Monday, October 23, 2006

Daily Cal: Lynch Was Driving Force Behind Win

BY Steven Dunst

Somewhere, E-40 is smiling. After amassing 203 total yards and scoring the game-winning touchdown in Cal’s 31-24 overtime win over Washington, tailback Marshawn Lynch grabbed a stadium cart and went cruising. He tried to ghost ride, but the cart had no doors, and Lynch—already suffering from two sprained ankles, a banged up knee and a bad back—had no reason to try and pull off a dangerous stunt.  Instead, he just leaned out and smiled, zig-zagging across the field and soaking up the win while the student section remained on its feet.  “He did it all today,” Cal coach Jeff Tedford said. “He carried the flag around at the March of Victory, too. I don’t know what got into Marshawn today.”

The scene E-40 raps about in “Tell Me When to Go” bore a lot of similarity to what Lynch experienced Saturday afternoon while avoiding security guards in his cart:  “The moon is full, look at the dark clouds/ Sitting in my scrapper, watching Oakland go wild.”  All of Oakland, all of Berkeley, heck, every fan of college football in the country had reason to go wild after Saturday’s frighteningly close finish.  Lynch, for one, was fired up before the game even began. He watched as the Washington captains stretched and danced on the Cal logo, disrespecting the home team by chanting that the Memorial Stadium turf belonged to them.

Read the entire article here.

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