California Golden Bears Athletics
Cal Looks To Become Bowl Eligible With Win At USC
11/10/2014 12:00 AM | Football
| Game 10: USC Trojans |
| Thursday, Nov. 13 | 6:00 pm PT |
| Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum | Los Angeles, CA |
| TV: ESPN, ESPN SkyCam - Rece Davis (Play by Play), Jesse Palmer (Analyst) Samantha Ponder (Sideline) |
| National Radio: ESPN Radio – Bill Rosinski (Play by Play), David Norrie (Analyst), Joe Schad (Sideline) |
| Radio: KGO 810 AM – Joe Starkey (Play by Play), Mike Pawlawski (Analyst), Todd McKim (Sideline) |
| Live Stats: GameTracker |
| Live Audio: TuneIn Radio |
| SiriusXM Satellite Radio: Sirius (91) and XM (91) |
| Cal Student Radio: KALX 90.7 FM Eamonn Shannon (PlayBy-Play), Justin Allen (Analyst) |
| Series History: USC leads, 66-30-5 |
| Last Meeting at USC: USC 27, Cal 9 (Sept. 22, 2012) |
| Last Meeting: USC 62, at Cal 28 (Nov. 9, 2013) |
| Current Win Streak: USC – 10 (2004-13) |
| Last Cal Win: at Cal 34, USC 31, 3 OT (Sept., 27, 2003) |
| More Information |
| Cal Game Notes | USC Game Notes | Pac-12 Weekly Release | Cal Information Guide | News/Features | Cal Athletics YouTube | @CalFootball | @CalCoachDykes | Cal_Football Instagram |
• Cal plays at USC on Thursday looking for one more victory to become bowl eligible for the first time since 2011. The Golden Bears are also looking for their first win over USC since 2003 and their first victory in the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum since 2000.
• With five wins in its first nine games of 2014, Cal has already enjoyed a four-game turnaround from last year when the Bears were 1-11. The program's largest turnaround in the modern era happened in 1947 when Cal won seven more games than the season before by going 9-1 after a 2-7 campaign in 1946. Cal's improvent in 2014 is its best since the Bears went 7-5 in 2002 after finishing 1-10 in 2001.
• Cal ranks in the top 20 nationally in eight offensive categories through the first nine games of the 2014 campaign – passing offense (4th, 361.0 ypg), scoring offense (8th, 41.9 ppg), total offense (11th, 509.1 ypg), first downs (12th, 235), fourth down conversion percentage (T17th, 66.7%), team passing efficiency (18th, 154.54), red zone offense (T18th, 89.7%) and third-down conversion percentage (19th, 47.5%).
• National honors candidate Jared Goff ranks among the nation's top 10 in seven individual
categories including touchdown passes (27, 4th), passing yards (3119, 4th), passing yards per game (346.6 ypg, 4th), total offense (338.4 ypg, 7th), points responsible for (164, 9th), completions per game (25.89 cpg, 9th) and points responsible for per game (18.7 ppg, T9th), while he is 15th in passing efficiency (154.86), 18th in yards per pass attempt (8.38 yppa) and 23rd in passing yards per completion (13.39 ypc). He ranks second in the Pac-12 in passing yards and passing yards per game, while he is third in touchdown passes.
• Daniel Lasco has scored in each of Cal's last eight contests. Lasco had his first career game with three touchdowns in his most recent contest at Oregon State when he also set personal bests in carries (30), rushing yards (188) and all-purpose yards (208). Lasco has eight rushing touchdowns in his last five games with at least one in each contest and seven of the last eight. His 10 rushing touchdowns on the season are second in the Pac-12 while he has added two receiving scores for a team-high total of 12 touchdowns and one two-point conversion for 74 points. Lasco is seventh in the Pac-12 in rushing (88.4 ypg) and with 796 yards through nine games is on pace to become Cal's first 1,000-yard rusher since Isi Sofele had 1,322 yards on the ground in 2011. He has added career highs of 27 catches for 324 yards to combine for 1,120 rushing and receiving yards, which is the most since Keenan Allen (1,398) and Sofele (1,355) both went over 1,300 in 2011.
• Cal has 42 players that have played for the first time this season, including 23 freshmen and 10 true freshmen. The Bears have also used 19 other players for the first time in their career.
• Cal is 3-1 on the road this year with wins at Northwestern, Washington State and Oregon State with the team's only road loss at Arizona. A win at USC would give Cal a final 4-1 regular-season road record that would be the best since 2004 when Cal was 5-1 on the road. The last time the Bears won four games on the road was in 2009 with a 4-2 mark.
• Cal has played in the two highest scoring games in modern-era school history (since 1937) in two victories in 2014. Cal and Washington State combined for 119 points in a 60-59 Cal win, while Cal and Colorado combined for 115 points in a 59-56 double overtime Cal win.
