Cal Football Video: Being Competitive and the Collapsing Banner

There are times when the symbolism of the moment is impossible to ignore.

On Wednesday evening, Cal coach Justin Wilcox was going through a heartfelt analysis of his team’s disappointing performance in the 35-0 loss to Utah and how the Bears must react to it.

“Anytime you go through a game like that when you just . . . we really didn’t do anything well,” he said. “I mean you have to give the other team credit, but we didn’t do anything well. Those are difficult and extremely frustrating. You have to move on from them, and you can’t forget them. It’s a fine line.”

Wilcox continued on to note that you have to be confident you can win every game.

“If you’re not confident walking into the stadium that you’re going to perform at your best, you might as well not show up,” Wilcox said.

He was continuing his talk about last week's preparation for the Utah game, when the banner behind him collapsed on his head. It was a “sky is falling” moment that symbolized Cal’s season that included a 4-0 start followed by the current four-game losing streak.

Perhaps more significant is the way Wilcox pushed ahead, undeterred by the problem around him.

“We knew it would be difficult,” Wilcox continued without missing a beat. “They’re a very good team. They’re as physical a team as we’ve faced in three years here.

“We knew there would be some tough matchups. We knew we had some relatively inexperienced guys. Our job is to go there and perform. We didn’t have enough. We didn’t do anything well enough to give ourselves a chance to win the game.”

The Bears have to hope they can recover from problems as well as Wilcox did in this situation.