Cal at Virginia Tech
Cal’s going to have to wait at least one more week to become bowl eligible, not that they didn’t put out enough effort in their 42-34 loss to get it done. But Virginia Tech’s Kyron Drones’ TD pass—just his eighteenth throw of the game—to Sophomore WR Takye Heath and successful two-point conversion in the second overtime couldn’t be matched by Cal’s Freshman QB Jaron Keawe who had the Hokies Senior DL Kelvin Gilliam Jr right on top of him for two of his four incompletions. The Golden Bears got off to a slow start in this one with back-to-back three and outs while Virginia Tech put up a TD and a field goal their first possessions to be up 10-0 with just half the first quarter gone. Cal finally got some points on the board at the end of their third drive on a 38 yard field goal by their Junior Place Kicker Chase Meyer to make it 10-3 and then held the Hokies to a three-and-out to finish the 1st Qtr.
The second quarter started just like the first except this time it was Virginia Tech’s first two possessions that ended in punts while Cal was the team scoring a TD and a field goal to give them the lead at 13-10 before extending it to 20-10 with another TD on their third possession of the period after a blocked punt gave them great field position inside the Hokie red zone. With less than two minutes to play Virginia Tech would run out of time in the half before getting the ball far enough down field to score.
The third quarter was a rinse and repeat of the beginning of the first quarter for the Hokies with a field goal and a TD to tie the score up at 20-20. Only this quarter Cal wouldn’t score at all while Virginia Tech would find the end zone again to start the 4th Qtr to go up 27-20. With just over two minutes left the Golden Bear’s Junior RB Kendrick Raphael would run it into the end zone to tie it up at 27-27 and send it into overtime. Cal would get the ball to start and found the end zone on their first play from scrimmage on a 25 yard TD pass from Freshman QB Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele to Sophomore TE Mason Mini. The Hokies would tie it at 34 each two plays into their possession on a 17 yard TD run by their Senior QB Kyron Drones. After that you know what happened.
I’m not exactly sure what has happened at Cal considering the background of Head Coach Justin Wilcox whose coaching career started as a graduate assistant working at Boise State under Dan Hawkins. After a couple of years he left to work under Jeff Tedford as a linebackers coach at Cal during the Aaron Rogers/Marshawn Lynch years. In 2006 he returned to Boise State to work for newly promoted head coach Chris Peterson who hired him to be their Defensive Coordinator. In their first year together the Broncos were undefeated and captured the school’s first ever BCS bowl game berth and were the only undefeated team in Division 1 FBS that season. The four years that Wilcox was at Boise State the team only lost four games and his defensive units were always ranked near the very top of the FBS. After Boise State he had various stops before landing at Cal including Tennessee, Washington, USC and finally as Defensive Coordinator for Wisconsin in 2016 where that team went 11-3, won the Cotton Bowl, and had a defensive unit that was top ten.
I brought all that up because Wilcox has always had a reputation as a great defensive coach and with his team last year allowing an average of only 110 yards per game I found the Virginia Tech box score in this one pretty shocking. They rushed 58 times for 357 yards—wow—and 2 TD’s. Their Senior QB, Kyron Drones, who only completed 50% of his 18 passes connected three times for TDs—two with Sophomore WR Takye Heath and the other to Junior WR Ayden Greene—and 1 interception. For Cal, Freshman QB Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele was 24-of-39 for 286 yards, 1 TD to Sophomore TE Mason Mini—and no interceptions. Junior RB Kendrick Raphael carried the ground game for the Golden Bears with an efficient 20 carries for 71 yards and 3 rushing TD’s while collectively, once Sagapolutele negative yardage is included, they rushed 27 times for a mere 39 yards. Virginia Tech led in first downs, 24-19; total yards of offense, 476-325; and converted their 3rd downs 50% of the time and made the only 4th down conversion they tried compared to 35% and 50% respectively for Cal.
Understandably Cal’s head coach Justin Wilcox was not happy about the loss with their next two games against Top-20 ranked teams and a win against the Hokies would have made them bowl eligible. The AP captured his thoughts afterward in their recap for ESPN: “Football is a game for tough people, and you have to be tough for the entire game. That’s physically, mentally, emotionally. … Having the ability to stay focused throughout the game is what we need to do. The No. 1 thing. The mood is not good, and it shouldn’t be. We shouldn’t be in a good mood after a performance like that. Virginia Tech has good coaches and good players. I don’t want to take anything away from them, but man, we have to expect more from ourselves than what we put out there tonight.” As if they haven’t had enough of the state of Virginia they’ll be coming back home to host a far more dangerous opponent in No. 16 Virginia this next Saturday.
Stanford at Miami
In this one Stanford scored first on a 9 yard TD pass from their Senior QB Ben Gulbranson to Junior WR Caden High to go up 7-0 halfway through the 1st Qtr but then never scored again. Miami tied it up right before the half on a TD pass from Senior QB Carson Beck to WR CJ Daniels and then poured on 35 points in the second half—scoring TD’s on five of their six possessions with one of those coming on just one play after an interception of Gulbranson and run back down to the Stanford three yard line to win it 42-7.
For the Cardinal, Senior QB Ben Gulbranson with an average 57% completion percentage on the year—the lowest of his career—was way worse in this one connecting on just 9-of-21 for 50 yards, 1 TD to Junior WR Caden High, and 2 interceptions while also losing 20 yards on the ground while keeping the ball twice. On the ground, collectively Stanford rushed 27 times for 55 yards without cashing in. For Miami, Senior QB Carson Beck was an efficient 75% for 189 yards, 1 TD to Senior WR CJ Daniels. Junior RB Mark Fletcher Jr. led the way on the ground for the Hurricans rushing 23 times for 106 of their 199 yards and three of their five TD’s with Sophomore RB Jordan Lyle and Freshman Girard Pringle Jr. picking up the other.
Miami led in first downs, 25-to-8; passing yards, 205-89; rushing yards, 199-55; were 53% on third down conversions and 60% on their five 4th down attempts compared to 28% and 50% for Stanford; in addition to having possession of the ball 13 more minutes and having no turnovers against Stanford’s two nterceptions. At 3-5 with just four games remaining with their last one against No. 12 Notre Dame, Stanford will need to win their next three games in a row to become bowl eligible starting at home against Pit this coming Saturday.