Cal keeps getting close, but once more a first-ever victory in the Atlantic Coast Conference was just beyond its reach on Saturday.
The Bears shut out high-scoring No. 22 Pitt in the second half, but still went home with a 17-15 defeat at the Pittsburgh Steelers’ Acrisure Stadium.
Cal (3-3, 0-3 ACC) has lost three conference games by a combined total of eight points. The Bears play four of their next five at home, beginning next Saturday against North Carolina State.
Pitt (6-0, 2-0) has now won its first six games for the first time since 1982.
The Bears were poised to win it after driving from their own 20-yard line to the Pitt 22 before sending placekicker Ryan Coe onto the field for a 40-yard field goal attempt.
Coe, a senior transfer who grew up near Pittsburgh in McDonald, Pennsylvania, kicked it low and wide to the right, keeping the Panthers in front with 1:50 left. Coe missed twice inside 40 yards in the Bears’ 14-9 loss at Florida State last month.
The Bears’ defense forced Pitt to punt with 55 seconds left but, with no timeouts left, Cal could not pull off a last-minute comeback.
Fernando Mendoza completed 27 of 37 passes for 272 yards and a touchdown and the Bears played turnover-free football. But the Pitt defense sacked Mendoza six times, including five times in the second half.
Cal’s defense held Pitt redshirt freshman quarterback Eli Holstein to 133 passing yards and no touchdowns while picking him off twice. Holstein entered the game with 15 TD passes.
After a scoreless third quarter, Cal got within 17-15 when Mendoza threw a 19-yard touchdown pass to tight end Jack Endries with 10:30 to play. Mendoza faked screen passes both to the left and right before Endries released down the middle, took the pass and barreled into the end zone.
The Bears, needing two points, had both Mendoza and backup quarterback Chandler Rogers on the field for the conversion. Mendoza lateraled the ball to Rogers, a good runner, but he went nowhere and Pitt retained the lead.
Endries, the former walk-on from Danville, caught passes of 20, 27 and 19 yards on the scoring drive and finished the game with eight catches for 119 yards — a career day.
The Panthers led 17-9 at halftime, despite Cal’s defense limiting Pitt’s red-hot Holstein to 55 passing yards on 6 of 13 accuracy.
The difference was Des Reid’s 72-yard touchdown on a gutsy fourth-and-1 call from the Pitt 28-yard line on the first play of the second quarter That stretched a 7-6 Panthers’ lead to 14-6.
The teams traded field goals thereafter, Ben Sauls converting a 58-yarder to make it 17-6 with 10:04 left in the half before Cal’s Coe delivered from 39 yards with 4:07 to play.
Cal’s biggest issue in the first half was penalties — eight of them for 90 yards. The Bears finished the day with 12 penalties for 110 yards.
Mendoza was sharp, completing 19 of 22 passes for 162 yards in the opening half. But the Bears, after running the ball well in the first quarter, had minus-3 yards in the second.
Cal scored first, putting together a 10-play, 75-yard drive that was capped by Jaivian Thomas’ 5-yard TD run with 8:56 to go in the first quarter.
Inexplicably, the Bears went for a two-point conversion, with punter/holder Lachlan Wilson overthrowing long snapper David Bird in the end zone.
Pitt went ahead 7-6 on Reid’s 5-yard scoring runway 5:07 left in the first quarter to cap an 11-play, 75-yard drive that was buoyed by a 19-yard completion from Holstein to Reid on a fourth-and-5 play.
