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Berkelium97:
Offensive line: they held Travis Long in check and did not surrender a single sack (I thought I remembered one sack, but play-by-play says otherwise). Additionally, I only remember one O-line penalty (holding). No false starts! They were opening up huge holes all night for the RBs. This was by far the best performance of the year for the line.
No fumbles!
Playcalling: We went with a 2:1 run-to-pass ratio, which plays well into our strengths. We added several Maynard runs, giving us a four-headed monster for the ground game. When we opted to pass, the Zach-to-Keenan connection burned the WSU defense all night long.
Pass defense: we ran mostly man coverage and guys did well in their individual assignments. Williams was the star this week with several pass breakups and an interception. There were occasional lapses, but that's bound to happen when the opponent throws 63 passes.
Check-with-mes: despite being on the road and having to deal with (minimal) crowd noise, we were able to change the play in about 8-10 seconds. We got burned once, but we seemed much faster about changing the plays this week.
Last positive: that there were so many positives to take away from the game!
Ohio Bear: Most of all, it was a win. As norcalnick described in his recap, it was an ugly, disjointed game. It would have been very easy for Cal to slip into a malaise given the flow (or lack thereof) of the game in the first half. But Cal did not. The Bears kept pounding the running game and beating WSU with a running attack that the Cougs really couldn't stop. It was a beautiful thing to run for over 300 yards. Another positive was the defense: Jeff Tuel, IMO, played very well when he brought in for an ineffective Connor Halliday. Cal defended the pass well for the most part, particularly Steve Williams who played an outstanding game.
Unclesam22: Obviously the running game was huge. It was great to see Cal finally just let it loose and run it down someone's throat. Granted, it was WSU, but still, seeing that kind of a display of power running really was incredible. And speaking of, the OLine came up huge. To see them open up huge running lanes and then to not allow a sack was a giant step forward for them and hopefully gets them pointed in the right direction. Keenan Allen going off was great too. He caught a ton of passes and averaged 15 ypc. Not bad at all. I also thought that the secondary, questionable penalties notwithstanding, played very well.
TwistNHook: Well, I'm big on the kick that Vincenzo D'Amato made. He only had one kick attempt on Saturday.
Field goal attempts ---------------------------------------- D'Amato, Vincen 3rd 02:02 52 yds - Good