Cannot be overstated how good a write-up this is in terms of capturing the game itself and the experience of being a Cal football fan. The football team will likely struggle this year but at least WFC will provide some solace through the musings of its talented scribes.
At least it took Wilcox 6 years to figure out when your 4th or 3rd short you dont give the ball to your rb (four yards back), instead you allow your 6' 5" qb, quick count, pick a hole and get that yard!
Defense gave up the middle of the field. The most glaring one was the TD to their TE. Sirmon was over the TE but got sucked up by the QBs eyes and Scott was late covering the slant. Had Sirmon fallen back into the middle (likely where he should have been) the middle would have been closed off and no TD.
Wilcox in his post game presser commented on "a play or two". Ah no, it was way more than a play or two. Cal, in the first quarter, with superior field position did NADA. That is more than a play or 2. While the officiating was egregious and likely cost us the game (multiple times), Cal had ample opportunities to "control" the game and they did not.
Ultimately we lost cuz of our known weakness, the OL. But the OL isn't a weakness it is non-existent here in Wilcox's 6th year. By my eye, of college games I've watched this year, Cal has the worst OL by far.
Despite the OL this game was winnable had we had a better 1st quarter and made ND one dimensional. Very disappointing. I don't see a solution in the near term for the OL.
Well said as always Avi. Makes me very happy to see Nam.
"Or tell some not-so-nice jokes about how part of the Notre Dame experience is recognizing the inherent corruption rampant within our privileged Catholic communities." This may be gratuitous and out of place in this football article but can't be ignored in our national moment of a Catholic majority on our Supreme Court making decisions based on their theology for the vast majority of Americans that are not Catholic. Have we not read this script before in human history?
Every game like this is a nail in the coffin that reads "Mediocrity" on the top and I'm getting dragged into it. For all the reasons enumerated, we are just mediocre right now. Watching the rest of the Pac play, I seriously wonder how we win against any but Arizona. And that's no gimme. UW, OSU, UO and the rest are putting up points like it's easy to do. What a concept.
This article will hopefully be step 1 in the healing process. Here's to moving on and not ripping open the wound next week against *checks notes* oh dear Oski...
Six years in and the losses come in the same excruciating fashion every time, and the 5 or so wins in the same miserable, grind it out, ulcer-inducing fashion. Just haven’t seen much growth out of this coaching staff. Meanwhile, the program has no excitement around it, and we continue to hemorrhage fans. Hope the athletic department is investing in more tarps for the stadium because this is showing no sign of changing. Can’t develop a qb we recruited. Can’t develop an offensive line. Stubborn playcalling and a lack of scheming around the offensive line’s deficiencies. Looking forward to being one of 20k ish in memorial this Saturday.
Cal isn't going to be facing any more quarterbacks who can't play a lick other than perhaps Colorado the rest of the season. Notre Dame looks like its going to lose several games. They're definitely losing to SC.
It drives me crazy how little we ran in the 4th quarter. We had two drives where the clock wasn't a concern and we could have ran any play we wanted. There was one run of 0 yards for Ott and a double reverse to a WR. That's it. Brooks never saw the ball again.
So much of football is finding something the opponent can't counter easily and running that until they figure it out. Cal under Musgrove in particular refuses to do that and shies away from what works.
Geez guys. You'd think we lost to Colorado or something. If Plummer could have a receiver corps that were all 6' 10" the game wouldn't have been close.
Notre Dame Football 2022: The most Cal loss to ever Cal
Who needs Football Jesus when you have the refs in your pocket?
Cannot be overstated how good a write-up this is in terms of capturing the game itself and the experience of being a Cal football fan. The football team will likely struggle this year but at least WFC will provide some solace through the musings of its talented scribes.
At least it took Wilcox 6 years to figure out when your 4th or 3rd short you dont give the ball to your rb (four yards back), instead you allow your 6' 5" qb, quick count, pick a hole and get that yard!
Defense gave up the middle of the field. The most glaring one was the TD to their TE. Sirmon was over the TE but got sucked up by the QBs eyes and Scott was late covering the slant. Had Sirmon fallen back into the middle (likely where he should have been) the middle would have been closed off and no TD.
Wilcox in his post game presser commented on "a play or two". Ah no, it was way more than a play or two. Cal, in the first quarter, with superior field position did NADA. That is more than a play or 2. While the officiating was egregious and likely cost us the game (multiple times), Cal had ample opportunities to "control" the game and they did not.
Ultimately we lost cuz of our known weakness, the OL. But the OL isn't a weakness it is non-existent here in Wilcox's 6th year. By my eye, of college games I've watched this year, Cal has the worst OL by far.
Despite the OL this game was winnable had we had a better 1st quarter and made ND one dimensional. Very disappointing. I don't see a solution in the near term for the OL.
The Antzoulatos penalty was legit IMO.
Just saying.........Troy Taylor won yesterday.
Well said as always Avi. Makes me very happy to see Nam.
"Or tell some not-so-nice jokes about how part of the Notre Dame experience is recognizing the inherent corruption rampant within our privileged Catholic communities." This may be gratuitous and out of place in this football article but can't be ignored in our national moment of a Catholic majority on our Supreme Court making decisions based on their theology for the vast majority of Americans that are not Catholic. Have we not read this script before in human history?
Every game like this is a nail in the coffin that reads "Mediocrity" on the top and I'm getting dragged into it. For all the reasons enumerated, we are just mediocre right now. Watching the rest of the Pac play, I seriously wonder how we win against any but Arizona. And that's no gimme. UW, OSU, UO and the rest are putting up points like it's easy to do. What a concept.
This article will hopefully be step 1 in the healing process. Here's to moving on and not ripping open the wound next week against *checks notes* oh dear Oski...
Six years in and the losses come in the same excruciating fashion every time, and the 5 or so wins in the same miserable, grind it out, ulcer-inducing fashion. Just haven’t seen much growth out of this coaching staff. Meanwhile, the program has no excitement around it, and we continue to hemorrhage fans. Hope the athletic department is investing in more tarps for the stadium because this is showing no sign of changing. Can’t develop a qb we recruited. Can’t develop an offensive line. Stubborn playcalling and a lack of scheming around the offensive line’s deficiencies. Looking forward to being one of 20k ish in memorial this Saturday.
Cal isn't going to be facing any more quarterbacks who can't play a lick other than perhaps Colorado the rest of the season. Notre Dame looks like its going to lose several games. They're definitely losing to SC.
The offside call stirred up some Game 6 NBA 2002 WCF trauma for me.
Best two minute drill run by Cal since Aaron Rodgers against OCU. Same result.
Fascinating to me that GA called out Musgrave on the play calling, like a lot of clowns like me on blogs.
There must be similar questioning going on in the building. Would love to be a fly on the wall at the next O meeting.
I SO wish we’d run some misdirection runs y’day. ND pursued well, use that against them. You get Ott in space and his ceiling is Touchdown Jesus high.
I also hoped we’d been saving up more creativity and trickeration the first two games to unleash against the Irish.
The double reverse took so long to develop I checked other scores around the nation and came back to see it end in a three yard gain.
It drives me crazy how little we ran in the 4th quarter. We had two drives where the clock wasn't a concern and we could have ran any play we wanted. There was one run of 0 yards for Ott and a double reverse to a WR. That's it. Brooks never saw the ball again.
So much of football is finding something the opponent can't counter easily and running that until they figure it out. Cal under Musgrove in particular refuses to do that and shies away from what works.
Geez guys. You'd think we lost to Colorado or something. If Plummer could have a receiver corps that were all 6' 10" the game wouldn't have been close.