TCU Coach Gary Patterson Fell Asleep Watching Cal-Nevada Game
Cal faces TCU on Saturday in Fort Worth, Texas, and TCU coach Gary Patterson admitted during his Tuesday press conference that he fell asleep watching Cal’s game against Nevada this past Saturday.
Now before you make any judgments about what that implies you should know that Patterson is a voter in the coaches top-25 poll each week, and he feels a responsibility to watch those West Coast games to vote intelligently.
“I’m still one of those guys who believes you have to do it the right way,” he said.
But the Cal-Nevada game began at 7:45 Pacific time, which was 9:45 p.m. Texas time. The game did not end until 11:10 p.m. Pacific time, which was 1:10 a.m. Texas time.
“I have to admit I fell asleep sometime around the fourth quarter of the Cal game,” he said.
He didn’t miss much, as a Cal field goal two minutes into the fourth quarter provided the final points of a game Cal lost 22-17.
Asked whether he expects Cal to make a sizable improvement from Week One to Week Two, Patterson said, “Of course.”
“I’m sure he was not happy,” Patterson said, referring to Bears coach Justin Wilcox. “Their kids weren’t happy. I read all their articles over there.”
TCU is coming off a 45-3 victory over FCS school Duquesne in a game in which the third and fourth quarters were shortened to 12 minutes. And playing an overmatched foe enabled Patterson and TCU to begin preparations for Cal in the days before the Duquesne game.
“That’s one of the advantages about playing a Division I-AA team (the former label of FCS teams) compared to playing a team like Reno, that was a good football team, is you can’t afford to look by anybody,” Patterson said.
But the performance against the Dukes was not good enough.
“We need to play a lot better to beat Cal,” Patterson said.
The paisley tie analogy
The 61-year-old Patterson is in his 40th year of college coaching and his 21st season as TCU’s head coach, so he has seen trends come and go. On Tuesday, he addressed whether defenses are starting to catch up with the explosive offenses in today’s college game.
“I thought a little bit of that last year,” he said. “It always goes through rotations. It’s kind of like a paisley tie. About every 10 years you pull it back out, it goes away and it’s terrible. Then all the sudden, you look around and everybody’s wearing a paisley tie. I’m old enough now I’ve gone through three cycles of paisley ties.”
TCU defensive tackle Terrell Cooper was expected to return to practice this week as well as right guard West Harris. Patterson said there is no update on cornerback Noah Daniels, perhaps the team’s best NFL prospect who sat out the opener.
The previous Cal-TCU game
The only meeting between Cal and TCU occurred in the 2018 Cheez-It Bowl. TCU's Corey Bethley described that game as "weird" in a story in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.
It was indeed weird. There were nine interceptions, and the game was played in a baseball stadium (Chase Field in Phoenix). Chase Garbers was pulled at halftime after throwing three first-half interceptions and replaced by Chase Forrest, who had not thrown a pass during the regular season. TCU won the game 10-7 in overtime when the Horned Frogs kicker who had been replaced for a fourth-quarter field-goal try, returned and made the game-winning field goal.
The Gary Patterson statue on TCU campus
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