Tuesday Presser: Lupoi, Somerville, Hutchings, Swinney and Jernigan On Syracuse Win

Three days after the Bears pulled out a tense 21-18 victory in their conference-opening game in Syracuse, the staff has had ample time to dissect what went right and wrong in Saturday’s win over a Syracuse team picked to finish 14^th in the ACC - two spots below the prediction for the Bears.

But before he got into an analysis of the game, head coach Tosh Lupoi wasted no time getting into sales mode to start his comments, knowing that their next opponent (Wagner) isn’t a big drawing card and trying to instill the thought that there’s no better place to be on a Saturday in the Bay Area.

“We're back at home this week, coast to coast,” Lupoi said. “So we got a rooted in the Bay game. Excited about that. Want everyone to come out, see all the special things the Bay has to offer. I mean, if I'm a high school coach within 100 miles from here, 100% I'm organizing, getting that team on the bus, and driving here to the game. What an awesome bonding environment! Get every single local high school here and their team.

“If I own a local business, super cool opportunity bonding event. Load up, load up your whole company. Come out here to the game and come create a special environment, just like when we played here last time. That sold-out environment was awesome. There's not a lot going on in the Bay this weekend either so you might as well come out, have a blast with us for kickoff.

“But we're just we just wrapped up our second day here, going into our Wagner prep and putting a huge focus on you versus you, and attacking the things that that we need to improve on. We got we got tons of improvement ahead of us, tons of growth. So really excited to see the way these guys have been attacking these last two days, and you know, approaching never swallowing the poisonous pill of success, and just because of the result of the game, we got what we want. But we got it the hard way.

“It was an awesome extension of our of our culture, and that's ultimately how the game was won. It wasn't won through through great execution, and that's what we want. We got to improve our execution, and got tons of things to address and improve. So thankful to have this awesome staff to help in that, and these players' hunger. I've been saying this for a long time, but there's a hungry team to improve and get better. So thankful and excited to see after two days of preparation the way they've attacked this process.”

In last week’s disappointing opening loss to UCLA, when adversity struck at 21-all in the fourth quarter, the defense folded and gave up three rushing TDs in quick succession to let the game get away from them in the Bears’ 45-24 loss. This week, when the chips were down, the defense stepped up in the end, especially safety Kingston Lopa‍, who hauled in his third of three interceptions on the day, taking it to the house for the game-winning score late in the fourth quarter on his way to being named the Walter Camp and Bednarik National Defensive Player of the Week, not to mention ACC Defensive Back of the Week.

“I think it was a team win,” Lupoi said. “Love some things that our offense is doing and progressing. They've been excellent in the red zone, scoring touchdowns, and from a special teams standpoint, the effort has been awesome. So it just goes back to overall, all our hard work puts us in position to to go compete and that's that's what we're guaranteed is we get the opportunity to compete when we work our butt off, but we've got to go execute.

“So, you know, from all three phases, there's some specific things that we've really addressed. That's how we approach every game, win or lose, is we debrief that game, we take the good, we take the poor, and then we take the growth. We call it GBG and that's the goal. You know, how do we attack these these specific things and grow from them?

“So, agree with you. There was just this tremendous resiliency with the defense and that's the goal. As an organization, we're starving for growth. So from week one to week two, there was some dramatic improvements on the defensive side of the ball. One of them that jumps out is tackling, and that was something that we committed to. Syracuse has a lot of good football players. There's there's quite a few NFL players on that team, in my opinion, and I think they got a bright future ahead.

“It's a tough offense to to defend and do a great job on defense. Incredible job on ST. So I think that that's the goal is to evaluate that growth. So answering your question, week one, week two, that was evident as far as the mental toughness. I wouldn't necessarily agree as far as week one. I didn't see any form of fold in that. What we did see is poor tackling and poor execution so there's some things addressed, and that's the goal that we just keep growing every week.”

There was a lot of optimism amongst many about the prospects for Cal’s offense this season with one of the nation’s top QBs returning after a stellar freshman season in soph Jaron Keawe Sagapolutele‍, a strong portal haul at receiver with Chase Hendricks‍, Ian Strong‍ and Cooper Perry‍, a talented tight end corps with Mason Mini returning and joined by portal addition Dorian Thomas‍ and talented frosh Taimane Purcell‍, not to mention a strong running back room led by Adam Mohammed‍, Carter Vargas‍, who had a tremendous fall camp and Ashten Emory‍ along with returning Anthony League‍. The talent and depth however has not translated to offensive production, with the Bears avering an anemic 17.5 yards per game heading into this weekend’s contest.

“I think there's no doubt in my mind, and I think there's no doubt in our opponent's mind that we have a lot of weapons there, so it's about not speaking in general as far as we got weapons or we got to get better. What exactly do we have to address and get better? I think that's what a great staff does. The benefit of having a five and a half hour plane flight is I graded every single snap in all three phases and created a cut up on all three phases, and then we get together as a staff and we do the same exact thing before we get to the players.

‘”Here's what we did good, here's what we did poor, and how do we grow?’

“I think Jordan Somerville is doing an awesome job, and I think he's got an open mind into seeing who we are, how we can utilize our personnel best, and when you dive into that film within the last two weeks, we've had seven balls with two hands from the eligible receiver (on the ball), you know it hits the hands and it's dropped. We've got to do that at a better level. We can't just say catch the ball. That’s a poor coaching point. So how do we make that better? How do we create distraction drills and popouts utilize our Monarc (ball catching machine) in a different way of just standing there and catching a ball. Just one of many things that we can address and improve in.”

Offensive coordinator Jordan Somerville was asked about why the supposed offensive talent hasn’t resulted in consistent production on the field.

“I think the biggest thing is just understanding who we are and really capitalizing,” Somerville said. “That was the big one from last last week, which is capitalizing on opportunities. We still believe that there's no doubt about it that we got an explosive unit, and we got to put it all together right now. And that's the biggest thing that we’re harping on, just fundamentals this week. Fundamentals go back to the basics. Trust our training. Trust one another that we've done it before through the past nine months in training, training camp, spring ball, and now we got to put it together, put it on the field ultimately.”

One area Somerville saw definite improvement in was the growth of the offensive line, including breaking in a new addition to the first team unit when right tackle Jimothy Lewis‍ left the game in the first half with what looked like a potential injury and redshirt frosh Mike Klisiewicz came in and acquitted himself well.

“Big Mike came in and he played with relentless effort,” Somerville noted. “Everything that we ask to come in in that moment, and I thought he played very well. A lot of growth opportunities for him, especially as a young guy, inexperienced guy, to come in and compete the way he did. We were really encouraged.

“Serious improvement in a pass game (overall). We left that game last week impressed from that standpoint of their game. Still improvement to be had in the in the run game, as well as just straining, making a bigger bigger focus for these guys in the core to continue to strain. I think we have that. It's the consistency of it that needs to show up.”

Though the Cal defense gave up more yardage and first downs than they’d have liked to see, the defense was in attack mode far more often than in the season opening loss. Defensive coordinator Michael Hutchings was asked if he’s brough a bit of Minnesota head coach Brian Flores and the Vikings' style of play to Berkeley with him after his move to Cal from the Vikings staff last season.

“Obviously you guys saw the Vikings game,” Hutchings said. “They brought a lot of pressure. You know, just game week by week, just game planning things that we come up with as a staff, and always want to have an attacking style and make sure we can try to dictate the terms of the game. And you know, our players feed off of it, right?

“We're not going to call any game timid or you with any fear, but we're going to let it rip and trust what we did during the week. We did the work during the week. Go ahead and let it rip on on Saturday and and call it without any hesitation, and our guys really lead off of it. I mean, I think we saw it in week one, just in a little bit of the game, and then we came in with that same mindset in week two, and I think our guys they definitely stepped up to that challenge, and I think it's just kind of our personality as a defense.”

The Bears came into the season with a significant number of talented additions to the defensive roster, though many had had little to no playing time before arriving at Cal.

Hutchings was about about the growth curve and projected rate of progress as his defense continues to gel this season.

“I think that's always the early part of the season, you're figuring out who you are as a team, just kind of around the country,” Hutchings said. “But really, we built the practice schedule to try to be as best we can at that. How can we start off fast and be game-ready during the first few weeks, but as you play more games, the things that are sloppy will clean up.

“The tackling was much better this week. I thought our overall communication as a defense was better and there's still room for improvement. But just the the way that they applied some of the criticism and built on those points from the previous week was really promising, and how can we continue to build on that? And we're going to keep our foot on the gas, but we're not easing off of the small things. Right? They they understand that we got to lean into to the criticism, have thick skin, and that's where the growth is going to happen.”

After last week’s run defense debacle where the Bears gave up an astounding 291 yards rushing as well as six rushing TDs, things started off rough against Syracuse as only a heroic chasedown by opposite side corner Daniel Harris‍ prevented the Orange from a long early rushing TD. But the Bears’ run defense buckled down from there significantly.

“Yeah, I think I mean things like that happen in the game, and it's really just about our response,” Hutchings said. “You know, we get back to the sideline and you make corrections, you fix it, and I think the way our guys responded responded to that was great. And really, just want to highlight Daniel Harris on that play, really a four-point tackle right there, going down to make that that tackle, and we end up holding them to a field goal. So the relentless effort by him was was a huge play, and overall, just the way our guys continue to show up, respond.

“That's where the defense happens, and you know the front did a decent job, a really good job actually, not a decent one in the second half of stopping the run game and allowing us to end up stopping stopping a little bit of passing attack that they had.

“I think the focus overall was just improving our technique and fundamentals, and that falls under that umbrella. And I think overall, what showed up was improved technique, improved jobs, and also just improved tackling. I think that really speaks to where the improvement came from. The small things that that they are capable are players.”

The Bears (1-1/1-0) will next hit the field against 1-2 Wagner, fresh off a dismantling from 2025 playoff team James Madison. Kickoff will be 12:30 at Memorial Stadium on the ACC Network.