BERKELEY, Calif. -- Ron Zook feels so strongly about the coaching cliches he displays around the University of Illinois football complex that he boxed them up and brought them along for the first road game of the season.
"It's a 60-minute game!" "It's a 100-yard field!" Those are banners he hung for his team to see as they filed from the visitor's locker room out onto the playing field at Cal-Berkeley's 82-year-old Memorial Stadium Saturday. They are phrases he uses frequently to remind his team it must play without lapses and that even if you've given up 99 yards by making mistakes on defense, a bold stand that refuses to allow one final yard can make a difference. Well, Illinois rose up and played like a competent, clever, well-coached football team for three quarters, then withered 15 minutes from the finish line, allowing 15th-ranked California 21 fourth-quarter points as the Golden Bears rallied to beat the Illini 35-20 Saturday.
And while the second-half collapse was a disappointment, Zook and his players seemed to find encouragement in playing so well against a Cal team that Zook said very much deserves its national ranking. "Our players should realize we can compete with a team that is ranked 15th in the country," Zook said. "I don't think we came in here and peed down our leg. That's a good football team and hopefully now we understand we can play with those kinds of teams, especially as we head into the Big Ten.
"I don't want anyone feeling down in the dumps. I think we are going to be competitive in the Big Ten. But we still have to go out and do that." For more than half of the game, Illinois (1-2) played as well as any Illini team has in recent memory. While building a 17-7 halftime lead, Illinois delivered the type of performance that was not expected until perhaps the second year of Zook's coaching tenure. And Zook said the team followed his upset script perfectly. "I told them to play hard and execute and we'd worry about the scoreboard when the game was over," he said. "I think what might have happened was in the third quarter we started looking at the scoreboard worrying about how we were going to win the game."
For whatever reason, Cal got clicking in the second half. Defensively it put increased pressure on Illini quarterback Tim Brasic, sacking him three times while making it difficult to throw the ball downfield. And Cal's running game began gouging the Illini defense for long gains. A two-yard touchdown run by Justin Forsett with 13:14 left in the game put Cal on top, 21-17. And that margin jumped to 28-17 when Tim Mixon slipped through a handful of would-be tacklers on a 79-yard punt return for a touchdown with 11:34 to go. "Unacceptable," Zook said in critiquing the punt coverage. "We had several guys who had a chance to get him on the ground and we didn't do it."
Even though Illinois answered with Jason Reda's 31-yard field goal to make it 28-20 with 8:54 to play, Cal came right back with an 80-yard touchdown drive capped by Marcus O'Keith's 12-yard run. After being limited to 102 yards rushing in the first half, Cal ripped off 192 yards running in the second half. "In the first half they tried to run it inside and we shut them down," defensive tackle Ryan Matha said. "Then in the second half they started attacking the edge a little and were able to make some plays." Once Cal seized control of the game and got its crowd of 57,657 to make some noise, it was difficult to remember just how well Illinois played while controlling the first part of the game. From the start, Zook's no-huddle, spread offense made Cal's defense look confused and befuddled. Initially, it was ball-control taken to an absurd level, with Illinois owning the ball for 21:35 minutes of the first half and getting off 49 plays to Cal's 21.
And Illinois' defense was playing sound, hard-hitting football. After Cal scored on its first possession to take a 7-0 lead, Illinois answered with an 80-yard, 14-play drive that included a 19-yard completion from Brasic to tight end Melvin Bryant, who made a one-handed catch after initially bobbling the ball. Two Cal penalties helped on the drive and when Pierre Thomas dove into the end zone with 7:00 minutes left in the period, tying the score 7-7, it was the first touchdown the Cal defense had given up at home in 10 quarters. After stopping Cal on its next possession, Illinois did get a lucky break when E.B. Halsey tried to grab a rolling punt, muffed the ball and nearly lost it. Somehow, though, Illini cornerback Alan Ball emerged from the bottom of a pile with the ball, giving Illinois possession on its on 23-yard line. This time Brasic engineered a 77-yard touchdown drive, hitting on seven-yard passes with Kyle Hudson, Kendrick Jones and Thomas, then hooking up with Hudson again on a 9-yard connection. A 15-yard scramble on third-and-six took Brasic and the Illini offense closer and when Cal was whistled for a personal foul on the play, the ball was at the Cal 9-yard-line. After Halsey was spilled for a three-yard loss on first down, Brasic hit Jones for a five-yard pass that made it third-and-goal at the seven. Halsey then gathered in a short pass and got inside the one-yard-line before being bumped out of bounds.
Zook decided not to settle for the field goal and on fourth down, Brasic kept the ball on an option rollout and slipped into the end zone standing up. That made it Illinois 14-7 with 14:07 left in the second quarter. Meanwhile, Cal could not get its offense untracked. Quarterback Joe Ayoob was just 1-for-9 passing in the first half and Cal's other scoring chance evaporated when a 35-yard field goal try was deflected by Chris Norwell. Illinois completed its first-half scoring by driving 61 yards before halftime where Jason Reda banged home a 36-yard field goal as time expired. The second half, however, was all Cal. Justin Forsett, filling in for injured tailback Marshawn Lynch, carried 16 times for 187 yards for Cal (3-0). And Ayoob recovered from his poor start to finish 8 of 17 passing. Brasic was a warrior for the Illini. He completed 21 of 37 passes for 228 yards and no turnovers. But he took a beating in the process. After the gamed he wore a bandage on his chin where he said he'd been given three or four stitches at halftime when a Cal helmet banged into him. His right hand had been stepped on and another helmet had crashed into his left arm. Ice bags were taped to the hand and arm.
"Just your standard Saturday," Brasic said. "That's how it goes. "Actually, coach Zook said this is nothing to hang our heads about. Our offense will continue to get better each week. You come into a game like this and you want to show you can compete with the better teams. I think we did that. We'll leave here holding our heads high, excited to be getting ready for Michigan State."
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