Counting Down Cal's Top-50 Transfer Athletes: No. 40 Caisa-Marie Lindfors

We rank the mid-career arrivals in Berkeley who have had the greatest impact on the Golden Bears

Caisa-Marie Lindfors | Photo courtesy of Cal Athletics

The transfer portal era in college athletics seems like it’s been with us forever. Likewise, most fans can recall less turbulent times when transfers happened, they simply didn’t look like a stampede to the 1849 California Gold Rush.

We thought it was time to rank the best transfers Cal teams have attracted, most of them in recent seasons but also including a few OGs from yesteryear. 

We limited our ranking to transfers from four-year colleges.

Here is the next athlete in our countdown: 

40. Caisa-Marie Lindfors

Sport: Track & field

Arrival year at Cal: 2023-24

Previous school: Florida State (Spent three seasons at FSU, winning the 2023 ACC women’s discus title and finishing fourth at the NCAA championships to earn first-team All-America honors).

Contributions at Cal: 

— Lindfors attended Cal for two years and made a significant imprint on the Bears’ record book. 

— As a junior, she competed at the NCAA west regional meet and ended the season ranked No. 4 among all collegiate discus throwers. Indoors, she broke Cal’s 23-year-old program record in the weight throw with a heave of 54-2 3/4 (16.53m).

— Following her first season in Berkeley, Lindfors represented her native Sweden at the Paris Olympics, the first Cal women’s discus thrower to qualify for the Games. She finished 27th place with a throw of 194-6 (59.29m). Previous to that, Lindfors placed second at the Swedish championships.

— As a senior at Cal, she broke a 41-year-old Big Meet record in the discus with a mark of 201-10 (61.52m). She won the discus at the Mt. SAC Relays at 201-7 (61.44m). Then she climbed to No. 2 on the Bears’ all-time list in the shot put with a throw of 54-8 1/4 (16.67m) that was good for third place at the ACC championships.

Standout performance: Lindfors saved her best for last. Competing at the 2025 NCAA championships, she unleashed a career-best throw of 205-3 (62.57m) on her final attempt to place fourth and secure All-America status. She broke her own Cal record and posted the No. 3 all-time spot in Swedish history, the No. 5 rung on the all-time NCAA chart.

Impact on her team: Lindfors’ achievements in the discus and shot put perpetuated the Bears’ recent excellence in the women’s throws, extending the program’s streak to five straight seasons with at least a top-4 finish at the NCAAs.  

Previously on our list: 

No. 41: Kendrick Raphael

No. 42. Aidan Keanaaina 

No. 42: Kaylee Pond

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