Golden Nuggets: Cal "hasn't put a solid football game together"

At the post-game press conference, Coach Sonny Dykes addressed the press about our performance in the loss to the Bruins.

We're learning. That's the thing. We're a team that hasn't put a solid football game together all year. As I said earlier, I thought defensively we played well enough to have a chance to win the ballgame, but offensively we just struggled to execute basic plays. UCLA runs well defensively. That's their strength. They can run and are playing with a tremendous amount of confidence. They tackle well in the open field and they've got a good defensive football team.

Dykes had the following to say about the defense--which turned in a relatively strong performance, all things considered--and our issues with tackling in particular.

I thought we started to tackle better later in the game but it's been a problem for us all year. It's something that we haven't been good at. We just didn't do a very good job of making those open field tackles, particularly early in the game. I thought defensively we played well enough at times to give us a chance to win. There's obviously a lot of ways for us to get better, but I thought defensively those guys improved.

Track and Field

• Tiarra Pittman and Ciara Jones used skills learned from the Bears that Care program to help students trapped in the elevators of Evans Hall during the campus-wide blackout. Why were they in Evans? For office hours, of course.

Men's Water Polo

• At the SoCal Invite, no. 5 Cal defeated UCSD in the first round, but lost to the vile no. 4 Stanfurd

Field Hockey

• Cal was unable to overcome a three-point deficit in our loss to Yale

Rugby

• The Golden Bears lost to the Bruins (a recurring theme...) in the finals of the West Coast 7s

Women's Soccer

• Goalie Emily Kruger is working with One World Futbol to donate indestructible soccer to Ghana

• The Golden Bears continue their undefeated streak with a tie against USC, but will have to defend it against UCLA today

Men's Soccer

• Cal remains undefeated with a comeback win over SDSU

Men's Tennis

• With Campbell Johnson's loss in the doubles quarterfinals of the Tiburon Challenger, all Golden Bears have been eliminated from the event
• Johnson and Andre Goransson are in the singles semifinals of the Battle in the Bay Classic
• Cal picked up six wins in the Battle in the Bay Classic and six more in the UCSB Classic

Women's Tennis

• Cal experienced mixed success at the Saint Mary's Invitational with Cecilia Estlander losing in the Red Singles main draw, but Kelly Chui winning in the back draw

Men's Basketball

• Stop by Haas Pavilion on October 19th for an open practice!

Women's Basketball

• I know the question on everyone's mind has been how does the team pass their time in Coach Gottlieb's basement!

— Kai Felton (@coachkai) October 13, 2013

Men's Golf

• Max Homa made his professional debut at the Frys.com Open. How well do you think that little chip performed?

Men's Swimming and Diving

• The Spieker Complex is Bear Territory after a Cal victory over Indiana

Women's Swimming and Diving

• Camille Cheng and Sophia Batchelor won the 200-yard freestyle and 200-yard backstroke (respectively) at the Bulldog Invitational

Volleyball

• Class is in session: Today's class is on opposite hitter/right-side hitter

Football

• Coverage of the game against the Bruins from the AP, SFGate, and video from ESPN
• Some statistical notes about our performance against UCLA
• SFGate has some more quotes from the press conference
• Videos of the press conference featuring Dykes, QB Jared Goff, LB Hardy Nickerson Jr., and WR (slash TB?) Richard Rodgers
• Bank of the West highlights from the game
• Your Scholar-Athletes of the Week are WR Jack Austin and LS/DT Bradley Northnagel
• CGB reader LABear took a look at the number of season-ending injuries per team (prior to this Saturday's slate of games) and discovered what we already knew--Cal is the most injured team and by a wide margin