2020 California Golden Bears football team

The 2020 California Golden Bears football team was scheduled to represent the University of California, Berkeley during the 2020 NCAA Division I FBS football season. The team was to be led by head coach Justin Wilcox, who was in his fourth year as head coach. The Bears finished 8–5 in 2019, matching their best record since 2015. The team's offense was to be led by Bill Musgrave, who replaced Beau Baldwin; Baldwin left to become the head coach at Cal Poly.[1]

2020 California Golden Bears football
Conference	Pac-12 Conference
Division	North Division
Head coach	Justin Wilcox (4th season)
Offensive coordinator	Bill Musgrave (1st season)
Defensive coordinator	Peter Sirmon (1st as DC, 2nd as coordinator, 3rd season)
Co-defensive coordinator	Tim DeRuyter (1st as co-DC, 4th as coordinator, 4th season)
Home stadium	California Memorial Stadium (Capacity: 62,467)

2020 Pac-12 Conference football standings
	Conf							Overall
Team		W		L					W		L
North Division
California			–							–
Oregon			–							–
Oregon State			–							–
Stanford			–							–
Washington			–							–
Washington State			–							–
South Division
Arizona			–							–
Arizona State			–							–
Colorado			–							–
UCLA			–							–
USC			–							–
Utah			–							–
Championship: TBA
$ – Conference champion x – Division champion/co-champions Note: Due to COVID-19, the Pac-12 suspended the 2020 football season. As of August 14, 2020; Rankings from AP Poll

For just the fourth time in the series history, the Big Game against Stanford will not be played during the month of November. It had been played twice in December: 2007 and 2018, the latter was the result of the originally scheduled game being delayed due to wildfire haze. It was also played in October once in 2012, due to conference scheduling. Cal has lost all three previous meetings where the game was not played in November.

On August 11, 2020, the Pac-12 Conference cancelled all fall sports competitions due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[2]

Offseason

Position key

Back

B

Center

C

Cornerback

CB

Defensive back

DB

Defensive end

DE

Defensive lineman

DL

Defensive tackle

DT

End

E

Fullback

FB

Place Kicker

PK

Guard

G

Halfback

HB

Kicker

K

Kickoff returner

KR

Offensive tackle

OT

Offensive lineman

OL

Linebacker

LB

Long snapper

LS

Split end

SE

Punter

P

Punt returner

PR

Quarterback

QB

Running back

RB

Safety

S

Tight end

TE

Wide receiver

WR

Offseason departures

Nine Golden Bears graduated in 2020[3], and three were selected in the NFL Draft.

2020 California offseason departures

Name	Number	Pos.	Height	Weight	Year	Hometown	Notes
Ashtyn Davis	27	S	6'1	202	Senior	Santa Cruz, CA	Declared for NFL Draft, drafted in the third round by New York Jets.
Jaylinn Hawkins	6	S	6'2	210	RS Senior	Buena Park, CA	Declared for NFL Draft, drafted in the fourth round by Atlanta Falcons.
Evan Weaver	89	LB	6'3	235	Senior	Spokane, WA	Declared for NFL Draft, drafted in the sixth round by Arizona Cardinals.
Valentino Daltoso	61	OL	6'4	305	Senior		Graduated
Ricky Walker III	21	WR	5'11	190	Senior		Graduated
Collin Moore	16	TE	6'4	240	Senior		Graduated
Colt Doughty	42	LB	6'1	230	Senior		Graduated
Trey Turner III	5	S	6'1	185	Senior		Graduated
Lone Toailoa	55	DE	6'2	290	Senior		Graduated
Chinedu Udeogu	91	TE	6'4	275	Senior		Graduate transfer to Illinois.
Gabe Siemieniec	46	PK	6'1	210	Senior		Graduate transfer to Louisiana Tech.
Greg Thomas	39	PK	5'9	165	Senior		Graduated

Preseason

On January 3, 2020, Cal announced that it would hire former Denver Broncos offensive coordinator Bill Musgrave as its next offensive coordinator, replacing Beau Baldwin. Musgrave, an Oregon alumni like Wilcox, began his coaching career as quarterbacks coach for the Oakland Raiders in 1997. He last coached at the collegiate level as an offensive coordinator for Virginia in 2001-2002.

On January 10, Angus McClure was announced as the next offensive line coach.[4] McClure spent 11 years at UCLA. Four days later, Aristotle Thompson was hired as the running backs coach.[5] Thompson was the running backs coach at Cal Poly prior to being hired at Cal.

Cal's defensive line coach, Gerald Alexander, was hired to the same position by the Miami Dolphins on January 24.[6] Cal announced it would hire former Arizona defensive coordinator Marcel Yates to replace him the following day.[7]

On March 4, it was announced that Peter Sirmon would be made co-defensive coordinator alongside Tim DeRuyter.

The Preseason Media poll will be released prior to the start of the regular season.

Schedule

Cal's 2020 regular season was announced on January 16.[8] The Golden Bears had 3 games scheduled against UNLV, TCU, and Cal Poly, but cancelled these games on July 10 due to the Pac-12 Conference's decision to play a conference-only schedule due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[9]

On July 31, the Pac-12 announced a new football schedule, consisting of 10 conference games instead of the usual 9. The Bears will add Arizona to their scheduled slate of conference games.[10]

Date	Opponent	Site	Result
September 26	at Oregon State	Reser Stadium Corvallis, OR
October 3	at USC	Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum Los Angeles, CA
October 10	Washington	California Memorial Stadium Berkeley, CA
October 17	at Washington State	Martin Stadium Pullman, WA
October 24	Stanford	California Memorial Stadium Berkeley, CA (Big Game)
November 7	Oregon	California Memorial Stadium Berkeley, CA
November 14	at Arizona	Arizona Stadium Tucson, AZ
November 21	Utah	California Memorial Stadium Berkeley, CA
November 28	at Arizona State	Sun Devil Stadium Tempe, AZ
December 4	UCLA	California Memorial Stadium Berkeley, CA (rivalry)

Rankings

Further information: 2020 NCAA Division I FBS football rankings

Ranking movements
Legend: ██ Increase in ranking. ██ Decrease in ranking.
NR = Not ranked. RV = Received votes. т = Tied with team above or below. ( ) = First place votes.

	Week
Poll	Pre	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	Final
AP
Coaches	RV
CFP	Not released															Not released

References

1. Curtis, Jake (January 3, 2020). "Cal Football: Bill Musgrave Officially Named Bears' Offensive Coordinator". Sports Illustrated. Retrieved January 20, 2020.
2. "Pac-12 Conference postpones all sport competitions through end of calendar year". pac-12.com. August 11, 2020. Retrieved August 11, 2020.
3. Mellor, Cam. "Cal Football graduates nine student-athletes".
4. "Cal hires former UCLA coach Angus McClure to coach the offensive line". California Golden Blogs.
5. "Bears hire Aristotle Thompson as new Running Backs Coach". California Golden Blogs.
6. "Miami Dolphins Hire Gerald Alexander as Defensive-Back Coach". California Golden Blogs.
7. "Cal Hires Former Arizona DC Marcel Yates as DB Coach". California Golden Blogs.
8. Chen, Rick (2020-01-16). "What to Know About the New Cal Football 2020 Schedule". California Golden Blogs. Retrieved 2020-01-17.
9. Bromberg, Nick. "Pac-12 follows Big Ten's lead and won't play non-conference games in 2020". Yahoo News. Retrieved 10 July 2020.
10. "Pac-12 Announces 2020 Football Schedules". Cal Bears. Retrieved 1 August 2020.