Posted:
#1
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I think Cal is in for a rough year this year. Not only from a conference perspective (at a disadvantage for preparing for teams who have undergone exotic coaching changes leads to an unfamiliar prepping perspective as in past years with new coaching changes), but right from the start as well. Playing Nevada to open up the season, one would think that Cal should be able to over-power Nevada based on talent alone. I’m not so sure, and the negatives started in the offseason. After having one of the best defenses in the P-12 the past two years, Cal has taken some hits. They lost Tosh Lupoi from the staff, who had lured in three top recruits to make this defense even better. Those players eventually transferred. Cal hasn’t done much as of late, and a lot of that is due to the inability of the offense to keep the ball moving. They bring back wideout Allen, but have an inconsistent QB by the name of Zach Maynard who will be starting for the second year after a decent stint at Buffalo. They lost other key positions offensively, and also lost half of their defense, keep in mind a defense that was expected to have some rather decent recruits suiting up. The offense might get a bit better for Cal, but I can’t expect the defense to be as good as it has in recent years, also noting this will be the second year that Tedford’s focus is on the offensive side of the ball (he called plays last year). With Nevada, I think it’s fair to say that regardless of the name on the back of the jersey, Ault’s pistol offense works based on fitting the right personnel into the right scheme. Fajardo will be starting again, and the dual threat QB is coming off a season where he completed close to 70% of his passes, along with an average of almost 7 yards per carry. They return a RB who averaged 6/per on the ground, and also bring back Wimberly after absence last year (he was WAC ROY as a freshman). Defensively, the Pack has enough returning even though they lost a few key linebackers. The most important part here is they go up against Maynard and Allen with the best group of secondary members who return posting a top 25 defensive pass efficiency last year. Aside from that, this really comes down to scheme. Cal and Tedford have always been built to stop the Pac-12 offenses, your standard offenses so to say, and have not fared well in containing the pistol in recent years. Two years ago, Nevada stomped Cal 52-31 (Kaepernick ran for 148 and 3 TD’s). Last year, Prince ran for 163 out of the Pistol en route to a 31-14 win for UCLA. I guess what I’m thinking, lesser Cal defense missing some key personnel against unfamiliar offensive style with experience, all at the same time with the program not having success with it in the past leads me to believe that more than a TD favorite here is a bit too much to overcome. In addition, there are quite a few other things going on that could possibly pose a distraction to Cal, most notably, the opening day for a remodeled stadium. Last thing I will note, Cal hasn’t had this early of a start time (Noon) in over 2 years. Not saying that it will hurt, but getting teams out of the familiarity routine is something I will focus on to a greater degree. I think 11 is too much here, and I also think Cal is in for a rough season, given the tough task of having to prepare for umpteen different styles of play, and at the same time, other programs knowing to a greater extent what Tedford wants to do. I like the total here to go over as well, just opting with the points instead.
Nevada +11
GL
0
He said he liked OVER the total in the last sentence of his write-up.
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