Cal Faces No Team Ranked in the Top 15 of Preseason Coaches Poll

The AFCA coaches preseason top-25 college football poll was released on Monday, and Cal faces none of the teams ranked among the top 15.

The only top-25 team Cal will face this season is SMU, which is No. 16 in the preseason coaches poll. Cal will play the Mustangs in the Bears’ final regular-season game on November 29 in Berkeley.

Clemson is ranked No. 6 and Miami is No. 10 in the coaches poll, but Cal does not face either of those ACC teams in 2025.

Last season Cal played three teams ranked in the coaches preseason top 25, and the Bears lost all three. The Bears lost to Florida State, which was No. 10 in the preseason poll, Miami, which was No. 19 before the season began, and North Carolina State, which started last season ranked No.22. The combined margin of Cal’s defeats in those three games was just seven points.

Unranked Cal faces three of the 26 teams that received votes in this year’s coaches preseason poll – Minnesota, Duke and Louisville – but the Bears will not play three other ACC teams that received votes – Georgia Tech, Syracuse and Florida State.

Obviously, a team’s ranking is likely to be different when Cal faces that opponent.

Last year, Cal played four teams that wound up in the top 25 of the final coaches poll, and the Bears lost all four of those games – to SMU, Miami, Syracuse and UNLV.

Cal wound up with a 6-7 record last season, and it has not had a winning season since 2019. The Bears have not had a winning conference record since 2009, but Cal’s favorable ACC schedule gives the Bears an opportunity to end that streak.

The Bears were picked to finish 15th in the 17-team ACC in the recent ACC media poll.

The Bears open their season with a nonconference night game against Oregon State on August 30 in Corvallis. The Bears then play three more nonconference games against Texas Southern, Minnesota and San Diego State before playing their first ACC game of the season against Boston College on the road on September 27.

Cal has a large number of transfers on this season’s roster, and a lot of starting spots are up for grabs in preseason practice, which started last week. Ohio State transfer Devin Brown came into the fall as the leading candidate to land the starting quarterback job, but freshman Jaron-Keawe Sagpolutele and redshirt freshmen EJ Caminong are competing with Brown for the No. 1 quarterback position in preseason workouts.

Recent articles:

Former Cal star Andrew Vaughn still producing with the Brewers

Two huge billboards in the East Bay promoting Cal football

New WR QuaRon Adams bring speed to Cal football

Ron Rivera talks about qualities he seeks in a quarterback

GM Ron Rivera looks at 3 issues when evaluating Cal football

Cal grad Mykolas Alekna wins Lithuanian national discus title