Washington State Cougars at California Golden Bears - Game updates

October 24, 12:51 PMCal Bears ExaminerRob Calonge

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As you probably already know by now, the Golden Bears' matchup with the Washington State Cougars isn't going to be televised. Don't worry though, because if you keep it here and refresh your page, I'll be updating you on the action throughout the game.

11:30 am

Jeeze! Where is everyone? Did I get the game time wrong? Let's see if the parking attendant can tell me what time the game starts...

Parking attendant: "Excited for this game?"

Me: "Where is everyone? Does the game start at 1:30 pm?"

Parking attendant [laughing]: "I know! I'm pissed because I've been here since 8:00 am!"

Well I guess I'm here on time.

12:20 pm

Washington State Cougars Examiner, Lew Wright, finds me starting this post. Great guy, but I think that he's in for a rough game. Who knows? Games aren't played on paper, right?

12:30 pm

Cal comes out on to the field for pre-game warm-ups. The thousand or so fans in the stadium cheer. Cal is wearing their blue jersey's and gold pants. What ever happened to the gold jerseys? The student section is set up nicely with the Golden Bear as the created picture from the colored placards.

12:55 pm

I saw Spencer Ladner on the field earlier taking passes from an offensive lineman and didn't think much of it. Ladner is suited up and warming up with the team. I spoke with Jonathan Okanes of Bay Area News Group who tells me that he practiced in full on Thursday. Wonder how much time he'll get today. Right now Cal is doing their pre-game stretching.

1:08 pm

With only three minutes left in the first quarter, Washington is up on #12 Oregon 3-0. From now until they've lost three games, Bear Backers need to be rooting against the Ducks.

1:18 pm

Jeremy Ross is starting at wide receiver along with Marvin Jones. The rest of the lineup is no different than it has been throughout the season. I could've swore that Nyan Boateng or Verran Tucker would be starting opposite Jones.

1:36 pm

The Cougars attempt a pooch kick, but Ross catches it from Cal's 17, finds a hole, and scampers to the Washington State 30 yard line. Two plays later, Riley hits Jahvid Best on a deep sideline toss for a touchdown. Giorgio Tavecchio gets the PAT and Cal is up 7-0 after only 52 seconds of play.

1:40 pm

Tavecchio kicks to the Cougars' 10-yard line, but Dwight Tardy returns it to the 48-yard line.

1:42 pm

The Cougars go nowhere after Tyson Alualu and Cameron Jordan sack Jeff Tuel. The Cougars punt it back to Cal who will start at their own 11. Media timeout...huh? This game isn't televised!

1:47 pm

Marvin Jones catches a 37-yard pass for another touchdown. That was the only pass on the drive. With 9:41 left in the first quarter, Cal leads 14-0 and Kevin Riley is 2-2 for 64 yards and two touchdowns.

1:50 pm

Chris Little just crushed Tardy on the kickoff return, losing his helmet in the process. The Cougars will begin at their own 33.

1:53 pm

Jeremy Ross returns the punt 76 yards for the touchdown. He pulled off a great spin move away from the gunner and then at about midfield broke away from a hand tackle and got enough blocking to take it the distance. There was a flag on the play, but it was holding on Washington State. The Cougars then ran into the kicker on the PAT. I wonder what the Vegas odds were on when Tedford would be clearing his bench? Cal 21-0 with 8:04 left in the first quarter.

(Syd'Quan Thompson is in the game, just not returning punts.)

2:07 pm

Wondering if the Cougars were going to do anything positive in this game, they began to move the ball--on Darrian Hagan. First, Tuel hit Jared Karstetter for 36 yards, then on third and seven, he passed to Jeffrey Solomon for 12 yards to get the Cougars on Cal's 14. Both passes were against Hagan. On first and 15 at the Cal 19, Tuel again passed to Solomon for 11 yards to get to Cal's eight yard line with Hagan covering.

They attempted an end zone play against Hagan, but the corner finally came out on top by breaking the pass up. The drive ended with Cal stopping Washington State at the two, forcing them to kick the field goal.

The Cougars then kicked off out of bounds, giving Cal the ball at their own 40-yard line. With 2:20 to go in the first quarter, Cal leads 21-3.

2:09 pm

In 1:07, Cal took three plays to score another touchdown. Jahvid Best ran twice for 39 yards and then Riley threw his third touchdown pass in as many attempts by tossing a screen to Shane Vereen that went for 21 yards and the score. Cal is up 28-3 with 1:13 left in the first quarter...Oh brother!

2:16 pm

The first quarter is finally over. Washington State is about to punt it back to Cal after getting a personal foul for head slapping and then not being able to get a first down. Washington State looks beaten and they have zero energy.

Unfortunately, there's not much home field advantage that the Cougars can point to. The stands are far from full and the student section isn't close to being packed.

2:21 pm

Kevin Riley finally got his first incompletion of the day. He's 3-4 with three touchdowns on the day. We also finally got to see Bryan Anger for the first time today. Anger punted 43 yards and it wasn't returned. Odd formation on second down, Shane Vereen was the single back, Isi Sofele was at one wide reciever spot and then they attempted a fake end around. Another media timeout?

2:26 pm

Even more odd than the third media timeout that was just called was a 49-yard field goal attempt by Washington State that hit the crossbar and bounced back into the end zone. The missed field goal was set up by a 37 yard run by Carl Winston who got knocked out of bounds pretty hard by Brett Johnson. Both players got up flexing after the play.

Cal will resume possession at their 32 yard line.

2:30 pm

Jahvid Best rushes 61 yards for the touchdown. The Bears lead 35-3 and the question becomes when does Tedford start bringing in the backups? 11:15 left in the second quarter.

2:36 pm

The Cougars moved the ball from their own 29 to the Cal 40, before getting stopped. On the punt, Washington State committed two fouls and since Ross had to fair catch the kick at Cal's 11, the Golden Bears opted for a reckick from the 45. The second punt was downed at Cal's nine yard line.

2:47 pm

Jeff Tuel just threw a perfect strike for a 68-yard touchdown with Bryant Nnabuife covering. The touchdown throw was to wide receiver Johnny Forzani, making the score Cal 35, WSU 10.

2:51 pm

Thinking that Jeff Tedford should bring in his backups might be premature. Cal has been stopped twice in a row and the team has looked disinterested over the last 10 minutes of the ball game. Jahvid Best dropped a screen pass and Jeremy Ross dropped the first down throw. Riley has made only one bad throw all day and that was after going 3-3 for three touchdowns.

2:58 pm

Cal needs to get out of neutral. Washington State just drove the field capping off the drive with a touchdown pass to Gino Simmone with 33 seconds to go in the half. The score has gone from 35-3, to 35-17. This is now a game, unless the Bears get back on track soon.

3:05 pm

Cal makes good use of their 33 seconds. After a squib kick was returned to their 40, Riley threw to Anthony Miller, Marvin Jones, and then Miller again. Cal called a timeout with three seconds left so that Giorgio Tavecchio could attempt a 47 yarder. The field goal was blocked and the half finally ended.

The momentum has swung in favor of Washington State. It will be interesting to see what happens after a halftime chat with head coach Jeff Tedford.

3:27 pm

Halftime is over and it appears that the Cougars have a second-wind. They came out on the field and after having a team huddle, they all went over to the WSU fan section and got their crowd pumped.

This was followed up by the Cal crowd spelling at C-A-L.

3:30 pm

Darian Hagan was taken off the field after colliding with Chris Conte on a tackle. The Cougars ended up punting to the Bears on fourth and one. The punt was called for a fair catch by Ross at the Bears' 11.

3:39 pm

Cal isn't done scoring yet, thanks in large part to Kevin Riley. Riley took a snap, faked a handoff and ran for 11 yards on one play, then he went deep for 61 yards to Jeremy Ross to get the Bears to WSU's two yard line. The pass was perfectly thrown so that Ross would have to run under it and bring it down--which he did.

Unfortunately, on first and goal Riley missed an open Jahvid Best in the right flat for the score. So instead of passing it in, Riley handed the ball to Best and the Heisman candidate ran off right tackle untouched. With 11:07 left in the third, Cal leads the Cougars 42-17.

3:45 pm

Announced attendance is 54,978. Two words to describe that announcement - no way. My guess is in the mid-40's because there is too much bench space visible.

Cal finally stopped the Cougars without a first down on a series. Hagan was back in the game and he made a great shoe-string tackle on a running play for maybe a one-yard loss. Cal starts their next drive from their own 46.

3:52 pm

Due to the slow response time I'm getting from Examiner on these posts, I'm a little late in reporting Riley throwing an interception to WSU linebacker Myron Beck on Cal's drive. WSU couldn't do anything with the ball with Tuel getting sacked on first and third down plays. Tuel was also almost sacked on second down. Cameron Jordan got away with a trip for a sack and then Derrick Hill crushed the offensive middle and took down the freshman.

If there was anything negative for Cal, it's Derrick Hill being helped off the field following his sack. Right now, Cal is at midfield with a second and 19 play to come.

3:59 pm

Cal got as far as Washington State's 42-yard line before having to punt. On Anger's first punt, the ball sailed into the end zone, but there was a false start by D.J. Campbell. The ball was moved back five yards and Anger got another chance for a good punt--didn't work out that way. Anger punted the ball 25 yards out of bounds, allowing the Cougars to start from their own 22.

4:04 pm

The third quarter ends with WSU on their own 41 with third and two coming up. The score is 42-17, Cal.

4:11 pm

WSU moved the ball down within the redzone, but chose to go for it on fourth down instead of kicking the field goal. The play resulted with a Cameron Jordan sack to end the threat. The Cougars had a little help moving the ball. On a sideline pass to Jeffrey Solomon, Hagan ran up to him, tapped him with two hands and then watched the receiver run past him for 31 yards. Cal takes over at their own 23.

4:18 pm

Cal drives 77 yards on 8 plays and caps it off with a great seven-yard run by Shane Vereen. Vereen went off the right tackle, stopped on a dime, and then veered left where nobody wearing white was able to get to him. Cal leads 49-17 with 9:25 to go in the game.

4:33 pm

Cal leads 49-17 with 5:17 to go and yet another media timeout. The crowd boos again when it's announced. Cal has the ball at their own 18. This is my last post, the game is over...almost, and I need to get ready for interviews. I'm impressed with the Cougars toughness, but they don't have any discipline. This is probably why they aren't any good. They've committed over 10 penalties with at least four of them being personal fouls.

The one player on the Cougars that I'm most impressed with is freshman quarterback Jeff Tuel. The guy has been harassed all day by the Golden Bears and through it all, he has looked very good. If he gets some players around him, Washington State is going to get good quick.

Cal is now 5-2, 2-2 Pac-10 after this game. Sweeney comes in at quarterback and the Bears will probably score again before the game ends. They are now at the Cougars 43.

Thanks for checking in today. Check back later for more!