Five Things: Oregon State
Last week’s five things:
1) Colorado QB – Loss, decisively. Montez faced a pretty decent Cal secondary, and completely terrorized it. Can’t say I was expecting that coming off of what happened at Washington State, or even the weeks before, so all credit to him.
2) Lindsay – Also a loss, as we kept him somewhat bottled up, but never disrupted him enough to really make a difference. He rushed for 4.9 YPC, and while we tackled him for a gain of 2 or less on 13 of his 33 carries, Colorado did plenty well outside of him, too.
3) Veterans – Loss. While Leo Jackson was limited to three total tackles, Drew Lewis had two PDs and a sack, and Isaiah Oliver was a late scratch. Without him, the Bears had some success throwing at Trey Udoffia, but the real disruptive guy in the secondary was Evan Worthington with 2 TFLs, including a sack, plus a forced fumble and pass deflected. They handled the Cal offense well, to say the least.
4) Turnovers – Cal’s fumble recovery on fourth down went for zero points. Colorado’s interception went for seven after the team loafed it on the tackling. Advantage, Colorado.
5) Finish Drives – This one, you can give half a win to the Bears for. When they did make it to the red zone, they managed touchdowns most of the time. The only issue was getting there, and they managed to let up a couple of long touchdowns where they likely were not going to need to, either, so Colorado benefitted from extending their opportunities.
That’s 0.5 out of 5 for an unexpectedly uncompetitive effort out at Folsom. There are only three games left this year, and this is our last, perhaps best chance for a win at all. Here we go.
Five things to watch this week against Oregon State:
Urgency – You want to make a bowl? It’s probably not happening without a win at 2PM. That’s the basic truth of it. We cannot afford to come out unprepared, 1-7 or not. Period. And the reason why even this – outside of Weber this was the likeliest win on the schedule all year – isn’t a given is because of…
Cory Hall – Under Hall, this Oregon State team has taken two conference opponents to the wire, including then No. 20 Stanford. He has been tremendous in terms of energy, attitude, and the players have begun circling a petition to make him their permanent coach. Can’t underestimate that.
Ryan Nall – The hope is that Cal performs much better against this do it all back than their last one, because whatever they learned or didn’t from facing Lindsay, Nall will be the same. Oregon State will dress up his usage with motion, wildcat him, and do all of the horrible, awful thing that we’ve already become too accustomed to last year. We have to come physical and ready to play, because we were small against him last year.
Stifle/Protect Ball – This Oregon State team is not particularly explosive. It’s last in the conference in plays of 10+ yards, 20+ yards, 30+ yards…you get the idea. It’s Nall, who is a good but not as good a player as Lindsay was, and a passing game that was mildly effective at best. Combine this with a -10 turnover margin for the Beavers, and all you really need to do is the same game plan we’ve always asked for this season. (Please no red zone turnovers again. I can’t keep watching these.)
Seniors – This is the last home game this year. They deserve to see you there cheering, if you can make it, and this is of course a chance for us to thank them for their contributions. So, big shout outs and love to: Devante Downs, Luke Rubenzer, Hamilton A’noai, Marloshawn Franklin, Vic Enwere, Noah Westerfield, Garrett Frum, Darius Allensworth, Matt Anderson, James Looney, Ray Hudson, Jordan Veasy, Ray Davison, Chas Peterson, Jacob Anderson, Dezhon Grace, Fabiano Hale, J.D. Hinnant, Rusty Becker, and Tony Mekari. Go Bears forever