Without divine intervention against Minnesota (muffed punt), BC (dropped TD pass followed by an end zone int) and UNC (fumble into the end zone) … we're 2-5.
0-5 against Power 4 teams.

15-2, baby!

Do you mean divine intervention in the persons of Luke Ferrellli, Paco Austin, et. al.? Or are you invoking a higher power who keeps tabs on his wins and losses?
GO BEARS!

the football gods have smiled on us in big moments for the most part

and had dozens of little chuckles along the way (drops) at our expense / to make things interesting

Cal football deserves some luck after being one of the most snakebitten programs in the modern era.

Last year we were unlucky, this year lucky but it all winds up 6-6

Did the goal line stand where Mikey Mohammed pick against furd in 2009 bring joy? How about Sonny Dykes 6 play goal line stand against Utah in 2016? Why can't yesterday's 1 foot strip be joyful?

Anarchistbear said:

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Last year we were unlucky, this year lucky but it all winds up 6-6

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With a large enough sample size, luck (or the lack thereof) gets evened out. At this point, it's clear that Wilcox is nothing more than a 5-7 or 6-6 coach. Once in a while he might finish 7-5, and once in a while he might finish 4-8, but the only way we finish something like 8-4 will be due to variance.

JSC 76 said:

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Without divine intervention against Minnesota (muffed punt), BC (dropped TD pass followed by an end zone int) and UNC (fumble into the end zone) … we're 2-5.
0-5 against Power 4 teams.

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The muffed punt may have been lucky but the INT and the forced fumble were great defensive plays.

Were the other teams lucky that our WRs have dropped 20+ Sagapolutele passes delivered into their breadbaskets?

bearister said:

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Were the other teams lucky that our WRs have dropped 20+ Sagapolutele passes delivered into their breadbaskets?

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It's only lucky if it's something fortuitious that happens unexpectedly. In the case of our WRs, since they reliably drop passes, no, the other teams didn't get lucky

burritos said:

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Did the goal line stand where Mikey Mohammed pick against furd in 2009 bring joy? How about Sonny Dykes 6 play goal line stand against Utah in 2016? Why can't yesterday's 1 foot strip be joyful?

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The thing is that Mohamed's pick came against a Stanford team that was actually quite good. It was the capper of a tough battle between two good teams, plus a heated rivalry game to boot.

BC and UNC in 2025 are not that.

I will give that the Minnesota game was a generally well-played affair that turned on a break that went Cal's way. I was happy after that game.

bearister said:

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Were the other teams lucky that our WRs have dropped 20+ Sagapolutele passes delivered into their breadbaskets?

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A friend of mine who is sort of a Cal fan Sent me an email this morning telling me that Cal was the luckiest team in the US damn dictation!!!

Oakbear said:

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A friend of mine who is sort of a cow fan Sent me an email this morning telling me that Cal was the luckiest team in the US

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cow fan?? dunno, who's that OB, tnx in advance.
ohh, apparenty the Dull As Shoot cows # Say No Ms
signed, native californian, born and raised (a bit)

Oakbear said:

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A friend of mine who is sort of a cow fan Sent me an email this morning telling me that Cal was the luckiest team in the US

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Was your friend aware that the other teams are lucky that our WRs have dropped 20+ Sagapolutele passes delivered into their breadbaskets?

sycasey said:

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burritos said:

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Did the goal line stand where Mikey Mohammed pick against furd in 2009 bring joy? How about Sonny Dykes 6 play goal line stand against Utah in 2016? Why can't yesterday's 1 foot strip be joyful?

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The thing is that Mohamed's pick came against a Stanford team that was actually quite good. It was the capper of a tough battle between two good teams, plus a heated rivalry game to boot.

BC and UNC in 2025 are not that.

I will give that the Minnesota game was a generally well-played affair that turned on a break that went Cal's way. I was happy after that game.

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Make a play against a good team, ego is intact. Need to make a play against an inferior team, ego is damaged. Got it.

burritos said:

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sycasey said:

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burritos said:

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Did the goal line stand where Mikey Mohammed pick against furd in 2009 bring joy? How about Sonny Dykes 6 play goal line stand against Utah in 2016? Why can't yesterday's 1 foot strip be joyful?

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The thing is that Mohamed's pick came against a Stanford team that was actually quite good. It was the capper of a tough battle between two good teams, plus a heated rivalry game to boot.

BC and UNC in 2025 are not that.

I will give that the Minnesota game was a generally well-played affair that turned on a break that went Cal's way. I was happy after that game.

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Make a play against a good team, ego is intact. Need to make a play against an inferior team, ego is damaged. Got it.

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How you win a game and the quality of the opponent matter, yes.

PAC-10-BEAR said:

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Oakbear said:

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A friend of mine who is sort of a cow fan Sent me an email this morning telling me that Cal was the luckiest team in the US

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Was your friend aware that the other teams are lucky that our WRs have dropped 20+ Sagapolutele passes delivered into their breadbaskets?

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Dropping passes is not luck

Jaydn Ott is well rested for a strong second half of the season.

JSC 76 said:

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Without divine intervention against Minnesota (muffed punt), BC (dropped TD pass followed by an end zone int) and UNC (fumble into the end zone) … we're 2-5.
0-5 against Power 4 teams.

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Good call outs

JSC 76 said:

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Without divine intervention against Minnesota (muffed punt), BC (dropped TD pass followed by an end zone int) and UNC (fumble into the end zone) … we're 2-5.
0-5 against Power 4 teams.

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San Diego State is not a Power 4 team. So we'd be 0-4 against P4, still 1-1 against G6 and 1-0 against FCS.

calumnus said:

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JSC 76 said:

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Without divine intervention against Minnesota (muffed punt), BC (dropped TD pass followed by an end zone int) and UNC (fumble into the end zone) … we're 2-5.
0-5 against Power 4 teams.

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San Diego State is not a Power 4 team. So we'd be 0-4 against P4, still 1-1 against G6 and 1-0 against FCS.

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What insight! If all the good things were actually bad things then we'd be bad! "If ifs were fifths we'd all be drunk."

ac_green33 said:

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calumnus said:

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JSC 76 said:

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Without divine intervention against Minnesota (muffed punt), BC (dropped TD pass followed by an end zone int) and UNC (fumble into the end zone) … we're 2-5.
0-5 against Power 4 teams.

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San Diego State is not a Power 4 team. So we'd be 0-4 against P4, still 1-1 against G6 and 1-0 against FCS.

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What insight! If all the good things were actually bad things then we'd be bad! "If ifs were fifths we'd all be drunk."

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In fairness to calumnus, he has been one of the biggest proponents of the "we coulda won 10 games last year if if if" theory, so at least he is consistently applying this in both directions, which is more than I can say about most people who pushed that narrative.

IMO, you are what your record says you are. If Cal "lucks" their way to 10 wins, by the end of the season, that is who we are. (I just want this evenly applied in both directions). That said, when we play poorly and barely beat awful teams and we have better teams coming up, I think that is a fair analysis (rather than we should be 2-5)

If Cal plays like they did against Minnesota, they can beat most of the teams on their schedule. If they play like they did in most of the other games, it's going to be a rough go.

We better see fired up Wilcox this week or one of those winnable games is going to be very very tough.

If the same "lucky" plays had happened to Cal instead of our opponents (Minn, BC, UNC), no one would be calling Cal unlucky, many would use it as clear objective evidence that Wilcox couldn't coach his guys up. All of a sudden Cal is a team with luck on its side? Sign me up.

Luck = when preparation meets opportunity.

As in all Paco's preparation met the opportunity of Leacock's weak hold on the ball.

That's luck.

SLTX Bear said:

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If the same "lucky" plays had happened to Cal instead of our opponents (Minn, BC, UNC), no one would be calling Cal unlucky, many would use it as clear objective evidence that Wilcox couldn't coach his guys up. All of a sudden Cal is a team with luck on its side? Sign me up.

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Well, that is just not true since that is exactly what many Cal fans and Ron Rivera did in reference to last year.

Would LOVE to "luck out" and eeke another ugly win Friday, get to 6-2/3-1 !

It would almost be more fun than winning big on the road...

BearlyCareAnymore said:

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We better see fired up Wilcox this week or one of those winnable games is going to be very very tough.

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Wilcox fired up?? LOL! When have you ever seen that in his 9 years at the head of our program? It's just not in his personality. He almost always looks like he's comatose.

Cal88 said:

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Would LOVE to "luck out" and eeke another ugly win Friday, get to 6-2/3-1 !

It would almost be more fun than winning big on the road...

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I think VT is more critical than that. VT and Stanford are the two toss up games left on the schedule. We will be underdogs against Virginia, Louisville and SMU. Win at VT and we have some confidence going forward, maybe even pull off an upset against Virginia, for example, lose and the wheels could come off with another 6-6 (4-5) finish more than likely. We could even lose to Stanford in that scenario. I think VT (like UNC) is a must win game.

BearlyCareAnymore said:

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ac_green33 said:

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calumnus said:

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JSC 76 said:

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Without divine intervention against Minnesota (muffed punt), BC (dropped TD pass followed by an end zone int) and UNC (fumble into the end zone) … we're 2-5.
0-5 against Power 4 teams.

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San Diego State is not a Power 4 team. So we'd be 0-4 against P4, still 1-1 against G6 and 1-0 against FCS.

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What insight! If all the good things were actually bad things then we'd be bad! "If ifs were fifths we'd all be drunk."

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In fairness to calumnus, he has been one of the biggest proponents of the "we coulda won 10 games last year if if if" theory, so at least he is consistently applying this in both directions, which is more than I can say about most people who pushed that narrative.

IMO, you are what your record says you are. If Cal "lucks" their way to 10 wins, by the end of the season, that is who we are. (I just want this evenly applied in both directions). That said, when we play poorly and barely beat awful teams and we have better teams coming up, I think that is a fair analysis (rather than we should be 2-5)

If Cal plays like they did against Minnesota, they can beat most of the teams on their schedule. If they play like they did in most of the other games, it's going to be a rough go.

We better see fired up Wilcox this week or one of those winnable games is going to be very very tough.

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Also, our losses last year in games that we developed big leads going into the 4th quarter through Fernando's passing were not bad luck. We lost because of the same bad coaching decision made over and over; trying to grind out a victory on the ground when we had little success running the ball in the game to that point. If we instead kept our foot on the gas we likely win going away and there's no close finish to get "unlucky" in.

This year our running game is worse, #131 in the country. Yet, in games where we had zero success on the ground all game, we had a couple big runs at the end that moved the chains and preserved victories. That is kind of lucky. (Luck being defined as success that is contrary to the odds).

calumnus said:

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Cal88 said:

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Would LOVE to "luck out" and eeke another ugly win Friday, get to 6-2/3-1 !

It would almost be more fun than winning big on the road...

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I think VT is more critical than that. VT and Stanford are the two toss up games left on the schedule. We will be underdogs against Virginia, Louisville and SMU. Win at VT and we have some confidence going forward, maybe even pull off an upset against Virginia, for example, lose and the wheels could come off with another 6-6 (4-5) finish more than likely. We could even lose to Stanford in that scenario. I think VT (like UNC) is a must win game.

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FWIW, UVA didn't look all that great last week. Unless there's manna from heaven, though, they'll still be favored against us.

I agree that VT is the crucial game, this week at least.