Cal's Losing Streak Is a Sad Movie We've Seen Before

Cal lets a 13-point lead in the fourth quarter slip away against NC State for its fourth straight defeat. Bears have lost their last three games by a combined margin of four points

Cal head coach Justin Wilcox / Darren Yamashita-Imagn Images

Cal’s football season has become that intriguing movie with the sad ending you’ve seen a dozen times. You know the final lines before they’re spoken, and you’re tempted to turn it off before the inevitable tragic ending arrives. But you can’t quite turn away because the plot was so enticing.

Cal’s 24-23 loss to North Carolina State on Saturday afternoon was the latest screening of that movie.  It was the Bears’ fourth straight loss, and what makes the Bears’ 2024 football screenplay so disappointing is that all four were ACC games and the margin of defeat in the four games combined was a mere nine point.   The last three losses were by a combined margin of just four points. It sounds almost impossible, a tragic plot movie moguls would dismiss out of hand.

Afterward Cal coach Justin Wilcox was listing the reasons this one got away, trying to pinpoint just went wrong, when he suddenly paused and said, “It sounds like a broken record. Everybody’s tired of hearing it; I’m tired of saying it.”

Wilcox was again supremely disappointed and seemed almost numb to the Bears’ fate.  On three different occasions during his post-game press conference, Wilcox uttered, “I gotta do a better job of coaching.”

The endings on the past four losses have been the same, but then again the past four losses have all been different.  One play in each game could have changed the conclusion.

Cal was in position to win all four games. Cal led by at least 13 points heading into the fourth quarter in two of them. A very makable Cal field goal that was missed in the final two minutes accounted for two losses.

Let’s review the carnage:

The Bears (3-4, 0-4 ACC) were in position to take the lead against Florida State when the Bears faced a second-and-5 at the FSU 12-yard line with 1:20 left in the game before a penalty, an incompletion and a sack led to a 14-9 loss in a game in which Cal dominated the statistics.

Cal was on its way to a program-changing win over then-No. 8 Miami the next week when it held a 35-10 lead in the third quarter.  The Bears could not make the one play that would assure victory and ultimately lost 39-38 when the Hurricanes scored the winning touchdown with 26 seconds left.

The following week a missed two-point conversion after Cal’s touchdown in the first quarter and Ryan Coe’s missed 40-yard field goal on a slightly bad snap with 1:50 remaining were the talking points in the Bears’ 17-15 loss to then-No. 22 Pitt.

And then came Saturday, when Cal led 23-10 entering the fourth quarter. It seemed safe, considering the way Cal’s defense was playing.  But the inevitable tragic ending seemed to be occurring when the Wolfpack scored on touchdown drives of 75 and 80 yards to take a 24-23 lead with 6:32 remaining in the game.

But wait. The calamitous last act apparently was about to be rewritten this time when Cal got to the North Carolina State 10-yard line with 1:37 remaining.  Freshman Derek Morris was about to become the hero, and what a story it would be.  In his first collegiate game, after replacing Coe as the Bears kicker, Morris, who had turned 19 years old just a week earlier, had hit field goals of 41, 26 and 24 yards, and here he was, facing a chip-shot 28-yard field goal to put Cal ahead and perhaps end the grieving.

Morris did not strike it cleanly.

It fluttered wide right.

Torture.

Four losses in a row by a combined margin of nine points, the last three by a margin of four points.

If Cal has scored a touchdown on any of its five forays inside the Florida State 15-yard line . . .

If Cal had held on to a 25-point second-half lead against Miami . . .

If Ryan Coe had made that 40-yard field goal against Pitt with less than two minutes left . . .

If Derek Morris had hit that 28-yard field goal with 1:28 showing on the clock . . .

If, if, if ,if . . .

“It sounds like a broken record. Everybody’s tired of hearing it. I’m tired of saying it.”

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