One of Cal's most awesome running backs versus a Cal swimming pioneer! Who's going onto the Sweet 16? Vote!
For each athlete, you can vote in the poll; it closes a week from today at midnight. After the jump, you can read the athlete profiles written up by our commenters, and discuss in the comments your memories of each athlete and which one deserves to move on. (Check out the full bracket here. To check out the original nomination thread, click here. For those who want to track the CGB Hall of Fame posts exclusively, click here or right next to the timestamp above where it says "Hall of Fame".)
#2 Marshawn Lynch
Avinash: That Washington game was awesome. You could feel the tension in the stadium, that all our Rose Bowl hopes were about to slip away to some 4-6 team (probably a warning sign of things to come). Then Marshawn entered Beast Mode and would not let us lose. Great great game.
I also have fond memories of him playing second backup to Arrington. Underscores the importance of having two not just capable but dynamic running backs. Forsett had his struggles in his backup role to Marshawn, Vereen did the same with Best. There was no real drop off with Marshawn though. 8.8 yards per carry, 8 touchdowns on only 71 carries.
#10 Mary Meagher
However, in 1981 Meagher gave one of the most memorable performances in competitive swimming at the U.S. Swimming National Championships held in Brown Deer, Wisconsin in 1981. At the meet, Meagher set world records in both the 200 meter and 100 meter butterfly, the two primary distances at which the butterfly is contested in competitive swimming. The times for both records were considered astonishing, especially the record of 57.93 seconds that Meagher set in the 100 m--a drop of over a second. Both times would stand as the World Record for nearly two decades: American swimmer Jenny Thompson lowered the 100 m record in 1999, while Susie O'Neill of Australia set the record in the 200 m a year later. Some have argued that Meagher's records in the butterfly were among the most impressive records ever set in sport, let alone swimming, ranking among such noteworthy records as Bob Beamon's long jump world record in 1968. These two swims led "T" to being named Female World Swimmer of the Year by Swimming World magazine, which she again won in 1985. She swam collegiately for the University of California, Berkeley, graduating in 1987 with a BA in Social Sciences.
At the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, California Meagher won gold medals in both the 100 m and 200 m butterfly races, along with another gold by swimming the butterfly leg of the women's medley relay. Returning to compete at the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, South Korea, Meagher won a bronze medal in the 200 m butterfly. By the time she left competitive swimming, Meagher had won 24 US national swimming titles.
ososdeoro: Broke the 100 and 200 butterfly records – records that would stand for 18 and 19 years, respectively. Won three golds at the LA Olympics.