Colorado University Athletics
Brooks: Are Buffs, Bears Traveling Same Pac-12 Path?
September 26, 2014 | Football, B.G. Brooks
BERKELEY, Calif. - Mike MacIntyre and Sonny Dykes go back - not way, way back but far enough to have developed a feel for each other as college football coaches.
In 2010 they entered the Western Athletic Conference as first-time head coaching adversaries, MacIntyre at San Jose State and Dykes at Louisiana Tech. Prior to the 2013 season, they took another parallel step - twin leaps of faith perhaps - into the Pac-12 Conference, MacIntyre being hired by Colorado, Dykes by California.
Their head-to-head records are 2-2, with Dykes' LaTech teams defeating MacIntyre's San Jose Staters in two of their three meetings. But MacIntyre's first CU team beat Dykes' entry level Cal squad 41-24 last season in Boulder. It was MacIntyre's and the Buffs' only 2013 Pac-12 victory; the Golden Bears have yet to win a conference game under Dykes.
But Cal came agonizingly close last weekend at Arizona, squandering an 18-point fourth-quarter lead and allowing the Wildcats 36 final-period points. Arizona won 49-45 on a final-play "Hail Mary" pass - which helps set up a fall Saturday rippling with storylines in Cal's refurbished Memorial Stadium (2 p.m. MDT, Pac-12 Networks).
CU has lost six consecutive games in California, including two (1968, 2010) in Berkeley. The Buffs are 2-16-1 in the Golden State, with wins against Washington in the 1996 Holiday Bowl and at UCLA in 2002.
No surprise here, but Bears fans (and probably the Bears) believe their best chance for a Pac-12 breakthrough is against the Buffs. With remaining conference road games at Southern California, Arizona and Oregon, Buffs fans (and undoubtedly the Buffs) see Saturday's trip as an opportunity for a 'W' not to be squandered.
Whose program - MacIntyre's or Dykes' - has progressed the most in the 21 months since their hiring? Saturday's encounter won't provide a definitive answer but it will offer enough fodder to keep fan bases and message boards pulsing at least through the weekend.
MacIntyre's record at CU is 6-10 (1-9 Pac-12), while Dykes' Cal mark is 3-12 (0-10 Pac-12). Both coaches will tell you that long-term progress isn't measured by one afternoon, but small steps can become big ones for lower tier teams hoping to ascend - like the Buffs and the Bears.
The Buffs (2-2, 0-1) need a win to further their weekly improvement since week one. The Bears (2-1, 0-1) want to flush the bitter residue of their lost weekend in the desert, and MacIntyre believes he knows Dykes' approach.
"I think the first thing you have to do is - and I'm pretty sure Sonny is doing it - you always forget," MacIntyre said. "You don't forget but, you always get ready on Sunday or Monday to come back for the next week. That last game doesn't really affect the next week . . . you can't let something like that linger on if you can help it.
"Any game that you lose on the last play . . . any way like on a field goal or touchdown at the end, however it happens, you're always a little bit more emotional afterwards. But, usually, it's still a win or it's still a loss. You've got to get over it either way."
If Dykes & Co. have moved past their Tucson trauma, other issues linger. One is how to remedy disturbing fourth-quarter droughts. Cal averages 43.7 points a game, but in three games the Bears have scored 14 fourth-quarter points. All of those came at Arizona, but the home team answered with 36.
"We've got to figure out how to be the team that played the first three quarters for the entire football game," Dykes said. "If we want to win some of these Pac-12 games, we're going to have to execute at a high level for all four quarters. If we can do that, we'll have a good team."
Cal is allowing 29 points a game, CU 29.8. But MacIntyre contends the Bears defense "has played really, really well except for the fourth quarter. They're also probably tired of hearing that, I would imagine." He and Cal defensive coordinator Art Kauffman are well-acquainted; they coached together at Ole Miss and were across-the-street neighbors.
Last weekend, Cal allowed Arizona 520 passing yards, which dropped the Bears like a rock -- 118th among 125 FBS teams - in pass defense. After Arizona, Cal is yielding an average of 316.7 air yards. But the Bears lead the Pac-12 in rushing defense, permitting 110.7 yards a game.
Cal and CU are Nos. 6-7, respectively, in the Pac-12's rushing stats. The Buffs are averaging 160.0 ground yards, the Bears 187.3 - and that number concerns MacIntyre. "If they run for close to 200 yards then, they're going to be extremely hard to stop," he said. "They're got a good attack going, a good balanced attack."
Meanwhile, CU's defense has allowed four opposing quarterbacks to complete 49.2 percent of their passes, and doing that Saturday against Cal's Jared Goff might earn MacIntyre his first Pac-12 road win. Goff's three-game completion percentage is 65.1 percent; he's thrown for 890 yards and 10 touchdowns, with two interceptions.
MacIntyre said if his defense can limit Goff to completing 49 percent of his passes, "Then we're going to be in pretty good shape. The way they do it, though, it's a little bit tougher to do that at times." And it could be tougher still if CU is without linebacker Addison Gillam, who suffered a concussion last Saturday and sat out the second half in the Buffs' 21-12 win over Hawai'i.
The Bears have thrived on throwing long, with Goff teaming with six different receivers for receptions of 30 yards or longer. His three longest passes have been 60 yards to Darius Powe, 76 yards to Trevor Davis and 80 yards to Bryce Treggs.
Cal's gaudy passing/receiving stats are an incentive for CU safety Chidobe Awuzie. "We like it when quarterbacks throw, I'm not going to lie," he said. "We pride ourselves on getting picks or PBU's (passes broken up) or turnovers . . . . When a quarterback throws it up like that we want to just make plays on the ball and try to get picks."
CU quarterback Sefo Liufau has been intercepted twice in each of the last two games (five picks for the season). But he's only slightly below Goff in completion percentage (64.0), has thrown for 1,124 yards and has matched Goff's 10 TD passes - seven of them to Nelson Spruce, the Pac-12's leading receiver (9.2 catches a game, 129.5 yards a game).
Despite the Buffs' and Bears' respective conference rankings in scoring defense - Cal is No. 10, CU is No. 11 - Liufau doesn't think his offense has to go point-crazy on Saturday. CU's defense "can definitely stop them. I'm not worried about that," he said. "Obviously, yes, the offense has to put points on the board. You want touchdowns, but it's not like we're trying to go for a shootout here.
"I trust our defense and trust in our offense that we'll be able to execute. Obviously, we didn't execute last week like we should have in the second half (the Buffs were scoreless). But we made the corrections and we're ready to play."
Contact: BG.Brooks@Colorado.EDU
