Clemson 24, Cal 10, and Our Offense Never Found the End Zone

Kamar Mothudi gave us a lead in the first quarter, then the offense spent the rest of Friday night proving it couldn't score on its own.

I was on my feet in the first quarter screaming about a defensive lineman I'd never thought about once in my life. Kamar Mothudi scooped up Tait Reynolds's fumble and went 35 yards the other way, and for a little while on a Friday night in Berkeley, 41,778 of us got to believe Clemson had flown across the country to lose.

That was the high point. Our offense spent the next two and a half hours making sure of it.

Our only touchdown came from the defense

Let that sit for a second. Cal scored ten points against Clemson, and the offense was responsible for three of them. A Chase Meyer field goal on the opening drive of the second half. That's it. That's the whole offensive highlight reel from a home game against the biggest name on the schedule all year.

The last time Cal went a whole home game without an offensive touchdown was 2018, and we won that one 12 to 10 over Washington because that defense was a brick wall. This defense was good. It wasn't that good, and it shouldn't have had to be.

231 total yards. 86 on the ground. 13 first downs to Clemson's 23. Three of twelve on third down and oh for two on fourth. I watched both fourth down stops with my hands on my head, and the guy next to me, who's been going to games since the Tedford years, just said "yep" and sat down. Yep. That's the review.

And Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele. I love the kid. I defended him in the preseason column when I said this team might actually be dangerous, and I'm not taking it back yet. But 16 of 29 for 119 yards and two interceptions is the fewest yards he's thrown for in 17 career starts, and he didn't look comfortable for a single series. Elliot Washington II picked him twice. The first one came on our opening drive, right after Isaiah Crosby picked off Reynolds on theirs, which in hindsight was the whole night in miniature: our defense makes a play, our offense gives it right back.

The drive that flipped it

I'm still mad about the second quarter.

Clemson kicked a field goal to make it 7 to 3, and then put together a 17 play drive that should've died well short of the goal line. We had them stopped. Fourth and 4, they line up in field goal formation for a pooch punt, and Niles Davis jumps offside. Free first down. The drive keeps going, Gideon Davidson punches it in from a yard out with 5:37 left in the half, and we go to the locker room down 10 to 7 instead of up 7 to 3 with the crowd still loud.

Do I blame a kid for jumping? Not really. Do I blame a defense that bit on one of the oldest tricks in the book in a tight game? A little. Maybe more than a little. Ask me tomorrow.

The punt

We tied it at 10 on Meyer's kick, punted on the very next possession, and then came the moment I'm going to be replaying in my head for a week.

Agnus Davies hit a low 39 yard punt straight down the middle of the field. Not toward a sideline. Not high enough to cover. Bryant Wesco Jr. caught it on the run, made two of our guys miss, cut toward the Clemson sideline and was gone. 65 yards. It was Clemson's first punt return touchdown since 2018, which somehow makes it worse, like we handed them an anniversary present.

Whose idea was it to kick that ball there? I'd genuinely like to know.

From that point on the offense never got close. Not once. The Clemson defense had the lead and played like it knew we weren't coming, and honestly, it was right.

Clemson wasn't even good, and that's the part that stings

This wasn't the Trevor Lawrence Clemson. Reynolds, in his second start, threw for 108 yards and turned it over twice. Dabo basically called it jitters afterward. Their passing game was as broken as ours. If you'd told me before kickoff that Clemson would throw for 108, I would've bet my parking spot on the hill that we'd win.

But they could run it and we couldn't stop it when it mattered. Davidson went for 159 yards and two touchdowns on 22 carries. Clemson piled up 255 rushing yards on 49 tries and held the ball for over 34 minutes, and that's how you wear out a defense that's been out there all night covering for its own offense. Kingston Lopa and Crosby had 11 tackles apiece. They were gassed by the fourth quarter and you could see it from the upper rows.

So when Davidson broke the 75 yarder with under three minutes left to make it 24 to 10, it didn't even feel like a punch. It felt like paperwork. Half the student section was already climbing the stairs.

Lupoi owns it, and he should

Tosh Lupoi said afterward the execution has to be better and that it starts with him finding the answers. Good. I believe him when he says it. I just want to see what the answers look like, because the offense that was supposed to carry this team has put up 55 points total against UCLA, Syracuse and Clemson combined, and nobody should count Wagner.

We're 2 and 2, 1 and 1 in the ACC. The UCLA opener was a mess, the Syracuse win was a grind, Wagner was Wagner, and now this. The first time Cal and Clemson have met since this whole ACC experiment started, exactly the kind of game the move was supposed to be for, and we didn't give the country one reason to remember it.

Next is UNLV in Las Vegas on Saturday, then Virginia Tech and Wake Forest at home. The rest of it is on the 2026 schedule page. Those are winnable games. They were always the winnable games. Clemson was the one we were supposed to measure ourselves against.

We measured. I didn't like the number.

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