Any Cal Football history video that starts with Holmoe does sound appealing.

Oh, wait, Holmoe did beat USC, not once, but TWICE, even once in the LA Coliseum (a game I attended), something that, to the best of my recollection, no other Cal coach has done since Coach Mike White (1975 and 1977, I think). Please someone fact check me.

Go Bears!

Personal life
Holmoe is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, converting from Lutheranism six years after leaving BYU.[url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Holmoe#cite_note-fleming20191001-8][8][/url]He lives in Provo, Utah, with his wife Lori and their four children. Holmoe's brother, Steve, a physical education teacher and assistant football coach at Glendale High School, was a strong safety at UCLA before sustaining a career-ending injury.
Head coaching record
Year
Team
Overall
Conference
Standing
Bowl/playoffs
California Golden Bears (Pacific-10 Conference) (19972001)
1997
California
38
17
9th

1998
California
56
35
7th

1999
California
07*
05*
T6th

2000
California
38
26
T8th

2001
California
110
08
10th

California:
1239
6-31

Total:
1239

*Cal finished 47 (35 in conference), but later vacated the wins due to use of ineligible players


https://calbears.com/sports/football/schedule/1997 Lost to USC in Berkeley 27 - 17

https://calbears.com/sports/football/schedule/1998 Beat USC in L.A. 32-31

https://calbears.com/sports/football/schedule/1999 Beat USC at Cal 17 - 7

https://calbears.com/sports/football/schedule/2000 Beat USC in L.A. 28 - 16

https://calbears.com/sports/football/schedule/2001 Lost to USC 55 - 14 in Barkeleyffi

This was difficult to do and the links above do not work now to change each year.
The asterisks for 1999 probably indicate that Cal's victory over USC that year as being vacated for some reason, which would get Cal down to two wins over USC in five years, the stat you came up with.

Wow! Great research Gobears49! Job well done.

So, Tom Holmoe beat U$C three years in a row (at least on the field), twice in a row in LA! That is awesome even if those were not U$C's glory years. Gas any other Cal Football coach done that in the last 60 years?

I was working in LA and attended the Cal's victory over the condoms in 1988 and 2000. It was glorious to beat the arrogant U$C in twice in a row in their home (there were a lot U$C alums in my work in LA and it was nice to make them shut up).

Tom Holmoe was a nice guy who had little success as a Cal Head Coach (other than beating U$C three years in a row), but gad proven to be a very capable Athletic Director.

Here is a lit more about Tom Holmoe (maybe, too much, but here it is):
. Early years in La Crescenta (in the foothills just north of Glendale and a good distance north of LA).
. I believe his father was a barber in the La Crescenta area.
. Although there were considerable number of active LDS members in the area, Tom Holmoe and his family were not LDS.
. Mt. Vista Elementary School, Rosemont Jr. High School and Crescenta Valley High School (all in La Crescenta (I know because one of my kids went to those three exact schools).
. DB at BYU on a Football Scholarship
. DB with 49ers and Super Bowl win
. Later DB Coach with 49ers
. Defensive Coordinator at Cal under Steve Marriucci (sp?) (one year) .
. Became Head Coach at Cal per Steve M's recommendation after Steve M took the 49ers Head Coaching job (Carmen Policy took Steve M away from Cal to become 49ers head coach even though either Carmen Policy or Eddie DeBartelo's daughter was a student at Cal, one of them made a decent donation to Cal to make up for taking away Steve M. from cal).
. Tom Homoe did not win much as Cal's Head Coach (except beating U$C)
. After being fired as Cal's Head, Tom Holmoe took an Athletic Department administrative job at his alma matter BYU. Tom Holmoe proved to be a much better administrator than a Football Head Coach.
. Somehow, when the BYU AD vacancy came up, Tom Holmoe was at the right place at the right time and he has been their AD for close to 20 years.
. Wishing him and his family the best.

Go Bears!

Only at Cal would we call a video entitled "The fall of Cal football "very good".

The title would be accurate if it started with Tedford's third season.

calbear80 said:

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Wow! Great research Gobears49! Job well done.

So, Tom Holmoe beat U$C three years in a row (at least on the field), twice in a row in LA! That is awesome even if those were not U$C's glory years. Gas any other Cal Football coach done that in the last 60 years?

I was working in LA and attended the Cal's victory over the condoms in 1988 and 2000. It was glorious to beat the arrogant U$C in twice in a row in their home (there were a lot U$C alums in my work in LA and it was nice to make them shut up).

Tom Holmoe was a nice guy who had little success as a Cal Head Coach (other than beating U$C three years in a row), but gad proven to be a very capable Athletic Director.

Here is a lit more about Tom Holmoe (maybe, too much, but here it is):
. Early years in La Crescenta (in the foothills just north of Glendale and a good distance north of LA).
. I believe his father was a barber in the La Crescenta area.
. Although there were considerable number of active LDS members in the area, Tom Holmoe and his family were not LDS.
. Mt. Vista Elementary School, Rosemont Jr. High School and Crescenta Valley High School (all in La Crescenta (I know because one of my kids went to those three exact schools).
. DB at BYU on a Football Scholarship
. DB with 49ers and Super Bowl win
. Later DB Coach with 49ers
. Defensive Coordinator at Cal under Steve Marriucci (sp?) (one year) .
. Became Head Coach at Cal per Steve M's recommendation after Steve M took the 49ers Head Coaching job (Carmen Policy took Steve M away from Cal to become 49ers head coach even though either Carmen Policy or Eddie DeBartelo's daughter was a student at Cal, one of them made a decent donation to Cal to make up for taking away Steve M. from cal).
. Tom Homoe did not win much as Cal's Head Coach (except beating U$C)
. After being fired as Cal's Head, Tom Holmoe took an Athletic Department administrative job at his alma matter BYU. Tom Holmoe proved to be a much better administrator than a Football Head Coach.
. Somehow, when the BYU AD vacancy came up, Tom Holmoe was at the right place at the right time and he has been their AD for close to 20 years.
. Wishing him and his family the best.

Go Bears!

---

It was Bill Walsh that recommended his former player and Stanford coach Holmoe to Mariucci in '96 and when Mariucci pushed back on bringing him for his staff on the Niners, even though he was a former Niner, due to his horrific worst in the country defense, it was Walsh that recommended him as Cal's coach.

OC Hue Jackson would have been the better gamble and maintained "continuity." Might have even flipped a few USC commits.

calbear80 said:

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Any Cal Football history video that starts with Holmoe does sound appealing.

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I laughed out loud.

Econ141 said:

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Only at Cal would we call a video entitled "The fall of Cal football "very good".

The title would be accurate if it started with Tedford's third season.

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It was a good description of the facts.

calbear80 said:

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Any Cal Football history video that starts with Holmoe does sound appealing.

Oh, wait, Holmoe did beat USC, not once, but TWICE, even once in the LA Coliseum (a game I attended), something that, to the best of my recollection, no other Cal coach has done since Coach Mike White (1975 and 1977, I think). Please someone fact check me.

Go Bears!

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You do Cal Football history without mentioning Joe, then it's simply incomplete at best, or a big miss at worst (let alone that Roth lead them to a share of the conference title, so that team deserves mention too.) They go much further back than Joe whenever a Notre Dame story is told...Even UCLA wouldn't include a story telling without going back to Gary Beban, a decade before Joe.
Joe's story is one of the best in college football history, certainly better than Rudy. He was the best player never to play in the NFL....

Actually, the records that I found (which were hard to find) show Holmoe's Bears beating USC THREE TIMES, but for some unexplained reason one year's victory was changed to a Trojan win.

calbear80 said:

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Any Cal Football history video that starts with Holmoe does sound appealing.

Oh, wait, Holmoe did beat USC, not once, but TWICE, even once in the LA Coliseum (a game I attended), something that, to the best of my recollection, no other Cal coach has done since Coach Mike White (1975 and 1977, I think). Please someone fact check me.

Go Bears!

---

The 1998 Cal victory over USC was strange. It was a comeback win that began with a penalty on a nullified Petros Papadakis 70 yard TD run. The penalty happen 20 yards back and had no bearing on the play. USC's fragile mindset shattered and Cal began to score at will.

Holmoe is a nice guy who was a bad football coach. The overwhelming image of the Holmoe years was Kyle Boller, hands raised in the air, waiting for the coaching staff to give him a play before we ended up with a penalty. Boller was a good QB hampered by bad coaching until Tedford took him under his wing.

calumnus said:

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It was Bill Walsh that recommended his former player and Stanford coach Holmoe to Mariucci in '96 and when Mariucci pushed back on bringing him for his staff on the Niners, even though he was a former Niner, due to his horrific worst in the country defense, it was Walsh that recommended him as Cal's coach.

OC Hue Jackson would have been the better gamble and maintained "continuity." Might have even flipped a few USC commits.

---

Looking back, the reason Holmoe lasted 5 years at Cal is the same reason Wilcox has lasted 7 years. The Cal fan base is very forgiving and will do mental gymnastics to rationalized bad performances. During the Holmoe tenure, in the previous incarnation of this board, there was a sizeable group of posters that would attack any poster remotely critical of Holmoe. Their chief argument was that 'continuity' would solve any issues with Holmoe. This group got so vocal that the few dissenters began to labeled them as the 'continuity' police.

We don't know how much money our athletic department is losing, but if we don't do better on the field to bring in more fans, things could be ugly very quickly.

As far as I'm concerned I think it is game over. There is no meaningful change forthcoming. Lyons has not found reason to fire Knowlton (McKeever scandal looks to be stalled or buried after years of investigation) and cannot fire him or Wilcox without cause due to the bad contracts and extensions put in place. I'm not sure Lyons even understands how bad Knowlton is because I keep seeing the latter in many pictures of cal athletics events smiling and beaming like he has not a concern in the world.

On top of that, if we have 1-4 strong seasons including making the CFP, how does that change the 100+ years of futility that has been Cal football? All of a sudden the networks will think that the Bay area is the bastion of college football?

I am going to enjoy the hell out of cal football games for however long the ACC lasts because I think it written on the wall that we will be relegated out of the super league.

Econ141 said:

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Only at Cal would we call a video entitled "The fall of Cal football "very good".

The title would be accurate if it started with Tedford's third season.

---

Tedford's 3rd season we went 10-1 regular season and even with a bowl loss after having been screwed out of the Rose Bowl, we finished in the top 10, which would be the 2nd best finish in 60 years (only behind the '91 team that finished #7).

Tedford's 5th season we went 10-3 overall (7-2 in conference) and while it was disappointing that we didn't win the conference outright (that damn UoA game...) and go to the Rose Bowl, we did claim a share of the conference title and finished the season ranked 14th.

2007 we were ranked all the way up to #2, we're primed to be #1 and Oregon State happened.

2008 we opened the season unranked, finished ranked 25th. Perfectly solid year, not great, but good.

I think you have to wait until the end of 2009 (UW and the Poinsettia Bowl) and then 2010 to make your Tedford assertion.

This graphic illustrates the downfall of cal football. I think the end is quite interesting...all of those teams have shown wide ranging success in CFB and will be part of the super league. I had no idea that UCLA has done quite well throughout the years.

Very cool video by @BetweenTheNums of all-time @AP_Top25 rankings. Duke had the most thru 1941 but couldn’t hold onpic.twitter.com/klljONjT81

— Brett McMurphy (@Brett_McMurphy) August 22, 2024

Gobears49 said:

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Any connection of good, Cal Football and Ho;moe seems suspect.

Econ141 said:

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As far as I'm concerned I think it is game over. There is no meaningful change forthcoming. Lyons has not found reason to fire Knowlton (McKeever scandal looks to be stalled or buried after years of investigation) and cannot fire him or Wilcox without cause due to the bad contracts and extensions put in place. I'm not sure Lyons even understands how bad Knowlton is because I keep seeing the latter in many pictures of cal athletics events smiling and beaming like he has not a concern in the world.

On top of that, if we have 1-4 strong seasons including making the CFP, how does that change the 100+ years of futility that has been Cal football? All of a sudden the networks will think that the Bay area is the bastion of college football?

I am going to enjoy the hell out of cal football games for however long the ACC lasts because I think it written on the wall that we will be relegated out of the super league.

---

He has been on the job less than 2 months, and he hasn't fired anyone...wow, you mean, kind of like how it often works in the real world?
What Lyons has said and talked about in terms of Cal sports is unprecedented in Cal history....maybe things won't change, sure, but you can't deny that this is a whole new world...let alone the external changing factors.
If Knowlton is nothing but a lacky for Lyons, that's what matters in the short run. Yes, he should be gone. But again, because facts matter: Lyons has reached out directly to boosters.

No doubt Rich Lyons, as our new UC Berkeley Chancellor, has more than enough UC Berkeley tasks to work on before he can swftly address all Cal athletic department needs I am interested in. Perhaps in the near future he will address them after I bring them to his attention.

I do think, however, it couldn't hurt, and should not take up much time to have Cal to indicate to ESPN that Cal would like to host ESPN's College GameDay broadcast as soon as Cal's record justifys that invitation. I have read that Cal once was once offeredd to participate in that TV broadcast but turned it down. Can't find the quote that supports that but it is clear that Cal is one of the few larger colleges to have never hosted College GameDay.

https://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/40907460/what-college-gameday-espn-history-hosts-guests-stats

"Which school has hosted 'College GameDay' the most?
Ohio State has hosted the most times, with 23 outings.
Which Power Four schools haven't hosted 'College GameDay'?
GameDay has visited every Power Four campus with the exceptions of Illinois, Maryland, Rutgers, Syracuse, Virginia and California."

I have a number of relatively small potential other UC Berkeley tasks to bring to Mr. Lyons attention, but if I do so it will likely be after this upcoming football season.

Gobears49 said:

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No doubt Rich Lyons, as our new UC Berkeley Chancellor, has more than enough UC Berkeley tasks to work on before he can swftly address all Cal athletic department needs I am interested in. Perhaps in the near future he will address them after I bring them to his attention.

I do think, however, it couldn't hurt, and should not take up much time to have Cal to indicate to ESPN that Cal would like to host ESPN's College GameDay broadcast as soon as Cal's record justifys that invitation. I have read that Cal once was once offeredd to participate in that TV broadcast but turned it down. Can't find the quote that supports that but it is clear that Cal is one of the few larger colleges to have never hosted College GameDay.

https://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/40907460/what-college-gameday-espn-history-hosts-guests-stats

"Which school has hosted 'College GameDay' the most?
Ohio State has hosted the most times, with 23 outings.
Which Power Four schools haven't hosted 'College GameDay'?
GameDay has visited every Power Four campus with the exceptions of Illinois, Maryland, Rutgers, Syracuse, Virginia and California."

I have a number of relatively small potential other UC Berkeley tasks to bring to Mr. Lyons attention, but if I do so it will likely be after this upcoming football season.

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I can tell you Lyons talking to ESPN would have little to do with their future decisions. But I can also tell you that there is no lack of interest in bringing Gameday to Cal.
My own opinion is the Gameday appearance is a very short term "boost," for lack of a better term, for the hosting University. The most important part factor is the reason you hope for it in the first place: that the season performance is on a high level...