The Cal 100: No. 62 -- Vic Bottari
We count down the top 100 individuals associated with Cal athletics, based on their impact in sports or in the world at large – a wide-open category. See if you agree.
No. 62: Vic Bottari
Cal Sports Connection: Bottari was twice an All-Pacific Coast Conference halfback and twice a top-10 finisher in the Heisman Trophy voting for Cal's "Thunder Teams"
Claim to Fame: He rushed for 137 yards and scored both touchdowns in Cal's 13-0 win over Alabama in the 1938 Rose Bowl -- the Bears' most recent win on New Year's Day at Pasadena
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Vic Bottari was 5-foot-9, weighed 180 pounds and played in the 1930s, when football players wore primitive helmets without the protection of a facemask.
"He was a very quiet guy, but he had such strength, and he put everything he had into finishing his runs," backup lineman Ray Rosso told California Monthly magazine some years ago. "He hit the hole and hit it hard. If he hit enough holes, he was going to break one. And God, he was tough.”
The Sporting Green's coverage of the 1938 Rose Bowl
San Francisco Chronicle
Wearing jersey No. 92, ”Vallejo Vic,” as he was known, carried the ball 37 times for 134 yards and two touchdowns and was named the game’s MVP on Jan. 1, 1938, leading the second-ranked Golden Bears to a 13-0 triumph over No. 4 Alabama in the Rose Bowl.
Cal hasn’t won in Pasadena on New Year’s Day in the 85 years since then.
A year later, Bottari was chosen in the fourth round (30th overall) in the 1939 NFL draft by the Brooklyn Dodgers — yes, they were a football team. But he turned down their $4,000 contract offer.
Bottari served on the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise during World War II, earning a Bronze Star. Afterward he built a successful insurance practice in the East Bay while also serving seven years on the Berkeley school board.
While he was never a pro, Vic Bottari was a terrific college football player, a centerpiece along with fellow halfback Sam Chapman on coach Stub Allison’s “Thunder Teams.”
The 1937 Bears were 10-0-1, outscoring opponents 214 to 33 and closing the season with four straight shutouts, including the Rose Bowl.
Bottari’s rushing total against the Crimson Tide was the most by a Cal player in a bowl game until Jahvid Best ran for 173 yards in a 45-31 loss to Texas Tech in the 2006 Holiday Bowl. He played 60 minutes in the game, also intercepting a pass on defense.
Bottari finished eighth in the Heisman Trophy voting that year with Chapman checking in ninth.
A year later, the Bears were 10-1 and Bottari was a consensus All-American while finishing fifth in the Heisman race. That made him still the only Cal player to twice finish in the top-10 of the balloting.
Twice an all-Pacific Coast Conference halfback, Bottari rushed for 1,536 yards and 22 touchdowns in his career. A three-year starter, he threw a touchdown pass to Chapman to beat USC 13-7 as a sophomore in 1936.
Bottari is a member of the College Football Hall of Fame, the Rose Bowl Hall of Fame and the Cal Athletic Hall of Fame.
In 2001, he was voted a first-team member of the Pacific-10 Conference's All-Century Team.
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Cover photo of Vic Bottari courtesy of Cal Athletics
Follow Jeff Faraudo of Cal Sports Report on Twitter: @jefffaraudo
