Let's face it. Cal fans who've come up under Tedford have had it easy. When Cal wins, it's usually a thing of beauty. The offense is gelling, the yards start piling, the running backs get scoring, the quarterbacks unleashing, the defenses dealing. We have these types of wins 2/3rds of the time--back in the Dark Ages, the Bears were lucky to pull it together more than once or twice a year.
However, last week's win? For 90 percent of the game, it was none of those things. It didn't even have the feel of a scrappy underdog giving a better team all it can handle before finally succumbing at the last moment. It was two teams playing grimy, their mistakes holding back any real offensive momentum. Turnovers, penalties, no running game by either side gave this one an odd feel, from start to finish. It was one of those games that probably left you shaking your head in disgust, pulling your hair in exasperation, or dousing more beer in gloominess on a number of plays.
And you know what? That's ok. Football isn't cricket; there are a good number of times you have to go and win the dirty ones too. And at the end of the day, an ugly triumph is recorded no differently than a beautiful one--a W.
I open up the floor to the readers, since I know this won't even scrap the top 50 of the aesthetically unpleasing triumphs the Bears have had to scrap through in the past. What are the ugliest Cal football victories you've watched and why?