Cal's Bowl Game May Be a Homecoming for Bears' Interim Head Coach

It’s starting to look like Cal’s bowl game might turn out to be a homecoming for Golden Bears’ interim head coach Nick Rolovich.

We cited 10 college football experts who projected bowl pairings this week, and five of them predict that Cal will play in the Hawaii Bowl against the host school, the Hawaii Rainbow Warriors.

As you may know, Rolovich was a star quarterback for Hawaii in 2000 and 2001, throwing 34 touchdown passes in 2001. Later he was the Rainbow Warriors head coach for four years from 2016 to 2019, and he took Hawaii to the Hawaii Bowl in three of those seasons, winning two of the three.

The Hawaii Bowl would also be a return home for four Cal players from Hawaii, including freshman quarterback Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele and freshman starting safety Aiden Mautai.

If Cal does end up in the Hawaii Bowl it won’t be played in the same stadium in which Rolovich played and coached, though.

Clarence T. C. Ching Athletics Complex was being built when Rolovich was the coach at Hawaii, but it did not become the home stadium for the Rainbow Warriors until 2021 and wasn’t the stadium for the Hawaii Bowl until 2022.

Aloha Stadium was the site for Hawaii home games and the Hawaii Bowl when Rolovich played and coached there. But it is scheduled to be demolished in early 2026.

Rolovich was Cal’s interim head coach for the Bears 38-35 upset win over SMU that guaranteed Cal (7-5, 4-4 ACC) its first winning season since 2019 and its first season since 2009 with a conference winning percentage of .500 or better.

.Hawaii finished the regular season with an 8-4 record, including 5-3 in the Mountain West. Cal and Hawaii had two common opponents this season -- Stanford and San Diego State. Hawaii beat both of those teams, and Cal lost to both. The Rainbow Warriors were 6-1 at home, and their only home defeat was a two-point loss to Fresno State when Hawaii failed to convert a two-point try with nine seconds left.

Two other experts predict an interesting matchup with a former head coach. ESPN’s Kyle Bonagura projects that Cal will land in the Liberty Bowl, and the Pro Football Network suggests Cal will wind up in the Independence Bowl, but both say Cal’s opponent will be TCU, whose head coach, Sonny Dykes, was Cal’s head coach from 2012 through 2016 before being fired and replaced by Justin Wilcox.

Wilcox was fired a week ago, and Rolovich was named interim head coach for the final two games.

It’s worth noting that teams that were members of the Pac-12 in 2023, such as Cal, still have tie-ins with the six Pac-12-affiliated bowls. The Hawaii Bowl is not one of them, but there is an excess of bowl-eligible teams from the group of 2023 Pac-12 teams, so some will go to other vacancies.

A list of the Pac-12-affilited bowls is posted at the end of this report:

Here are the Cal bowl projections from the 10 experts we cite:

ESPN (Mark Schlabach)

Hawaii Bowl – Cal vs. Hawaii

Wednesday, December 24

Clarence T.C. Ching Athletics Complex (Honolulu)

5 p.m., ESPN

CBS Sports (Brad Crawford)

Hawaii Bowl – Cal vs. Hawaii

Wednesday, December 24

Clarence T.C. Ching Athletics Complex (Honolulu)

5 p.m., ESPN