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Wednesday night, right before BearTerritory's mammoth podcast recording with Chase Lyman, Donnie McCleskey, J.J. Arrington and Lorenzo Alexander, the California football team got some big news of its own, receiving a commitment from its third offensive tackle in the 2012 recruiting class in recently-offered Elk Grove (Calif.) lineman Steven Moore, fresh off of his official visit to Berkeley last weekend.

The commitment came as a surprise for the Bears coaching staff, which did not anticipate a commitment from the 6-foot-6, 265-pounder until later in the week.

"I've been talking about it with my parents, and I kind of knew it was going to be Cal," Moore said. "Then, today, I called coach M and I called coach [Jeff] Tedford and let him know, and the were pretty excited. They were happy to hear it. Coach M said it made his day."

Moore praised his primary recruiter -- offensive line coach Jim Michalczik -- for not just his coaching style -- which he got to see up close at Saturday's bowl practice - but also for the way he recruited Moore, who has been a lifelong Cal fan.

"The deciding factor was just how close it was to home," Moore said. "It was the education and coach Michalczik," Moore said. "I'm just happy to play in the Pac-12 and to play against the USC's and the Oregon's and those kinds of teams."

With senior All-Pac-12 left tackle Mitchell Schwartz graduating, and a dearth of tackles on the current roster, the commitments in the past month of Moore, Freddie Tagaloa and Christian Okafor will provide immediate depth to the position that will be protecting not only current quarterback Zach Maynard, but also his successor, which could very well be 2012 Danville (Calif.) San Ramon Valley signal-caller and grassroots recruiter extraordinaire, Zach Kline.

"[Playing early] is definitely attractive to me," Moore said. "I hope to maybe make the traveling squad as a freshman. That would be very cool."

Growing up in Northern California, Moore had an affinity for Cal for many years, all the way up to when he got his offer a mere few weeks ago.

"My whole family is from the Bay Area," Moore said. "No one in my family went to Cal, but my whole family is from the Bay Area, so I grew up watching the Bears, being a Bear fan."