Cal Football: Chase Garbers Says the Offense is Ready to Soar in Year 2 with Bill Musgrave
The start of Cal’s fall camp is just weeks away and senior quarterback Chase Garbers expects that Year 2 under offensive coordinator Bill Musgrave will be a huge step forward from the pandemic-mangled 2020 campaign.
“Compared to a year ago, it’s completely different,” Garbers says in the interview above. “Myself and our side of the ball is so comfortable with coach Musgrave’s offense.
“Last year, no spring ball, not even really camp. You’ve got 15, 20 practices thrown together . . . and then not even knowing who you’re going to play until a couple days before was definitely hard on the offense, especially a new offense we were trying to learn.”
The Bears were 1-3 a year after having their entire non-conference schedule wiped out along with five Pac-12 games. They lost to UCLA in their opener after the game was added to the schedule just two days earlier when their original game vs. Washington was canceled.
But there were issues on offense, to be sure: Cal ranked 11th in the Pac-12 in scoring (20.2 points), last in total offense (319.5 yards) and passing offense (192.8) and 11th in rushing offense (126.8).
Garbers, in his third season as the Bears’ full-time starter, called the team’s approach in spring ball and this summer “spectacular.”
“We finished spring ball really well strong. In the summer offensively we’ve taken a really good approach. We’ve stayed on the playbook, even learning some new things.
“We’re just going to keep rolling this momentum into fall camp. I think offensively it’s going to be a pretty good year for us.”
After last season, Garbers recalls, the offense gathered to watch game tapes. The players did not like what they saw.
“We all kind of looked at each like, `Wow, we were pretty raw. Yikes!’ It was not the greatest thing to watch,” Garbers recalls.
With fans expected to be back in Memorial Stadium beginning with the Sept. 4 season opener against Nevada, Garbers says crowds should expect to see a different product on offense.
“Coming into this year the fans are going to see a lot more exciting offense, a lot more explosive plays, a lot more polished offense,” he says.
Garbers says his personal offseason goals included improving his accuracy, arm strength and footwork. But the development of the offense as a whole will be accelerated by Musgrave sharing a larger percentage of his offensive resume.
“Last year we came in with a very limited playbook just because we never had time to put anything in. You wanted to run the things you were good at in practice.” Garbers says. “But this year, starting in the spring and even in the winter when we could meet, coach Musgrave opened up the offense, gave us quarterbacks complete control.
“It’s going to look like what you’ve seen from him the last couple years in the NFL. So it’s going to be a lot more exciting to play in and to watch.”
Musgrave, who has 20 years’ coaching experience in the NFL, including 13 as an offensive coordinator, showed what he could do in a recent stint with the Raiders.
The team averaged just 15.9 points and 282 yards the season before he arrived as coordinator and by his second season in 2016 was producing 26.0 points and more than 373 yards. Quarterback Derek Carr threw for more than 7,900 yards and 60 touchdowns in two seasons under Musgrave.
Can the Musgrave plan reap similar improvements for Cal?
“This is probably the most comfortable and confident I’ve been in my career at Cal,” Garbers says. “My teammates see it . . . how comfortable I am in the offense and how confident in what I can do as a player and as a leader.”
As far as the offense, Garbers says the Bears are more concerned with victories than statistics.
“Our defense is really good so they’re going to hold teams to a low number,” he says. “Ultimately, the offense just has to do its job and go score.”
*** Here are Cal’s offensive and defensive rankings in the Pac-12 since coach Justin Wilcox arrived before the 2017 season:
Cover photo of Chase Garbers by Darren Yamashita, USA Today
Follow Jeff Faraudo of Cal Sports Report on Twitter: @jefffaraudo
