Where to Start?
This question is almost as easy as it was to stop Cal's Offense yesterday. Bill Musgrave, it is time to hang it up. Not only did we play and lose to a team that was giving up 507 total yards and 43 points a game... We only accumulated 297 yards (which includes 35 rushing yards against the worst team in FBS) and 13 points. The Offense was so inefficient that Cal should have left him in Boulder. The offensive line was getting manhandled, the running backs had no room to run, and Plummer was rarely given more than 2 seconds to do anything with the ball. I want to remind everyone we had 2 weeks to prepare for this team and we laid a giant egg.
The next item of concern is the red zone offense. The defense and special team set up our offense for success multiple times by giving us the ball in Colorado's territory or close to it. Cal converted 3-5 times in the red zone, with 2 field goals and 1 touchdown. That is unacceptable, especially against a defense as bad as Colorado's. You have a top 3 running back in the Pac-12 and long, athletic WRs. It should almost be automatic to get in the back of the end zone with the skill players we have. Again, we had 2 weeks to prepare for this team.
I will give props to our defense yesterday. They did their job by limiting Colorado on offense most of the day until Cal's offense forced them to get on the field immediately after stopping them. Do I wish we could have held them better? Yes, but if the offense was finishing their drives and not messing up the defense would have been fine. My only complaint is the lack of pressure being put on the QB. That was a true freshman taking snaps the least you could have done is gotten in the backfield to rattle him a little bit.
Cal is behind the 8 ball with conference realignment. The poor football play does nothing to help the situation. We need someone to come in and bring life back into the school and the program as we have fallen so far from the days of being competitive. There is so much talent in a 50-mile radius of the campus that it is embarrassing we are not more consistent on the football field.
Lastly, if Wilcox wants to save his job changes need to be made. Before the game, I had his seat temperature at 6.5/10... it is now looking to be a 9/10. Clearly, the program is staying in a mediocre purgatory with Wilcox. Excluding the 2020 Covid year Coach Wilcox has averaged 6 wins in 4 years, and this will likely be another 6-win year if we are lucky. Cal is in need of a huge change. The talent is there but the execution is not. We may need to clean house by the end of the season before it gets worse. Just once more if Cal fans are still on board with our coaching staff. We had 2 weeks to prepare against a team that fired their head coach last week.