GRR: St. Mary's
Just two weeks after pulling off a late comeback win over Cal, Saint Mary's won in impressive fashion over their Northern California rivals to take their D1A quarterfinal Saturday in Moraga.
Cal Poly visited Cal for Round 1 in the Western Bracket and the Mustangs started the game on the front foot and using their kicking game to test the Bears.
A Coby Baker penalty attempt drifted wide, and after a few minutes Cal finally got into Mustangs territory. A short pass while being hit by Evan Weigold to Oliver Newall put Newall through for a 25-meter jaunt and try.
Decades-long rivals Saint Mary's and Cal meet up in Moragain a game that has massive playoff and rankings implications.
After losing games to BYU and Army, Cal has once again performed a turnaround, beating #1-ranked Navy in Berkeley last week to shake up the entire D1A pecking order.
If there has been a knock on Saint Mary's it's been that they haven't played a lot of the major teams in the D1A Top 10.
That changed this weekend as the Gaels traveled to Provo and beat BYU 38-21 in a wild one where Saint Mary's seemed in total control, only to be reminded that there's no such thing.
In a game that lived up to the hype #7 Saint Mary’s defeated #8 Central Washington by a single point, 27-26.
Playing in Ellensburg, Wash., Saint Mary’s spent the vast majority of the first 25 minutes inside the CWU 22. They came close to getting a try, getting held up at one point, but CWU’s defense was tenacious.