Cal Plays Its Toughest Foes at Home -- But Does It Matter?
When Cal’s original football schedule was released months ago, it was seen as a significant advantage that the Bears played their two biggest challengers in the North Division, Oregon and Washington, at home.
In the revised schedule released Saturday morning, Cal is still scheduled to face Washington (Nov. 7) and Oregon (Dec. 5) as well as Stanford (Friday, Nov. 27) in Berkeley, but there is debate about how much of an advantage playing at home is now.
Because spectators will not be allowed to attend Pac-12 games this season because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the crowd support enjoyed by the home team is gone,
Entering this weekend’s game, FBS home teams had won only 59.5 percent of their games, which would be significantly worse than the 65.7 winning percentage of home teams last year. In fact, 59.5 percent would represent the worst home-field winning percentage in 15 years.
**Cal won't have the benefit of home crowds like this
Photo by Darren Yamashita - USA TODAY Sports
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More illuminating is a look at where the biggest upsets took place.
Defending national champion and sixth-ranked LSU had about 82,000 empty seats at its stadium when it was stunned by unranked Mississippi State last week. Would the Bulldogs have won if they were being badgered by 102,000 loud Tigers fans?
Kansas State stunned No. 3-ranked Oklahoma in Norman, Okla., with fewer than 23,000 people in the stands. Could the Wildcats have done that in a packed Oklahoma stadium.
No. 23 Iowa State had no fans at its home game against unranked Louisiana, and the Cyclones got bounced 31-14.
Only 12,000 fans were in Louisville’s stadium when the 18th-ranked Cardinals lost at home to No. 17 Miami.
And today (Saturday), unranked TCU, which lost its opener at home to Iowa State, upset No. 9 Texas on the Longhorns' home field.
It's hard to believe all four of those results would have occurred if the stadiums were full. And Pac-12 teams will have nobody in the stands for home games.
There are other advantages to playing at home, such as sleeping in your own bed, not having to withstand the laborious travel and familiarity with the surroundings.
But crowd support is the biggest advantage, and it does not exist this year in the Pac-12.
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Follow Jake Curtis of Cal Sports Report on Twitter: @jakecurtis53
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