I keep hearing from various people that what was so hard about the loss to USC was that “this was our only chance”.  Everyone looks to the next two years and assumes that Cal can’t beat USC.

I think that’s hogwash.  At the beginning of the season I agreed that 2006 was a great opportunity to beat USC because it was likely going to be a down year for USC.  But it turns out it wasn’t.  USC looks to be their usual self and likely is going back to the National Championship game.

There was less of an opportunity here than everyone thought.  Unfortunately Cal didn’t have USC on the schedule until they had 90% of a season to get the kinks worked out.  If Cal had played them when they played Oregon, I think it would have been a different situation.  But as it turns out, USC had hit their usual rhythm by the time Cal had them on the schedule.  Unfortunately, people can’t seem to get out of the mindset that we all had at the beginning of the year so they’re giving USC too much credit for how much better USC will be next year because they thought this was going to be down year for USC.

But it wasn’t.  Who can honestly call this a down year for them?

So I don’t think USC is going to be heads and shoulders better next year.  While I don’t see USC being worse next year, I don’t see them being substantially better.  They’ll be losing both their star recievers as well as a number of other talented players.  True, they’ll have lots of talent to replace them, but the point is, they’ll be basically the same team.

And so will Cal.  We’ll be losing some defensive talent, but we have lots of talented young guys who will be filling those spots.  On offense, I think Marshawn is going to stay and therefore we’ll have the same offense with probably a bigger and more experienced offensive line.  Even if he goes, between the experience of Forsett and the highly recruited talent behind him, we’ll be in good shape.

Also, I think people under estimate the offensive line problems we had this year.  Although the pass protection was OK, the run defense stunk.  I think that’ll be better next year with another offseason in the weight room.

And then there is the schedule.  Cal is undefeated at home this year.  Next year we get both Tennesee and USC at home.  That’ll make a BIG difference in those two games.  Also Cal gets the scary trap games at home: OSU, UA and WSU.  The “scary” away games are Oregon and UCLA because Cal has struggled at those two places.  However, both schools are struggling, don’t seem to have significant upside for next year and Cal handily won those games this year, making those games optimistic for next year.  Washington, ASU and Stanford on the road won’t be a problem.

So don’t buy into the “we’re doomed to be 2nd fiddle to USC” mindset.  This Cal team is young, just like USC.  They’ll be a reasonable challenge to USC next year.  Don’t sell your 2007 USC game tickets.  I think you’re going to want to be there.  Count on it.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 22nd, 2006 at 10:18 am and is filed under Sports, Sports - Cal Football. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.