Cal’s season has already reached a dangerous place, and the problems go well beyond one bad Saturday in Las Vegas. Through five weeks, the biggest alarm bell is that this simply does not look like a well-coached football team.
The offense has been the loudest mess. Cal’s first unit looks stuck in place, with a staff that appears unable to do much beyond the script it came in with.
Backup wide receivers have had to line up as running backs, the offensive line has been bogged down, wideouts keep dropping passes, and a talented quarterback has fallen well short of expectations. Jackson Brousseau’s entrance made the Bears look a little better under this system, which only underscored how much the first team has struggled to handle an offense that takes up more than half the practice snaps.
The play calling has only deepened the frustration. When changes were made in how the staff handled the game, they produced almost nothing with QB1 in the first half.
Cal was throwing rollouts to the short side of the field, asking a slow-footed offensive line to hold up on long-developing plays for JKS, and dialing up wide receiver screens on third and long. Whatever is being installed during the week, it is not showing up on game day.
Even when the Bears got help from special teams, the offense still squandered it. Cal had a successful onside kick, a fumble recovery, a huge kickoff return and a punt block, yet those moments only yielded three points.
That has become a familiar theme for this team: takeaways and momentum swings that end up going right back to the other side. In Vegas, it happened again in full view.
The defense, which had at least seemed to be trending upward, was exposed by the speed of quarterback Jackson Arnold. Injuries played a role, but so did two targeting penalties that wiped out the backside and forced the team on the back unit.
Then, after Cal fought back to take the lead in the fourth quarter, the defense quickly gave it away again amid a pile of penalties. Allowing 39 points to UNLV is a bad performance, and the schedule only gets tougher from here with much better ACC quarterbacks ahead.
What makes this team so volatile is that it can make plays - and it has. Cal won its only P4 game because of those plays.
But too many snaps swing the wrong way, and the Bears keep living in that space where they look either over-aggressive or oddly passive depending on the situation. The result is negative football far too often, and it keeps dragging the team down.
There was always going to be some risk with a first-year head coach, especially one without the strategic background to fully manage a game. The hope was that the influx of talent Tosh Lupoi could bring would lift the ceiling. Instead, the coaching issues have swallowed the gains, leaving Cal in a far more disappointing spot than anyone expected.
The concern now is bigger than just the current record. Ron Rivera is on the sideline with the headset, serving as a director of football overseeing the coaches he helped bring in. Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele looks lost trying to process what he’s being asked to do, and he was beaten up for it.
The fallout could be severe if this keeps going. Memorial Stadium could empty out the rest of 2026.
Cal fans may find other ways to spend their Saturdays. Recruits could start looking at the chaos and wondering what they’d be signing up for.
And donors who put millions into NIL may be asking what all that money produced on the field.
Lupoi had financial support, internal backing and broad community alignment. After five weeks, much of it has already started to crack under the weight of strategic mistakes and a team that cannot consistently play smart or strong on game day. Cal is now a decided underdog in its next five games, and turning this around before the season slips away has become the only priority that matters.
If it doesn’t happen, this tenure may be in trouble before it really gets going.
In Other News...
Cal Showed Fight In Tosh Lupoi Debut But A Bigger Problem Emerged
Cals first look under new coach Tosh Lupoi came with some real energy, especially after the Bears unveiled a new offense and battled back against UNLV before falling 39-31. The second-half push gave the afternoon some bite, with backup quarterback Jackson Brousseau helping spark the rally, but the early-season opener still left Cal searching for cleaner execution and a better finish as the new staff gets its footing.
The bigger concern, though, was what happened to the lineup along the way. Quarterback Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele and safety Kingston Lopa both left with injuries, turning what had been a promising debut into a far more complicated day for a team trying to establish momentum. Lupoi now has to sort out not just what worked against UNLV, but how quickly Cal can recover if those absences linger. [Read more 🡒]
Cal Let A Winnable Night Slip Away In Frustrating Fashion
Cal had a chance to make a road night in Las Vegas count at Allegiant Stadium, but the game kept tilting back and forth in a way that never let the Bears settle in. It featured scoring plays on both sides, turnovers, penalties and injuries to key defensive players, with Cal hanging around well enough to keep the pressure on UNLV deep into the second half.
The Bears even pulled in front briefly in the fourth quarter before the Rebels answered and regained control, turning a winnable game into a frustrating one for Cal. By the time UNLV was protecting a 39-31 lead late, the Bears were left trying to recover from too many self-inflicted swings and too few stops when they needed them most. [Read more 🡒]
Cal Heads Home With A Bigger Question Than The UNLV Loss
California left Las Vegas with a loss, but the bigger immediate concern was what happened under center. After starter Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele went down, the Bears turned to backup Jackson Brousseau and suddenly had enough offense to make things interesting late in a 39-31 defeat to UNLV, a game in which the Rebels got a strong dual-threat effort from quarterback Jackson Arnold.
Brousseau helped fuel the rally and gave Cal something to build on as it heads home to face Virginia Tech, but the quarterback situation is still the story hanging over the Bears. Sagapoluteles injury changed the feel of the night, and how Cal handles that spot going forward will loom larger than the result itself if the starters status becomes a concern again. [Read more 🡒]