Golden Nuggets: Urban Meyer is Concerned with Giving Up Big Plays and Cal's Unorthodox Defense

Urban Meyer hosted his weekly press conference this week to discuss last week's game and the upcoming match against Cal. Here are the Cal highlights from the 35-minute session.

Q. You mentioned big plays on defense being a problem, this week, going to a player like Keenan Allen, big players from Cal, what do you look at from your secondary to do better to avoid giving up those big plays.

COACH MEYER:Well, I should probably have a breakdown for you; I don't. But what they are is lack of discipline in the undernet drop (ph), for example, that third down at 21, I think it was 21, and they completed a pass we had a good coverage call on. We just didn't sink deep enough; so lack of discipline on coverage. Missed tackles are another result.

We had another play down the sideline for about a 45 , 50 yard run, was a missed tackle. So missed tackles and coverage areas are the two right now that are giving up big plays.
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Q. You mentioned Cal is going to bring in a unique defense; what kind of challenges do they present for what you're trying to do with the on the ground game?
COACH MEYER:It's a very, it's not unsound at all. But it's just not normal what's unorthodox style of defense. Our guys right now were put in a new system. We made errors against a very traditional defense last week, very traditional.

That's my concern is making sure we have a tight enough package because sometimes there's a lot of rule breakers, so we have to really tighten it down. If you have a big veteran group that's done this for three or four years, go. But this is not that kind of group.

Urban and the reporters had a laugh when someone inarticulately pointed out Cal's struggles against the pistol.

Q. Cal's defense, had a lot of trouble pistol, they run a lot of inside stuff you know, all that stuff.

COACH MEYER:What stuff? I want to hear it. (Laughter). If I give you a board, can you diagram it?

Q. Some similar stuff that you guys (Laughter). I'll get up there.
COACH MEYER:I'm sure you will.

Finally, he talks about going up against his good friend Jeff Tedford.

Q. Coach Tedford at Cal is probably the best coach that program has had in the last 20, 30, 40 years, whatever it is; your exposure to him, have you ever talked with him? What do you know of him?
COACH MEYER:He's one of my great friends. I've known Jeff for a long time. Studied football with him back when I was at Bowling Green and still to this day utilize some of his pass concepts. We were at the St. Louis Rams together for three or four days just studying football and we spent a lot of time together. And he's part of that Nike group. So every year we spend a lot of time together; a great man, great wife, great family, and I have a lot of respect for him as a coach.

Ohio State opened as a 17.5-point favorite over the Bears. Will Cal cover the spread? More links after the jump.

Football

• Jordan Wynn has retired from football after his latest shoulder injury. It's a shame, but understandable given that he's already had two season-ending shoulder injuries.
• Do you like numbers or colors? Take a look at this color-coded chart of nearly every Pac-12 statistic known to mankind. Don't look at Cal's stats though; they're bad.
• Jon Wilner gives the Bears a D for their performance against Southern Utah.
• Ted Miller looks ahead to this week's Pac-12 slate.
• The Bears made some depth-chart updates as they prepare for Ohio State. Matt Summers-Gavin is not listed on the depth chart. Bill Tyndall is the starting RT and Geoffrey Gibson is his backup. In Gibson's place, Matt Williams is now the backup center. Freddia Tagaloa is on the two-deep at LT. Tedford's comments on Tuesday morning indicate that Richard Rodgers and Chris McCain will likely play on Saturday.
• Former Cal longsnapper Nick Sundberg broke his arm during the first half of the season opener against New Orleans. He kept snapping throughout the rest of the game, though he did give Robert Griffin III some extra motivation to keep the offense on the field.
• BearInsider has a great unit-by-unit analysis of the team's performance against Southern Utah, complete with several video clips.
• Daniel Lasco talks about scoring his first career touchdown.
• Tedford talks about the mistakes made during Saturday's game and looks ahead to the Ohio State game.
• Cal-USC will kick off at 3pm and air on the Pac-12 Network.
• The Bears are 10th in Wilner's latest Pac-12 power rankings.
• Is the Stanford-USC rivalry bigger than the Big Game rivalry? We'll see after USC beats Stanford by 30 this weekend.