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Published Sep 5, 2022
Jesse Stewart's Monday Mailbag: Answering your Cal football questions
Jesse Stewart
Staff writer

As always, we have a chance for you guys to ask some questions and get some ideas off your chest and into print following one game and before the next.

Here is this week’s (smaller) mailbag as the Bears get set to face off against UNLV this Saturday.

The more questions you send in, the more questions get answered!

How concerning are our trenches? The offensive line didn’t push a smaller UC Davis line around. How’s the defensive line going to get more pressure?

I think there was certainly a reality check that happened for Cal at some point on Saturday. The Aggies definitely didn’t let themselves get pushed around, but yes, Cal has to find a way to dominate these matchups. But it’s also worth noting that UC Davis does not actually have a small/bad defensive line, especially for an FCS squad. I think overall there was more good than bad in the run game (Jaydn Ott did go over 100 yards after all), but there are some things with pass pro that need to be sorted out.

Defensively, I think they did fine. Two sacks on Saturday against a UC Davis team that really wasn’t going to even attempt to live downfield. Would it be nice to see that number go up? Yes, but it won’t until the Bears face a team with some real downfield threats.

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