Washington State football looks to capitalize off a strong road win against Stanford with a home win over the California Golden Bears in Week 10.
It’s looking like the Washington State Cougars are off to the Pac 12 Championship game for a chance to win their first-ever Pac 12 Championship. The Cougar passing offense is the best in the nation behind East Carolina-transfer Gardner Minshew and a wide assortment of receiving talent. Minshew has topped 300 passing yards in every game this season and has gone over 400 five times. The real story of this Washington State team is their defense.
The Cougars were expected to take a big step back after last season considering their offensive production was expected to pick up and they lost a pretty big playmaker in Hercules Mata’Afa and their greatest loss of all was defensive coordinator Alex Grinch who shipped out to join the Ohio State defensive team. Thus far in 2018, the Cougars are the 24th all-around defense, 37th pass defense, and the 35th ranked pass defense in college football.
California’s offense hasn’t offered much to write home about but their defense has played stellar defense over the past several weeks with five interceptions in the previous four games with only two passing touchdowns allowed.
Even in their 37-3 loss to UCLA, Dorian Thompson-Robinson couldn’t pass successfully on the Golden Bears and it took Cal’s former starting quarterback Brandon McIlwain turning the ball over four times to give them enough opportunity to hang that many points on them. Last week, it didn’t matter about how bad the California offense is because they beat the Washington Huskies 12-10 without ever scoring an offensive touchdown.
Can the Washington State Cougars remain the Pac 12’s best hope for the College Football Playoff with a win over Cal? or will the Golden Bear defensive unit put an end to the Coug’s chances?
Date: Saturday, Nov. 3
Time: 10:45 p.m. ET
Location: Pullman, WA
Venue: Martin Stadium
TV: ESPN
Live Stream: WatchESPN
Keys to Victory
The California Golden Bears need to score on offense if they plan to win. The Washington State passing attack is the best in the nation and no matter how good the Bears defense is, they would have to be able to capitalize on any and all mistakes that Gardner Minshew made. Whether it’s Chase Garber, Patrick Laird or Brandon McIlwain, someone has to be able to find the end zone and keep the ball away from this prolific passing attack. Defense travels, but, unfortunately for the bears, their offense does too.
Washington State must overwhelm the California defense and avoid making mistakes. The Cal passing offense it 91st overall nationally and would have no chance in keeping up with the high-powered Cougar offense if they can turn this one into a shootout. The Washington State defense needs to zero in on the run and make Chase Garber throw the ball and take advantage of any and all mistakes that he makes in the process.
Betting Odds
Points Spread: Washington State -9.5
Over/Under: 50
Prediction
California will need a new revelation on offense if they expect to win this game. Washington State might start off slow, but after wearing down the Golden Bear defense they will score multiple times late to extend their lead a bit. Minshew becomes the first quarterback to throw for 300 against Cal and Washington State goes into an interesting matchup against Colorado on the road next week.
Final Score: Washington State 35, California 17