BERKELEY, Calif. — The popular read on Washington’s game at California on Saturday, say, two months ago, was likely that this is one of the few games on the Huskies’ schedule they should certainly win.
The Golden Bears won one game and lost 11 in 2013, and looked bad doing it. The Huskies easily beat them, 41-17, at Husky Stadium last year.
But Cal (4-1, 2-1 in Pac-12) has looked much better since the start of the 2014 season, winning four of their first five games with their lone loss coming on a successful, last-second Hail Mary by Arizona. The Bears are currently in first place in the Pac-12 North, qualifying so far as one of the biggest surprises in what has already been a season of upheaval in college football.
The Huskies (4-1, 0-1), meanwhile, enter this game at California Memorial Stadium (3 p.m., Pac-12 Networks) facing questions about their inconsistent offense and a young secondary that will have its hands full against the Bears’ balanced, high-scoring attack.
If UW harbors any hopes of competing for the Pac-12 North title — each team in the division has a loss, so it’s still wide open — this visit to Berkeley can be classified as a “must-win.”
But it’s no longer the “definitely will win” it appeared to be before everyone actually started playing.
“It’s going to be crazy. Nobody’s that much better than anybody,” Huskies linebacker Travis Feeney said of the early Pac-12 results. “Anybody can beat anybody on any given day. There’s no easy games in the Pac. Every team’s good.”
Even Cal, now. Second-year coach Sonny Dykes dealt with so many injuries upon his arrival last year — particularly on a defense that struggled to stop anybody — it was hard to truly determine just where the program stood.
The defense is still plenty suspect, as evidenced by the 164 points Cal has allowed in its last three games. But the Bears have unveiled a renewed dedication to running the ball in addition to passing it well in Dykes’ version of the Air Raid offense — they call it the Bear Raid here — and started the season with an upset victory at Northwestern before throttling Sacramento State.
The Bears were an eyelash away from starting the season 3-0, but Arizona quarterback Anu Solomon’s Hail Mary toss found the hands of receiver Austin Hill, and Cal dropped its Pac-12 opener 49-45.
It rebounded with wild wins over Colorado (59-56 in double overtime) and Washington State (60-59), a three-game stretch so physically taxing that Dykes gave his players extra time off from practice this week.
Sophomore quarterback Jared Goff — who has thrown 22 touchdown passes and just three interceptions, and averages a fairly ridiculous 10.4 yards per attempt — leads a passing game that averages 398.2 yards per game, good for third nationally. Tailback Daniel Lasco provides a change of pace in the running game, too, averaging 6.2 yards per carry.
“They just kind of keep coming at you,” Huskies coach Chris Petersen said. “Then they go fast, and then they kind of keep you on your heels, not getting lined up correctly or fast enough. They execute better than the other side.”
The way things have been going, another harrowing finish may await the Bears and Huskies on Saturday — even if UW’s so-so offense and capable defense prevent it from being as high-scoring as Cal’s last three games.
“There’s so much parity in the league,” Dykes said this week. “Every Saturday’s going to be an adventure. We talk to our players and just said, ‘hey, look, we expect this Saturday to come down to the last play of the game, just like the last three Saturdays have, and this one won’t be any different.’”
That’s a belief that sounds far more reasonable now than it might have in August.
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