I looked on ND Rivals page and saw that they are scheduled to have over 35 recruits on Campus to attend the game against Cal. They even have a WR from Hayward, who was just offered recently, attending as well. Not only would this be a great win but it would go a long way with turning the heads of some the recruits that are attending the game. Does anyone have any info as to why Cal hasn't gone after the kid from Hayward?

#AGTG

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Please see the attached release. For those who fretted about fund raising for the Title IX facility deficient women's sports, that "roadblock" is no longer in the way. Open your wallet @Harky4 its time to share the serious cash.....

Funds Raised

took them this long to shoot something up on tightwad?

A good look at the Irish here by Jesse:


I have a lot more coming for you today as well. I finally drove home yesterday from Stanford after spending two days in a hotel in Santa Cruz trying to finish my business taxes before my extension deadline (what a nightmare -- worst day of my year every year). I went straight from Santa Cruz to USC practice, barely making it for interviews, and then got home and was asleep by 9:45. So I'm catching up on a lot across the board. Bear with me and by the end of today I'll have a number of pieces up here.

OK, OK, here we go! Week 1 was easy, Week 2 was more like a normal week of Guess the Score. That said, nobody need be discouraged by a bad result last week. Remember, you get to drop your two worst scores/missed weeks. After Week 4, I'll factor that into the math. So starting with the standings after next week, I'll put your two exclusions in bold and average the other scores, updating the exclusions as needed each week. So the early standings really don't mean a ton, unless you're off to a dominant start like @spbdoug or @drfunk4316. When I drop the excluded weeks, the standings will change significantly. Anyways, keep getting your picks in. You're allowed to miss two weeks, and some -- like MYSELF -- have already used one of those. Oops.

Onto the results ... the aforementioned @drfunk4316 wins with a guess of 24-13 Cal (actual score 20-14, thus off 4 on Cal and 1 on UNLV). Two free months are being added to his subscription.

Last week, all the subscription extensions were processed, but I only heard from @cal1982 about the Amazon gift card. I wanted to do them both at the same time, so I still need @Ptown Mac11 to DM me with an email address.

Any questions, let me know!

SEASON STANDINGS Through Week 2
(The number in parantheses is your season average; the number after the dash reflects each week's score)

sandmanj (4) -- 4-X
Ryan Young (4) -- 4-X
spbdoug (5) -- 2-8
drfunk4316 (6) -- 7-5
ColoradoBear (7) -- 7-X
1calfan (7.5) -- 4-11
richmondisnotghetto (8) -- 1-15
calderon11 (8.5) -- 5-12
MC415 (9) -- 7-11
bluebeargold (10) -- 7-13
elindsey (10.5) -- 7-14
YellAtRefsALot (11) X-11
Colonial Bear (11.5) -- 10-13
Cal1982 (12) -- 0-24
GoBears96 (12) -- 8-16
GoBears93 (12) -- 6-18
marklog (12) -- 7-17
dannyroe (12) -- 4-20
sppbears (12) -- 4-20
pwbecker (12) -- 6-18
mike79 (12) -- 3-21
Ptown Mac11 (12) -- 0-24
Btmatsu (12) -- X-12
fjbards (12) -- 4-20
ilyn (12.5) -joni- 8-17
petalumabear (12.5) -- 7-18
90Bear (13) -- 4-22
rathokan (13) -- 12-14
hessebear (13.5) -- 6-21
UrsosArctosCalifornicus (13.5) -- 9-18
gocalbears1994 (13.5) -- 7-20
beeasyed (14) -- 8-20
uplandbear (14) -- 4-24
joni.a (14) -- 4-24
Wookids (14) -- 7-21
Harky 4 (14) -- 14-X
kotaconduct (14.5) -- 7-22
droski (14.5) -- 14-15
OskiBear1941 (14.5) -- 4-25
bearborn11 (14.5) -- 4-25
tluv123 (14.5) -- 4-25
bear949 (14.5) -- 4-25
moonpod (15) -- 13-17
TomBalk (15) -- 2-28
Rollonyoumatt (15) -- 6-24
hilgardbear (15.5) -- 4-27
billyosier (16) -- X-16
Eugene Choo (16.5) -- 10-23
tanaka7 (17) -- 14-20
kairbear (17) -- 12-22
bayareabear (17) -- 7-27
UCB4LIFE (17) -- 18-16
Bearington (17) -- 7-27
ayetee11 (17) -- 17-X
Bubba_Bear84 (17.5) -- 11-24
vjrousseu (18) -- X-18
sflye13 (18) --11-25
DenMaf (18.5) -- 15-22
Fire Starkey (18.5) -- 10-27
dlit (18.5) -- 12-25
WaterBear (18.5) -- 10-27
Jcharocv (19) -- 12-26
BLbearfan (19) -- 17-21
lonestarbear (19) -- 17-21
golden oso (20) -- 13-27
SlugLyfe57 (20.5) -- 15-26
febfeb (21.5) -- 15-28
Ptownbear1 (22) -- 22-X
mvpcalbears (23) -- 35-11
icbear (23) -- 22-24
Bear Derriere (23) -- 18-28
yelee (25) -- X-25
JoJoSungy (27) -- 22-32
trainx (27) -- X-27
CaliDrank (28) -- 24-32
dhemy (29) -- 30-28
gbforever (35) -- X-35

Got to CHI-town yesterday afternoon with another Cal couple. Gibson's last night and Tavern on Rush. Lots of Bears out and having a good time. Wrigleyville and Cubs game today, will represent. Expect lots of other Bear fans there.
Go Bears.

Matt has the update:

Jesse and our Notre Dame counterpart traded questions and answers this week for a better look at the other side:


You can read Jesse's answers here:

Our OL play is really terrible. The weakness starts at T. Coleman is a fine lineman but a poor T. RT position is a disaster.

I don’t know if this can be solved. I’d prefer to move Lovell to RT and move Vatikani in at RG.

I’d prefer to see Coleman at LG, but can’t think of a serviceable player to put at LT.

Bottom line, I don’t think we can weaken our T play, but we can improve our G play.

7-4 last week for 10-10 for the year. 0-1 for my lock of the week for 0-2 for the year.


[home team in italics]

UCLA by 15.5 over South Alabama - South Alabama is decent. South Alabama covers.

ND by 10.5 over Cal - This line opened at ND -17.5. People love fading ND. ND covers.

Minnesota by 27.5 over Colorado - Betting against Colorado until proven otherwise. Minnesota covers.

Oregon by 3.5 over BYU - Oregon covers I guess.

WSU by 17 over Colorado State - No idea. This isn't a good colorado state team, but WSU isn't scoring a lot of points. Colorado State covers.

Washington by 4 over Michigan State - I think UW is pretty good, but 4 points over a good program seems like a lot. Michigan State covers.

Utah by 21 over SDSU - This would be a clear SDSU cover traditionally, but SDSU looks down this year. Utah covers.

USC by 13 over Fresno State - Fresno will score points, but not enough to cover. USC covers.

ASU by 19 over Eastern Michigan - Not a good Eastern Michigan team. ASU covers.



Non conference lock of the week: NC State by 10.5 over Texas Tech - Texas Tech covers.

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I was at the game and haven't read any of the threads from today, so delete if this has been covered. But damn, could we have a worse situation going into South Bend? If we win, we beat a "terrible, falling apart" Irish team and get no credit. If we lose, we don't get the pass for losing to a team that is competing for a national championship. Just a huge bummer all around.

I'll be handling all the press conferences today in place of Jesse. Here's the schedule. I'll post any notable updates:

11:30 am Justin Wilcox Media Availability (Zoom)
Noon Peter Sirmon Media Availability (Zoom)
12:15 pm Bill Musgrave Media Availability (Zoom)
1:00 pm Jack Plummer Media Availability (Zoom)
6:30 pm Daniel Scott Media Availability (Zoom)
6:45 pm Matthew Cindric Media Availability (Zoom)

And I'm getting caught up on other stuff I have coming too. Bear with me and there will be multiple pieces coming your way today.

Just realized he is from the same HS as Goff. Anyone reminder his recruiting story - Iowa seems a weird destination. Was Cal ever a possibility?

Jesse's follow-up piece:

@Ryan Young could we get a weekly article covering how far along players with redshirt eligibility are from hitting the game limit? Also one with a snap count for each player who saw the field in the last game, provided you have access to PFF stats? Both are useful in tracking how players are utilized. Thank you

Here’s another post-game dump in a bit different format:

Positives
(Admittedly this will be a shorter list)
The secondary played really well especially taking away UNLV’s playmaker WR, the transfer from MSU. Hearns was dominant throughout especially considering that for most of the game we had no pash rush. Scott had another stellar game and his two late-game blitzes saved the win. And the nice INT by Young at the end capped it off.
Kickoffs were all good - almost all touchbacks.
Sheehan is a really good punter. He had two kicks go in the end zone that should have been downed. He’s a weapon.
Croteau had a good game and made several good plays. Sirmon looked even better and made several important stops as well. Oladejo was everywhere. Carlton also had a nice sack.
Ott looked just as dangerous to everyone except evidently Cal’s offensive coaches. Only a few touches but two TDs and an electric run that he came close to breaking. Give him the damn ball.
Latu looks like a good receiving TE and had several nice grabs.
No injuries that I saw, always a good thing. Hunter got drilled but came back but didn’t do much - hopefully he’s ok.
Defense looked passive until it really mattered but then flipped the switch. On the last three drives by UNLV, they were money. They have the potential to be really good but I think the play calling needs to be a lot more aggressive.

Negatives
The OL looked just awful especially on pass protection. I saw multiple guys just get bull rushed and knocked way back or just beaten by speed. By UNLV - I mean, cmon. The running lanes were also minimal. This is a real problem and limits this team’s potential big time.
Plummer was not impressive. In fact he looked like a bottom-tier QB in the Pac12 IMO even though his stats weren’t terrible. His passes fluttered, he often did not hit WRs in stride, his INT was terrible, and he did nothing but look like a deer in the headlights in the second half. Yes, the OL was bad, but there were still plays to be made and he didn’t make them. I think he will get better, but he appears to only be an incremental improvement over Garbers at best.
Why oh why didn’t Ott play more? It was the most idiotic thing I’ve seen in a long time. If AT is the one deciding this, he needs his authority taken away. It was preposterous in the extreme that Brooks got more touches. I just don’t get it. Why?
Special teams other than punting and kickoffs were atrocious. A key missed FG, penalty on a punt, giving up an onside kick, and nothing on returns. Just another debacle in a long string of them. When will it ever end?
The DL had no pass rush on their own and only when blitzes were added in was there any pressure. We just don’t have that top-notch pass rusher. Carlton is probably at the top of the list right now but he’s like a big LB instead of a DL guy. What happened to Saunders being such a stud? He looked mediocre today.
Mavin Anderson looks really good but made two bad plays - catching the KO out of bounds and dropping the TD pass, which while a bit high, was catchable. Especially egregious because Plummer threw the INT on the next play. The other receivers were fine but not very exciting and disappeared in the second half.
Our WR blocking is once again awful. Every WR screen goes nowhere because no one can block.
Too many dumb penalties right at the start of a drive. This offense isn’t good enough to overcome that. Stop it.
A lack of turnovers. We need takeaways to beat teams IMO and we only had the one at the end of the game. We need more.
The offensive play calling in the second half was atrocious. The three handoffs at the end were embarrassing. The running game lacks creativity as does the offense in general (they ran one sad reverse. Everything else was boring, plain Jane.) And they did nothing to help a QB under pressure almost every play, just very telegraphed screens. Just terrible. And did I mention it was incredible they didn’t play Ott more? Just crazy. Absolutely insane.

In summary, you could say a win is a win, and it’s great to be 2-0, but today showed that this team has too many serious issues with players and staff to be a good team. Despite the win, this was one of the more disappointing games I’ve seen right up there with last year’s Arizona and Nevada games.

They may surprise someone, but anyone looking at today’s film will be licking their chops with ND right at the top of the list. I don’t expect we will get blown out next Saturday, but I’d be shocked to see this team go into South Bend and win after today. There are just too many problems.

Maybe I’m wrong and this season will turn around and be a great one, but I’m a lot less hopeful after this game. I want to believe in this team as a true Cal fan, and I generally like the players who appear to be great kids, but I’m growing so tired of Wilcox football. It’s boring. It’s maddening. And worst of all, it’s mediocre. It could be another long season, folks.

Another busy weekend of news and rumors: