Dear friend of Cal Athletics:

Greetings from Berkeley!

This is truly one of my favorite times of the year as our students have returned to campus in full force and the fall season is getting underway. Women's Soccer opened the year with our first official competition, new head men's soccer coach Leonard Griffin made his debut with the Bears and our volleyball and field hockey teams have opened the season as well.

We couldn't be more excited to host our football season-opener this Saturday against UC Davis. Last week, we announced a series of improvements and upgrades to the gameday experience at FTX Field at California Memorial Stadium, and we are looking forward to having you enjoy the new amenities as you watch our Golden Bears throughout the season. Among the new features are open air suites in the south endzone and along the East Rim, each of which feature spacious private dining, a bar and premium viewing areas. Two more suites are available for purchase in the seventh floor of the press box, as are eight open-air, table top seating for four along the southwest corner of the field level. We've also added new sharper videoboards and ribbon boards that feature the best clarity of any outdoor venue in the country, and have teamed up with Levy to elevate our food and beverage options on gameday.

Additionally, our Cal Athletics Fund Tailgate is back and now open to all student-athlete alumni with a student-athlete alumni membership card. The tailgate includes food and beverages, entertainment and more! For a full look at this year's Cal Athletics Fund benefits, view the CAF membership guide for details.

It should be a memorable season for a lot of reasons, and now there is another one – our longtime radio voice, Joe Starkey, has announced that he will retire after the 2022 season. This will be Joe's 48^th and final year calling our games, and he will be truly missed. In the meantime, we plan on honoring Joe in a variety of ways throughout the season, including holding "Joe Starkey Day" for our season-finale on Nov. 25 against UCLA. Joe is a Bay Area legend, and we have been so fortunate to call him our own for almost five decades.

Last week, we welcomed back both of our basketball teams from memorable trips to Europe. Our men's team had an amazing experience traveling to France, Belgium and Germany. Some of the highlights of their journey included visiting the Eiffel Tower, the Lourvre and Paris Saint Germain Football Stadium in Paris, meeting the Deputy Ambassador to Belgium in Charleroi and visiting with senior Lars Thiemann's family in Dusseldorf, which is near Lars' hometown of Krefeld. The team also enjoyed a big win over Spirou Belgium before dropping a game against Bayer Giants Leverkusen – Lars' former team before coming to Cal.

Our women's basketball team had a wonderful trip to Spain and Croatia. Among their highlights were ziplining in Omis, Croatia, kayaking in Dubrovnik and going on a "Game of Thrones" tour. The team also conducted a clinic with middle-schoolers in Barcelona and did a community service event with special needs children in Split. A 72-67 win over Mataro Select highlighted the team's on-court competition!

Part of the excitement of the new school year are the assortment of events that are held to welcome returning and new students to campus. Earlier this month, we held our New Student-Athlete Orientation hosted by the Cameron Institute and our Cal Athletics Parent Open House at the University Club in California Memorial Stadium. We had over 140 incoming student-athletes attend our orientation, and it was the first time in three years that we have been able to hold this event in person. It felt wonderful to celebrate and meet with the new additions to our campus community, including their parents.

I also had the pleasure of speaking to over 10,000 new additions to our campus community at New Student Convocation, sharing with our new community of incoming students information about our department – its history and its successes – both competitively and academically. I look forward to seeing them joining our passionate students, alums and fans while supporting our teams and making friends along the way.

Last Tuesday, we held our annual Welcome Back Barbecue, hosted by the Big C Society and the Cameron Institute. This is always a memorable event, and this year's proved to be no different as our 930 student-athletes, along with coaches and staff, filled Haas Pavilion for a short program before heading out to Stu Gordon Stadium to break bread and share in community. Chancellor Christ kicked off the event, and we celebrated last year's successes while setting expectations for our student-athletes. We enjoyed hearing from football's Jamieson Sheahan, who is a leader of our Student-Athlete Advisory Council, and lacrosse's Kennedy Goss, who is president of the Racial Justice Council.

Our final Cal Athletics Coaches Caravan takes place this week in Lafayette on September 1st - if you're local to the East Bay, it's a great opportunity to hear from our head coaches! The Notre Dame game is right around the corner and if you're traveling to South Bend, I hope you join us at the Cal Athletics Tailgate. We are nearly sold out, so purchase your tickets now if you haven't already. Preparations are also underway for the 125th Big Game, including a special 125th Big Game Dinner on Friday, November 18th that will honor our Big Game heroes. Please save the date and look for an opportunity to register in the coming weeks. 

I'm excited to share that we recently completed the Gender Equity Campaign that will allow us to upgrade and build new facilities for our softball and beach volleyball programs. A special thank you to the campaign committee, and donors who made this possible! I also hope you take a moment to read our exciting recap of the 2021-2022 Year. Through your generosity, Cal Athletics received $39.6 million in gifts and pledges from 10,882 gifts made by 5,926 donors. In addition, the number of donors who supported Cal Athletics grew by 9% from 2020-21. I am incredibly grateful to all of you who continue to support our student-athletes - it has made an incredible impact, especially during the past two years. 

You may have seen by now that a new collective was launched earlier this week that provides a platform for our student-athletes to explore the new landscape of name, image and likeness (NIL). Founded by prominent alums Kevin Kennedy, Stephanie Rivera and John Stock, CAlegends.com will allow supporters and brands to search a database of our student-athletes with the opportunity of landing partnerships.

We are excited about the start of the semester, and look forward to enjoying Cal Athletics events throughout the year with you! Go Bears!
   


Jim Knowlton
Director of Athletics