Because the Cal soccer crew travels east for the third time already this season to face No. 22 Pitt on Saturday afternoon, the Golden Bears have to pack their working sport for the journey.
It actually was absent final Saturday when the Bears misplaced 39-38 to unbeaten Miami after forging a 25-point lead.
Cal’s floor sport points begin with working again Jaydn Ott’s almost season-long nagging ankle harm. However that’s removed from the entire story.
If the Bears (3-2, 0-2 ACC) hope to upend the stunning Panthers (5-0, 1-0) for his or her first-ever Atlantic Coast Convention victory, they’ll have to current a extra balanced offensive assault.
Towards the Hurricanes, quarterback Fernando Mendoza handed for 285 yards and two touchdowns and triggered 4 performs of fifty yards or extra — one thing no Cal crew has achieved in no less than 12 years, together with Jared Goff’s three prolific seasons.
However three working backs — Ott, Jaivian Thomas and Kadarius Calloway — totaled simply 23 yards mixed on 15 rushes, a meager common of 1.5 yards per try. 9 of their 15 runs produced 1 yard or much less. Ott completed with a career-low 2 dashing yards.
Every week earlier, Miami gave up 206 yards on the bottom towards Virginia Tech.
“The running game, it was a struggle,” Cal coach Justin Wilcox conceded. “We couldn’t get much going, kind of our traditional run game. The biggest challenge was up front. We’ve got to find ways to run the ball more effectively.”
It’s been a problem a lot of the season. Cal is 96th nationally at 131.2 dashing yards per sport — 40 yards per sport fewer than a yr in the past.
Their incapacity to maintain drives and run clock with the lead towards Miami left the Bears on the quick finish of a dramatic 86-to-49 discrepancy in complete performs. That led to the protection tiring within the fourth quarter, when the Canes outgained Cal 278 yards to 26 and scored 21 factors.
“It’s very, very difficult to win when the play count is nearly double for the other team,” Wilcox stated. “We had some (big-play) shots, but we’ve got to get more out of our normal down and distance.”
Ott, who rushed for 1,315 yards a yr in the past, injured his ankle within the opener towards UC Davis and has by no means discovered a rhythm. He scored on a 66-yard go play and a 5-yard run towards Miami, then apparently aggravated the ankle and noticed restricted motion within the second half.
Wilcox listed Ott as possible to play this week.
Cal additionally has performed all however a part of one sport with out guard Sioape Vatikani — maybe the crew’s finest offensive lineman — who missed time early resulting from a foot ailment and is questionable to play Saturday after struggling a neck or head harm at Florida State final month.
In an effort to create some range of their offense, Cal used No. 2 quarterback Chandler Rogers situationally towards Miami. Rogers, who rushed for 900 yards in earlier stops at Louisiana-Monroe and North Texas, scored on a 9-yard keeper towards Miami and accomplished a 12-yard go for a primary down throughout one other scoring drive.
“I wanted to package Chandler in there and knew it was going to be tough sledding running the football,” offensive coordinator Mike Bloesch stated. “He can give us some versatility, we can do some different things in the run game and he did a great job.”
Bloesch stated Rogers — who additionally handed for almost 3,400 yards with 29 touchdowns final season at North Texas — can be a part of the Bears’ sport plans going ahead.
“It felt good to be back out there, contributing to the team, trying to win a ballgame,” Rogers stated. “I know I can add value to the team, open the playbook more with different types of runs. Anything to help the team win is what I want to do.”
Initially Revealed: October 10, 2024 at 5:45 a.m.
