Reader, I've often been fond of saying Five Things Never Lies over the past few seasons, and I will admit that I wish it had on Sunday.
Did I anticipate Cal losing all Five Things? Honestly, no - on paper, it felt like a fairly comfortable projection that the Bears would win that game, and that they stood a good chance in each category. But they lost every key factor, and that's just the way it goes sometimes. Perhaps they wouldn't have under normal conditions, but that cannot be allowed as an excuse for too much longer -- that is simply the reality of playing college football right now, and because there are only four or five more games remaining, in essence, every single one is a must-win game.
The good news is that the season, and the hopes that the program had for it, aren't yet doomed, even after all of that.
The bad news is that it could be if they lose this game. So, let's see what quintet of factors will make the difference, shall we?
1) Chase Garbers - If you had to rank the reasons for optimism coming into 2020, you'd probably credit Chase Garbers for a healthy amount of it. A pre-season rank of the Pac-12 quarterbacks from top to bottom would have credibly left him as no less than 4th, and certainly as high as 2nd, behind Slovis, thanks to a blistering end-of-season run and an undefeated-when-he-finishes-the-game statistic that Cal Twitter has trotted around proudly. All of that, of course, has dimmed considerably after the stunningly poor performance from him last weekend. It seems like it's been a long time since Garbers hasn't been dependable, and the guy that took the snaps versus UCLA appeared skittish, indecisive, and inaccurate, things he hadn't been since facing down North Texas last year.
Obviously, that's the guy they need back out there before too much longer. The Bears may be able to survive the next two games without a fully in form Garbers - Stanford and Oregon State are the worst teams remaining on the schedule - but it's not likely they can win out if he doesn't rediscover most of what made him unbeatable. To some degree, this also means we're watching Bill Musgrave pretty closely too, who may have had no choice but to call it vanilla last week. The real Musgrave offense should start rearing its head now. We think.
2) Cal OL vs Hamilcar Rashed Jr - Oregon State has had one sack on 57 dropbacks by Jayden De Laura and Dylan Morris, which normally might indicate a rather toothless defensive front. But because Washington played with extreme conservatism in their first game, and the Cougars have yet to give up a sack due to their offensive line (per PFF), I'd be really wary of discounting their front seven.
We know that the Beavers still have talent - Rashed had 14 sacks last year (11 of them against Power Five competition), on a unit that is returning 31 of their 32 sacks, numbers that would have ranked them in the upper third of the country. I manually ran (that's right, I make the moderate bucks for data entry too, baby) the sack rates last year too, and they also hold up - Oregon State would have been second in the conference by sack rate.
All of that is to say that after a somewhat understandably rusty performance -- alarming, but understandably so -- the Cal OL will have a lot to prove this week, both on the ground and in pass protection.
And besides - the Beavers are likely thinking that they're getting close. Rashed hasn't performed up to his own lofty, previously set standards so far, but he and the Beavers have still 26 total hurries between them. It's only a matter of time. They've nearly knocked off both teams they've played so far, and arguably should have beat UW if it wasn't for a questionable spot.
3) Tackling - In a word last week, horrendous. Deng has always had some trouble here (PFF counted 21 missed tackles from him last year and an average of a miss every 6 attempted tackle, which put him at 12th among 23 Pac-12 LBs by snap last year. Weaver, predictably, led the conference with a miss every 10 tackles; the worst graded player here was ASU's Khaylan Kearse-Thomas at one miss every 4.4 tackle attempts), but seeing Tattersall and even the normally reliable Elijah Hicks struggle in this category was incredibly discouraging. You can cut them a little slack for the body clock stuff. Fine.
But the Beavers won't. You can bet that offensive coordinator Brian Lindgren - who, if you'll remember, schemed Oregon State to an upset win over the Bears last year - will be licking his chops, and he consistently places his guys into good positions to make plays. Quarterback Tristan Gebbia doesn't look tremendously talented or threatening, but Jermar Jefferson is the conference's 2nd leading rusher after Jarek Broussard right now and has forced 11 missed tackles on 44 rushes. He's your one to watch when Oregon State has the ball.
4) Nose Watch - And speaking of guys to watch -- all eyes are now on Big Stan McKenzie on the other side. With Aaron Maldonado out for the season, the Bears are back to playing BRETT JOHNSON(!) out of position, walk-on Erick Nisich, and McKenzie, who may or may not be cleared for play. Can the Bears get by with JOHNSON at the nose? Absolutely - and he did a great job against the Bruins yet again. But the best version of this defense will have JOHNSON playing end, and McKenzie's fitness - or lack thereof - will play a big role in unlocking that.
The staff believes he is ready to play immediately. How much he can bring on Saturday, or going forward, will have a chain reaction up and down the defense. Watch Big 58, is all I'm saying. If he can take 15-20 snaps, that's 15-20 plays you can move JOHNSON to his more natural spot. If not, they'll roll with BRETT and he'll do BRETT things as usual. (The defensive line was truly the only bright spot on both sides of the ball.)
5) Mental - A lot of questions here. Was last week's game against UCLA simply Cal being exposed? Are they not really contenders after all? Or do you simply point to that 34-10 as a confluence of freak events? Either way, the margin for error is gone if this season is to be as special as they hoped for.
I've long expressed confidence in Justin Wilcox as a steely-eyed, even-keeled leader - traits that seem like they would translate meaningfully in such a turbulent time. The season is on the brink here, as it will be again next week, and the one after that, too. How do they respond?
