Calgorithm Is the Top College Football Story on ESPN.com

The clever Cal online community has captured the attention of a nation with its satire

Jaydn Ott / Melina Myers-Imagn Images

Calgorithm, which is given credit for getting ESPN College GameDay to Berkeley this weekend, is no longer just a Bay Area phenomenon.  ESPN.com’s top college football story on Thursday afternoon carries this headline:

“’We live in the weird’: How the Calgorithm has become college football’s newest sensation.”

With this subhead: “A  new conference brought out the best in Cal’s online community as the Bears are off to a 3-1 start”

Click to the story itself and you find this headline:

“How the Calgorithm has become CFB’s newest obsession”

It’s followed by these first six paragraphs of the lengthy ESPN.com story by Kyle Bonagura about the influentail and clever Cal online community.

BERKELEY, Calif. -- Miles Goodman, a first-year grad student at UC Berkeley, had no idea the chain of events he was about to set off when he opened his photo-editing app late in Cal’s 21-14 win at Auburn on Sept. 7.

For months, Goodman had interacted with opposing fan bases under the handle @golDonbear on X, and it was normal for him to run into barbs about Cal as a bastion of progressive values. The stereotyping was often meant to be insulting, but it usually just left Goodman amused.

Still, those comments were top of mind as Cal put the finishing touches on a win in which it physically dominated the Tigers at Jordan-Hare Stadium.

"I was like, 'OK, well this thing that you are pushing both Cal as a team and as an institution, why not take it on from a satirical lens?'" Goodman said.

He cobbled together a few poignant photos, slapped on a rainbow and completed his meme with the phrase, "You just lost to the woke agenda."

When the official Auburn football account posted a final score graphic on X, Goodman reposted it with his work of art. The post went viral, and in the weeks since has been viewed more than 5 million times.

The story noted the song that most Cal fans have seen by now. The song "Hot to Go!" by Chappell Roan was reworked to "Ott to Go." Jaydn Ott, of course, is the Bears star running back who was a first-team all-Pac-12 selection last year and preseason all-ACC pick this year.

Take a look if you haven't seen it yet.

O-T-T-T-O-G-O
We've got Jaydn Ott to go!#Calgorithm #FightForCalGameday #H1M #WhyNotCal pic.twitter.com/8D68f8pnjH

— The Liberal Calgorithm (@wokemobfootball) September 28, 2024

Perhaps the most interesting part of the ESPN.com story came near the end, after it was acknowledged that Calgorithm played a major role in luring ESPN's College GameDay to Cal. Here is the telling excerpt:

After "GameDay" announced it was coming, the California Legends Collective announced an inspired anonymous donor was willing to match up to $1 million in donations ahead of the Miami game, and in the first 36 hours the collective received more than $300,000 in pledges.

You will no doubt hear more about Calgorithm on ESPN’s College GameDay on the Cal campus, starting at 6 a.m. on Saturday morning.  Former Cal star running back Marshawn Lynch is the celebrity guest game-picker for the show.

The Awful Announcing website and the Front Office Sports website are among the others that have reported on the Calgorithm phenomenon.

Follow Cal Sports Report on Twitter: @jakecurtis53

Find Cal Sports Report on Facebook by going to https://www.facebook.com/si.calsportsreport