California Holds On For 35-21 Victory Over Minnesota

The California Golden Bears had a hard time putting the Minnesota Gophers team away. I would like to say that the game was a battle of two teams duking it out, but it was quite the opposite.

California took the early lead in the game 14-0 on a 34-yard touchdown run and a two yard touchdown run. It looked like California was on its way for another blow out win, but hold your horses.

Minnesota came back with a questionable touchdown drive. On the play Eric Decker, who ran circles around the Bears corners, was able to come down with his foot barely in bounds for a 26-yard touchdown.

The play was reviewed because during the process of the play he was hit hard and knocked out of bounds. The ruling on the field was touchdown and the replay confirmed it, but the replay officials got it wrong.

First of all there's two things that the officials must determine/; whether Decker's foot was inbounds and the second and most important part is if he had possesion. It was clear that Decker was able to get a foot down inbounds, but he did not have full possession.

When he was hit by the Cal defender the ball popped up, therefore negating possession when he had the foot inbounds. So in order for him when he was in the air going out of bounds he would have had to establish his foot inbounds again, something he did not do.

He did not gain full possession of the ball until after he had fallen to the ground out of bounds. Therefore it should have been an incomplete pass with Minnesota attempting a field goal because the catch was on a third down play.

The Bears did answer back to the score with another touchdown run by Best. So, Cal lead 21-7.

But, Minnesota was able to score thanks to a penalty that shouldn't have even been called because both the calls were wrong. Cal was punting Isi Sofele went after the punt returner who did not signal fair catch and he hit him hard just as the returner caught the ball.

The first penalty that was called on Soefele was interference with the catch which, was clearly wrong if the NCAA still had the halo rule. But it doesn't so the player only has to allow for the punt returner to catch the ball, which is exactly what Sofele did.

Then the officials called Soefele for a helmet-to-helmet hit, when all it was was a big hit. On the play the Gophers' returner fumbled the ball. Instead of Cal picking up a fumble the Gophers got excellent position, which led to another touchdown.

So, that made the score 21-14 and that's how it remained at half time.

In the third quarter there was only one scoring drive for either team and that was for the Gophers who tied the game up at 21-21. The Bears offense fell asleep. The only play that was anything positive for the Bears was a pass to Jahvid Best that called back for holding, which there was no hold on the play.

There was another questionable call that happened a pass interference call on the Bears, when replays show that the Cal defender didn't even touch the receiver luckily for the Bears that penalty didn't hurt them and the Gophers ended up punting.

In the third the Bears offense did absolutely nothing, going three and out four times with Best only touching the ball twice. He had 13 carries at half time.

California finally woke up in the fourth quarter. Best scored two more touchdowns in that period as well. One a two yarder and the other a one yarder.

Jeremy Ross made two big plays on the first scoring drive in the fourth quarter for the Bears.

Anthony Miller on the second scoring drive made an outsanding one-handed catch to get the Bears to the eight yard line. Kevin Riley also had a huge play on a 4th and inches by getting the Bears a first down.

As for the overall game itself the Bears played marginally. There were careless mistakes on the defensive side as well as too conservative on the playcalling on the offensive side. If the Bears come out with the type of effort that started from the second quarter to the middle of the fourth quarter the Bears have no shot against USC or maybe even Oregon.

As for the overall grade for the Bears today it was a C.

There were four players that really played well the whole game: Jahvid Best, Sy'Quan Thompson, Tyson Alaulu, and Mike Mohamed.