Call Adds San Jose State, Wagner to Future Football Schedules

Bears will play a home-and-home against San Jose State, restarting a Bay Area rivalry that ended in 1996
The San Jose State Spartans run out at the start of the Hawaii Bowl
The San Jose State Spartans run out at the start of the Hawaii Bowl / Marco Garcia-Imagn Images

Cal completed its 2026 nonconference football schedule with the addition of a home game against Wagner, and the Bears also announced a home-and-home series against San Jose State.

The Bears will host San Jose State on September 9, 2028, and will play a road game against the Spartans on September 13, 2031.  This seems like an attempt to play more nonconference games locally, given the amount of cross-country travel Cal must make in its ACC games.

San Jose State finished the 2024 season with a 7-6 record, including 3-4 in the Mountain West Conference. The Spartans lost to South Florida 41-39 in five overtimes in the Hawaii Bowl.

Cal used to play San Jose State annually, but the 2028 matchup will be Cal’s first game against the Spartans since 1996. Cal faced San Jose State 16 years in a row from 1981 to 1996, and 29 out of 31 seasons from 1966 to 1996.

Cal also announced it will host Wagner on September 19, 2026. Wagner will be the third of the Bears’ four nonconference game to start the 2026 season.  Cal will open the 2026 season with a September 5 home game against UCLA, then will play a September 12 road game against BYU, followed by the home game against Wagner and the October 5 home game against UNLV.

It will be Cal’s first-ever game against Wagner, which is located in Staten Island, New York, and operates as an FCS football program. The Seahawks had a 4-8 record in 2024, and they lost their only two games against FBS opponents, falling to Florida Atlantic 41-10 and losing to Massachusetts 35-7,

In that 2026 season, Cal will play ACC home games against Stanford, Clemson, Virginia Tech and Wake Forest, and road games against North Carolina State, SMU, Virginia and Syracuse. Dates for those conference games have not been set.

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Jake Curtis
JAKE CURTIS

Jake Curtis worked in the San Francisco Chronicle sports department for 27 years, covering virtually every sport, including numerous Final Fours, several college football national championship games, an NBA Finals, world championship boxing matches and a World Cup. He was a Cal beat writer for many of those years, and won awards for his feature stories.