Cal - USC Pac-12 Football Game Photo Essay Part 2 10.13.11

Part I

When we left off, the band finished up its pre-game show and the players were done warming up.  There was a palpable sense of "Could this be the year?" as the team came streaming back onto the field!

Sadly, it was not the year.  It was cruelly not the year.  But that doesn't mean we can't enjoy looking at all the photos again.  Or we can't!  Either way, the photos are going to be here.  Enjoy them or not.  GO BEARS!

Like I said in Part 1, things that seemed remarkably similar were incredibly different.  We've seen Cal run onto the field 1,000 times before.  But never in a place that isn't Memorial Stadium.  It's not that different, but just unique.  

Players finished up their final warm ups.  Backup QB Allan Bridgford was doing some throws right in front of us.  

The mic man then came onto the big screen to give us a Gladiator-style pep talk.  Unfortunately, Cal couldn't win based on histrionics, because if so, we'd definitely dominate.  It was quite the spirited affair.  

And soon we were off!  I forget exactly what this was.  I think it was Keenan Allen's fumble near the start of the game, which turned into a small skirmish.  Speaking of skirmishes, some fans got into a fight to the left of us in the stadium.  I didn't quite catch exactly what happened, but when I looked over two Cal fans (one young and one old were grappling).  The younger Cal fan seemed really angry.  An usher came over and the younger Cal fan explained something about somebody being punched in the back of the head.  

The younger Cal fan appeared to be with at least one USC fan leaving me to imply that this older Cal fan came over and punched the USC fan in the head without warning.  Unclear, though.  

Here is SF Giants president, Larry Baer, a Poli Sci graduate from Cal in the early 80s.  He used to do KALX, too.  Maybe we should try to do an interview with him about his time at KALX.  How do we contact him?

He was the Cal fan of the game.  Probably because he helped coordinate the games at AT & T Park.  

Here is the Chancellor, but with a cane.  Is he OK?  

They had a video of about the Third Place finish in the Director's Cup.  GO BEARS!  Shouldn't it be 2nd since Ohio State cheated like the cheating cheaters that they cheatingly are?

We had a couple return sets with both Jones and Allen out there.  But we always seemed to have terrible field position.  A lot of Cal drives started right in the shadow of the end zone where my seats were.  Which led to decent enough photos.  

I doubt that in the above photo Maynard was calling the "Fumble ball and fall on top of it for 10 yard loss play."  Yet, unfortunately, that is exactly what happened.  There were myriad basic execution errors all over the place.  Just fundamental things going wrong.  

Monica's Dad has a shot of the same play.  

IMG_3379 (via Monica's Dad)

Mychal Kendricks on the video board.

Isi Sofele makes a great run up the middle.  

We had too much Anger punting.  Although, in some ways, we didn't have enough Anger punting.  If we had some Anger punts instead of turn overs or failed fake punts, it might have gone better for our Golden Bears.  Notice Moala in there to help block.  

Speaking of the failed fake punt, a gentleman in our section really freaked out after that happened.  He stood up, marched towards the exit, threw his sunglasses hard down the stairs and left through the exit, presumably, as NorCalNick stated, never to return to Cal football ever again!

They were putting tweets up on the big board, including this one from Shane Vereen:

These seats were controversial.  They are the bleachers placed on the field in the center field section.  The season tickets were ridiculously expensive and apparently very few got sold.  So, Cal released them as single game seats.  Given that only a few thousand visiting seats are held for USC fans, the USC fans turned to Cal single game ticket sales to get a ticket to the game.  

You can see that it is just packed with red as USC fans snapped up some of the best seats in the house:

I believe on this snap, Michael Calvin was supposed to do an end around.  However, the snap got bobbled.  If I recall correctly, it bounced off of Calvin's knee and went flying backwards.  Cal lost another 10 or so yards on the play.  Another fundamental just plain executed poorly.  

Bigalow with a return!

Here is Maynard on the TD:

Since we were in the end zone section, footballs were flying over our heads on kicks.  Here, some fans near the bottom of the section had brought a target!  

Got a lot of photos of plays happening right in our end zone.  Cal consistently had terrible field position.  An underrated part of this loss was how difficult Cal made it on itself with the field position.  

AT & T Park is a truly gorgeous ballpark.  I am an A's fan, so I am used to the old Coliseum.  I love the Coliseum, but it is tough to argue against the beauty of AT & T Park.  The Coke bottle was all lit up.  

And so was the plaza outside.

The weather was amazing.  We were in the City until 9:30 PM and never had to put a jacket on.  One of the most beautiful days of the normally foggy SF.  A great day, save for the disastrous game.  Oh well.  C'mon, Utah!  Let's do this thing!  

Finally, Monica's Dad put some artwork together with some photos of his.  Enjyo:

Cattouse Art (via Monica's Dad)

Student Section Art (via Monica's Dad)

Maynard Art (via Monica's Dad)

Cal Dance Team Art (via Monica's Dad)

Marvin Jones Art (via Monica's Dad)