Cal Football

Tuesday Practice Report: Oregon Prep Continues

By Jim McGill

October 1, 2019

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A day after starting QB Chase Garbers was ruled out with injury for the foreseeable future, the new-look Bears continued their Oregon game prep behind new starter Devon Modster Tuesday.

Offensive coordinator Beau Baldwin was on the banner after the practice.

“I thought the guys handled Tuesday very well,” noted Baldwin. “My thing is, if we’re all driven by the three hours of results on Saturday, you’re not truly making the process. I think there was a consistency with how we’ve practiced all the other Tuesdays. I love the way they attacked it and I loved their attitude. It’s serious but not mopey in any way.”

The clear topic of the day was Modster -both assessing his performance Saturday and trying to get a handle on what expectations should be for him going forward.

Baldwin, for one, is confident in his new starter.

"He's better than what he did on Saturday and I've seen it in practice," said Baldwin. "I've seen it in former games in the Pac-12. I have no doubt in my mind that he's going to play very well."

As for the differences between practice and gameplanning behind a new quarterback, Baldwin said, “There’s just certain things that we may call -and this is the same with every QB- there’s certain things we called for Brandon (McIlwain) that were called differently for Chase (Garbers) and different from Garbers to Ross Bowers -all the way back to what we did at Eastern (Washington).

“There’s certain things we’ll do differently but that’s only because every quarterback has certain things that are more in their wheelhouse. We have an idea of that and we’re able to spend that time and gameplan and fit things around his strengths.”

Baldwin noted that a backup QB needs a lot of mental reps to be ready, particularly going into a game. He noted the importance of starters getting 75-80% of the reps going into a game to be fully-ready, noting the juggling act between getting a starter ready and keeping a backup sharp.

In facing Oregon in Eugene, the Bears may well be facing their most daunting opposition so far this season. After their tight loss to #16 Auburn, the Ducks have creamed the competition to the tune of 136-to-15, including a dominating 21-6 win over Stanford before their recent bye week.

“More than anything, those guys are extremely athletic in a lot of spots,” said Baldwin of Oregon’s defense. They get to the ball well, they react really well. Your margin for error and times for things are really tight. Windows are going to close in the run game. You might think you have the edge and they’re going to get there. The numbers don’t lie, what they’ve done this year. And they’ve done it against some quality opponents. It’s impressive, so we know we’ve got our work cut out for us.”

Baldwin noted that the offensive line’s play wasn’t up to their standard in their loss to ASU, though they did excel in certain areas, despite a revolving cast of starters and backups.

“The pass pro- it was impressive,” said Baldwin. “And at times, we did some good things running the ball, like at the start of the second half till they started loading the box a little bit. But they continue to grow and continue to do some things at a very high standard.

“They work at it. It doesn’t just happen.”

The 4-1 Bears will face Oregon in Eugene at 5 pm Saturday in their third road trip of the season.