Cal's Glorious Football Weekend Ends in Disappointment

Cal was about to put the cherry on top on what would be the greatest weekend in recent memory for Golden Bears football, possibly a transformational Saturday for the Cal football program.

Calgorithm, Cal’s online community, had become a national phenomenon with its influence and satirical humor this week. The first ESPN College GameDay ever at Cal had been a huge success Saturday morning, with thousands of students lining up in the middle of the night to attend the popular show, with a Cal kid winning $100,000 for making a field goal. Record donation amounts were pouring into the Cal NIL collective.

And here was Cal on Saturday night, before its first home sellout crowd for a non-Big Game in 11 years, with a ton of recruits in attendance, holding a 35-10 lead with 8:06 left in the third quarter against eighth-ranked Miami, in position for a huge upset.  It would be Cal’s first victory over a top-10 team since Cal defeated No. 8 Washington State 37-3 in 2017. But it seemed bigger than that because this was Miami, a football giant that had won five national titles, is located 2,600 miles away, was led by Heisman Trophy contender Cam Ward, and was a 10-point favorite.

And the hero of this monumental Cal win would be quarterback Fernando Mendoza, who had completed four passes of more than 50 yards, and no one knew when or if a Cal quarterback had ever done that before. And Mendoza was from Miami, had attended University of Miami football camps as a high school player, hoping to get a scholarship offer from Miami, then coached by Manny Diaz, only to be told that maybe he could walk-on.

Yet Mendoza refused to bad mouth the Hurricanes.

He had joined forces this year with a Berkeley restaurant to establish the Mendoza Burrito, with proceeds going to the National MS Society because multiple sclerosis had stricken his mother, who, along with Mendoza’s father, had made the trip from Miami to attend Saturday night’s game.

Everything had lined up.

Then the story had a surprise ending, a tragic ending for Cal players, coaches and fans.

Miami outscored Cal 29-3 the rest of the way, scoring the go-ahead touchdown with 37 seconds left. Cal lost 39-38, and the crowd and Cal players and coaches were stunned.

“What is the mood?” Cal coach Justin Wilcox said afterward. “As bad as you can imagine.”

You can look at the fourth-quarter stats to explain it, because in that quarter Miami outgained Cal 276 yards ro 26, had 11 first downs to two for the Bears, was 2-for-4 on third downs and 2-for-2 on fourth downs while Cal was 0-for-4 on third downs and 0-for-1 on fourth down in the quarter.

The overall stats for the game indicated Miami had outplayed Cal. The Bears finished with just 47 rushing yards, including 2 rushing yards by Jaydn Ott.

But Ott had scored on a 66-yard pass reception on a gutsy fourth-and-1 play from the Cal 34-yard line midway through the second quarter that helped Cal to a 21-10 halftime lead.

And by the time Cal’s Nohl Williams turned his fifth interception of the season into a touchdown and backup quarterback Chandler Rogers scored on a 9-yard touchdown run, the Bears held that 25-point lead seven minutes into the third quarter.

Yet they lost, partly because of the wizardry of Ward, who enhanced his Heisman bid, and partly because Cal could not complete its magical weekend.

If the Bears’ 14-9 loss to Florida State in their previous game was a gut punch, this one was a Mike Tyson left hook to the jaw that flattened Cal, who will need all its will to get off the canvas for next week’s game at Pittsburgh.

And to make matters worse controversy invaded Cal’s loss.  For the second week in a row a controversial officiating decision in the closing minutes helped Miami stay unbeaten.  This time it was a possible targeting call that was not made.

On a third-and-12 play from the Cal 42-yard line with two minutes remaining, Mendoza scrambled for 4 yards before being dealt a vicious hit by Miami’s Wesley Bissainthe.  When replays on the big screen in the stadium suggested Bissainthe might have delivered a targeting blow to Mendoza, who was injured on the play, the crowd roared with the expectation of a penalty that would give Cal a first down at the Miami 39-yard line with 1:50 remaining.

But a video review indicated that targeting was not evident, and Miami scored the game-winning touchdown after receiving Cal’s resulting punt.