BERKELEY - After a six-year career as a Cal player starting in 2000, to grad assistant and the youngest position coach in Cal football history, to 14 more years spent with some of the brightest minds in collegiate football history, not to mention a three-year stint in the NFL, homegrown Cal Bear Tosh Lupoi made his triumphant return to Berkeley today as Cal’s 35th head coach in program history.
His day began by being greeted on the tarmac after his flight with his wife and three kids by GM Ron Rivera, Chancellor Rich Lyons and the Cal band before making his way to Memorial Stadium for a meet and greet with former players and donors, to a Q&A session with fans and his introductory press conference to conclude.
"It's an exciting time at the University of California, Berkeley, in the athletic department, in the football program," Rivera said. "We've been able to go out and identify our next football head coach. Very excited as to who he is and what he stands for, but more so, and what's very important for us is that this really creates true alignment as far as the university is concerned.
“Our chancellor is an undergraduate alum. Our general manager is an undergraduate alum. And now, our head football coach is an undergraduate alum. The three of us all have like minds in terms of where we believe the university can be as far as our football program is concerned because we already know that we are number one public institution the United States.”
Lupoi opened with some thoughts before taking questions.
"I'm extremely humbled and blessed be here on this stage," the new head coach said. "It gets thrown around a little too loosely at times. As far as a dream job, it's a little bit different. When you've been through it, you've walked up that hill from Clark Kerr, you've competed on that field, you've competed in those business classes and all the chairs that you're sitting in right now. You contributed over a decade of time, of work that you contributed just a little piece of that, that awesome puzzle that puts us in this place today. So extremely blessed, thankful for this opportunity.
“Want to thank first off, Rich Lyons and Ron Rivera, unbelievable leaders. Every career decision that I've made, really dating back about the last 12 years of my 20 year coaching career, have been based off of growth, and I think this opportunity to come in with the two-time NFL Coach of the Year, a proven elite leader in Ron and to attack this as a collaborative effort to produce something that everyone's extremely proud of, that's what absolutely fires me up.
(Program starts at 8:40)
“It motivated me to the point of last night, ultimately making the final decision to come here and really respect the process that was taken because of the elite organization that I'm coming from. Having the leadership there and the players that I was blessed to coach put me in an amazing position to have quite a few opportunities in this cycle, to be a head coach, and ultimately showed me the process that they took to do this, how thorough it was evaluating myself, other options. Just everything about it led to me wanting to do this over any other opportunity that I was afforded. So extremely blessed and thankful.
“Appreciate that my queen is in here somewhere, Jordan. just want to give a special thanks to her. Unbelievable woman, unbelievable mother, unbelievable tennis player, and what she's done for our family to allow me to passionately coach the way I do and play a major difference in the academic and character foundation of men. Couldn't be more thankful for her and her presence every day in my life. ‘
“Also want to just give thanks to the many leaders that have led me to this point and have changed my life. Coach Nick Saban, Kirby Smart, Raheem Morris, Dan Quinn, Urban Meyer and, of course, Dan Lanning - the leadership that has afforded me this opportunity to ultimately continue to build my identity to lead to this point, along with Rob Mullins and Phil Knight, just some integral individuals that I greatly respect. I’m excited for the future here to attack this process with this organization.
“I'm a homegrown young man, native to the bay. My mom is from Oakland. Spent many days in that great city. I've lived under two roofs in the Oakland area code. Started out life in Hayward, Concord, Walnut Creek, spent many summers in Pittsburgh, Antioch El Cerrito. This is home to me, and ultimately, I'm a die-hard Cal Bear. And for myself to have this opportunity and be on this stage is an extremely humbling experience, and something I'm so thankful for. To go attack this dream job of mine. I think what's really important is expressing the vision of this place and ultimately attacking this with a process-oriented organization, and that's exactly what we're going to do.
“You're not going to hear me make any guarantees of the end results. I think that's ultimately going to be how we attack the process together, and that's exactly what we're gonna do. We're gonna do that with a growth mindset, and everything we do, I'm gonna be encouraging and enforcing as the head coach, here is how we go about our business, is to grow and to challenge every young man, just like I challenge myself every day. Not have a fixed mindset, but rather a growth mindset, and how we can improve on a daily basis as we get started here.
“Couldn't be more excited to go attack that. I think ultimately, the goal here is to be the most connected team in college football and to create a unified group that ultimately is going to be preparing and competing for something much bigger than just themselves. And if we can accomplish those goals and then go to attack our culture together, I think we could become an extremely dangerous organization, all with the understanding and keeping at the forefront of how important it is to attack our academics, to establish and continue the standard that's been set here.
“And I'm going to stand up in front of these young men every day and say, ‘I promise you, it wasn't because my intelligence level of becoming an undergrad here and then having the opportunity to attack the Masters education program as well. And it wasn't because of my intelligence, it was because of my relentless effort to have that opportunity. So if I can do it, I promise any player they can do it, too. That's going to be the approach every day of representing this university with high esteem and that balance of life.”
(Press conference begins at 10:36)
One of the biggest areas of emphasis that played into the coaching search as well as Lupoi’s decision to return to Cal was the possibility of coaching and also retaining the services of one of the most talented young quarterbacks in the country in freshman QB Jaron Keawe Sagapolutele. Lupoi was asked about the opportunity in the Q&A session with fans prior to the press conference.
“I think the last six days or so when this kind of really became a reality, that this might be an opportunity, I think there's no one that's watched more film on him in America, including the University of Hawaii, the next opponent,” Lupoi said with a smile. “Extremely gifted individual.
“You know what I love? What's so cool about watching JKS’ game is where his elite abilities exist in a different manner. Where he's off the platform, when he's throwing off his back foot, making all the throws in awkward positions. His ability to extend the play, and, of course, being able to throw the rock in intermediate, high percentage, shallow routes, but the long ball and to be able to do that. I'm so pumped to work with what he potentially and I know he could become.
“Just as important as all the research I've done on him, the character standpoint, the leadership ability at obviously an extremely important position on your team, those are the qualities that you're looking for.
“I know going into that SMU game, he had 13 touchdowns, nine interceptions, and he had a 61% completion rate, right? So I think what's awesome to see is a great performance in this last game. But that's the personal commitment of myself, of how being a defensive head coach, just like I did with Bo Nix, just like I did with Dylan Gabriel, coming in multiple times a week, being able to give something a little different from a defensive side and seeing what, why and where our safety rotation is, how the tempo variables affect the defense, why the formations that we're going to be presenting and making defenses play on their heels.
“I think it's a really cool, unique perspective to be able to offer to him, and again, the guys (other coaches) that right now are courting me to go and have a possible chance to come coach this young man and join forces here, and I think he's a big part of that. So we have some high level NFL coaches, and I'm going to be completely transparent with you; some of these names that are calling me right now and it’s like, ‘Oh, smacks. Like, we might get dangerous.’
“That's that's really exciting. I can't wait to have that conversation with JKS and share the potential candidates there that can come in and help.
So, just tremendously excited and going back to that talent acquisition, of having a young man like this, and the assistants that we can bring to the table.”
Lupoi will continue to serve as defensive coordinator for Oregon as they make their playoff run while using every other waking moment not related to Oregon gameplanning to begin the process of building his staff and acquiring the talent he needs to take the program to a new level. He also touched on the role his former teammates and other Cal football alums can play in the process, many of whom joined to reception and Q&A in support of their friend.
"I'm just gonna be honest with you, I was up till 2:30am last night, recruiting," Lupoi said. "You know, some possible opportunities. And got on an early flight here, but to see that was really cool. I didn't have a lot of communication with those guys, and to then see them show up. So 24/7 there's gonna be some access with with Golden Bear alums here and to have these guys around and practice, to have their juice game day and off season. That's what I'm going to challenge them to. I better not just see you on game day. You know, come around in this process.
“I was fortunate where, as a part of multiple 10-win seasons, truly competing for conference championships. And we took a lot of pride in multiple first round draft picks during that time, whether I played next to them or contributed to the development of them. Guys like Tyson Alualu, Cameron Jordan and so many more to this day. And what's so cool about this is the guys that weren't the first round draft picks, like an Austin Clark or whoever it be, that probably had no chance playing the NFL, but having just as strong as those relationships that carry on for a lifetime, being a Golden Bear.
“So ultimately, the way we attack the process and the way we implement our culture, that's going to be your answer. So I wholeheartedly believe in how we go about our business.”
