There’s this great line from a song that everyone sings at baseball games in America.

“Root, root, root for the home team. If they don’t win it’s a shame.”

Lots of people around campus think that it’s a shame whenever the Daily Cal bags on a team or the performance of an athlete here at Cal. Hypothetically, these people would say, “But you’re the school newspaper. You’re supposed to support our student-athletes.”

While we may root for the Bears in our hearts, we cannot explicitly root for Cal when we’re on the job. Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 22%

I’m going to come out and say it: This is the year the Cal football team earns a trip to the Rose Bowl in January.

Personally, I do not believe in jinxing the thing. After all, Bears fans have tried every trick in the book for almost a half-century to no avail. Plus, it’s my senior year. One can hope, right?

Whether you agree with me or not, you must at least acknowledge the possibility of Cal playing in January, and with that in mind, the Daily Cal is poised to bring you comprehensive coverage of Bears football all season long.

There will be four writers on the beat—sports editor Steffi Chan, Steven Dunst, Ryan Gorcey and Gerald Nicdao. Chan said the extra personnel will mean more analysis and features on players who otherwise would not get as much coverage. This week’s articles included features on Jahvid Best and Shane Vereen, and Craig Stevens.

The special Saturday Gameday editions will again be passed out at all home games and at the Big Game in Stanford. We hope to generate awareness about the issues and devise a more efficient distribution plan, especially for the students attending the games.

It can either be a magical season or just another heartbreaking chapter for Cal, but we’re ready to bring you all the details. For the next four months, let’s savor all the memories!

Popularity: 11%

If you flipped over to the back page of last Monday’s paper, you would have come across a large picture of Steve Sexton on the sports page. Sexton, a second-year graduate student, is a talented athlete with Olympic aspirations on the Cal Triathlon Club.

Summer provides a great opportunity for the Daily Cal to cover stories such as Sexton’s. The sports section only publishes once a week in the summer compared to five days a week in the fall and spring semesters, but it allows the section the ability to produce more features on teams and athletes.

Although much of the coverage in the fall and spring is dedicated to the 27 Division I teams on campus, the Daily Cal recognizes there are athletes at UC Berkeley with noteworthy accomplishments for club teams.

Last week, ESPN.com featured “a few of the best non-NCAA-sanctioned programs in the country.” Its first article was on the Cal rugby team, winners of 14 of the last 15 national championships, including a 37-7 win over BYU in May. While the Daily Cal assigns a beat writer to the rugby team because it is a Division I sport, ESPN.com’s coverage serves as a reminder that there are often teams and athletes that are overlooked by the media. It’s great to see a national media organization like ESPN be mindful of less prominent sports. Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 9%