and hope that the tremendous edge in blocking (39 to 19 after the first three matches) is real, particularly against the tougher competition of Pac-12 play.
Leading the way for Cal is middleblocker Lydia Grote, who missed half of the 2021 fall season after a splendid spring debut. Grote looked healthy in Cal’s first weekend while setting a new (temporary?) career high of 22 kills in the 5-set loss to UCSD.
The Cal Bear doing the bulk of the setting should be Swiss sophomore Annalea Maeder. In addition to Grote, Maeder will set up a brand new Cal attack. Joining Grote, who will be counted on even more now that former middleblocker standout Bella Bergmark has graduate transferred to Texas, in the middle is Mikayla Hayden. On the outside are fellow freshmen Sophie Scott and Peyton Dejardin.
We shall see how the young Cal Bears fare in their second weekend of action, again from the road.
Best Case: Cal head coach Sam Crosson has finally returned the Golden Bears to the NCAA Championships. Bears win nearly half of their Pac-12 matches.
Worst Case: Despite the talented freshman group, Cal just lacked the experience and depth to get out of the Pac-12 basement.
GO BEARS!
Women's soccer, in terms of coaching misconduct allegations, seems like a shining light in contrast to what went down with women's swimming. McGuire didn't have anyone transfer out, didn't have a dip in his recruiting, and was never placed on suspension. McKeever had all of those things.
And I just saw that Volleyball lost 1-3 to Utah Valley. I think that's gonna project to a worst-case scenario season, no?
Re: womens soccer it seems that #1 recruiting class was a bit of a shotgun approach, as I recall it had ~13 players in it. Easy to be “#1” when you have a multiplier like that. No way you can channel all that talent onto the field. Womens soccer is SUPER competitive; if Cal makes the post-season, I’d call that success, and be thrilled with a first round win, and overjoyed with a second round win.