BERKELEY, Calif. (AP) — Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele was on the sideline on a recruiting visit for the Big Game a year ago, hobnobbing with former California football stars like Aaron Rodgers and Marshawn Lynch.
Sagapolutele will be on center stage for this season’s meeting between the Golden Bears (6-4, 3-3 ACC) and Stanford (3-7,2-5) on Saturday as Cal’s star quarterback looking to extend the team’s winning streak in the rivalry to a fifth straight game.
“I’d definitely say it’s a full circle moment,” Sagapolutele said Tuesday.” Being able to watch it last year and seeing the impact it had, it was a really blessing to be able to watch it. … Our plan is to retain The Axe.”
How many more Big Games that Sagapolutele will play after Saturday is a hovering cloud over the Cal program. In the modern era of the transfer portal and NIL payments, keeping players on campus can be a more challenging task than getting them there in the first place.
Sagapolutele didn’t quite make a definitive promise that he would return to Cal for his sophomore season, saying only: “My main focus is winning this game on Saturday, but I’m pretty sure, yeah.”
Pressed again on whether he would be back next season, Sagapolutele hesitated and said, “Uh . . . yeah, I mean, yeah.”
Cal general manager Ron Rivera expressed much more confidence in the prospect, saying he has worked hard to make sure that Cal has the funds to keep its star quarterback for the long term.
“We’ve been very fortunate,” Rivera sadi. “We’ve had some very good alumni engagement. These are people that are stepping up and wanting to make the commitment to the university to help us. This isn’t just about football, it’s about the university. Players like Jaron, great players that you have, help elevate the profile of the university. Sports is quickly becoming the front porch to a lot of these college experiences for the students.”
Rivera, who is in his first year running the program, said Cal is trying to build a sustained culture of winning for a program that hasn’t been ranked for a single week in the AP poll since 2019 and hasn’t finished a season ranked since 2006.
Finishing the season with wins over Stanford and SMU would give Cal its first eight-win regular season since 2009 and show progress in coach Justin Wilcox’s ninth season in Berkeley.
Rivera declined to address a question about Wilcox’s job status saying he would only talk about the Big Game.
But the key to Cal’s future success will be retaining Sagapolutele and adding more players like him.
“He has lived up to the expectations that we had and in some cases has gone beyond,” Rivera said. “He plays with a maturity and poise you don’t usually see as a freshman. … It’s one of those things you feel very fortunate to have a young man like this.”
Sagapolutele has made an immediate impact on the Bears, throwing three TD passes in a season-opening win at Oregon State and building from there. He has topped 200 yards passing in every game this season, becoming the second FBS player ever to throw for at least 200 yards in each of his first 10 career games and the only one to do it in his freshman season.
After a bit of a midseason lull, Sagapolutele is coming off one of his best games on Nov. 8 when he threw for a career-high 323 yards and threw a game-winning touchdown in overtime to Jacob De Jesus to beat No. 14 Louisville 29-26 on the road for Cal’s first win over a ranked opponent since 2020.
“He’s a special person, first and foremost, then he’s obviously an extremely talented young man,” Wilcox said. “For a 19-year-old kid to start and play the whole season and go through things for the first time a number of times, I think he’s handled it exceptionally well.”
Sagapolutele ranks fourth in the ACC with 2,518 yards passing and has the most yards of any freshman in the country.
Senior receiver Trond Grizzell hasn’t been surprised by the performance after catching passes from Sagapolutele during his visit to Cal last year.
“He came out and threw with us as a high schooler,” Grizzell said. “It was pretty special watching him throw the ball. It was always on the money. I’d go back to the first time I played catch with him.”
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By JOSH DUBOW
AP Sports Writer
