Who’s next at Cal? Tosh Lupoi, DeSean Jackson and more candidates to replace Justin Wilcox

Justin Wilcox did a solid job in almost a decade at Cal, one of the toughest places to sustain success in the Power 4 ranks. He was fired Sunday, less than 24 hours after the Bears (6-5) got blown out by rival Stanford, 31-10.

It’s not one of the better coaching vacancies this cycle, but there will be a bunch of candidates with regional ties who will be interested, especially because the Golden Bears have one of the most talented young quarterbacks in college football in Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele, a 19-year-old freshman who has said he would like to stay at Cal despite being seen as a hot commodity on the portal market.

Cal interim coach Nick Rolovich was formerly the head coach at Washington State and Hawaii. The 46-year-old Bay Area native seemed like an ideal fit to replace Mike Leach in Pullman after he did very well at Hawaii, including a 10-win season in 2019, but things went off the rails at Washington State pretty quickly, as he was forced out during the pandemic after refusing to comply with the state’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate. Rolovich has been on staff at Cal for less than a year as a senior offensive analyst, and he won’t have much time to prove himself after taking over right before the regular season finale against SMU. Still, general manager Ron Rivera did think enough of him to give him this shot, so you never know where it could lead from here.

Oregon defensive coordinator Tosh Lupoi is expected to be a leading candidate for the job. The 44-year-old former Cal defensive lineman earned a reputation as a dogged recruiter when he helped bring a bunch of blue-chip prospects to Berkeley while on Jeff Tedford’s staff. Lupoi played at local prep powerhouse De La Salle High School in Concord, where they won a national title. His dad was a former Cal assistant coach. Lupoi later spent five years with Nick Saban at Alabama, including one season as the defensive coordinator, before moving on to the NFL as an assistant with three teams.

Lupoi has been a terrific fit with Dan Lanning in Eugene and has proven to be a lot more than just an excellent recruiter. The Ducks (10-1) have the nation’s No. 5 defense in yards allowed per play. He’s shown a good eye for talent and knows how to develop it. Lupoi has been in the mix for several other coaching vacancies, but this would seem like the best fit.

UC Davis coach Tim Plough also has Berkeley ties from his time as the Bears’ tight ends coach on Wilcox’s staff in 2023. The 40-year-old former UC Davis quarterback has spent a lot of years at his alma mater on staff and has done well in his first two seasons running the program, going 19-6. The Aggies finished No. 5 in the FCS last year. He knows what it’s like to work in the University of California system, which can help his chances. Expect him to get a close look.

UConn coach Jim Mora also has plenty of experience dealing with the UC system from his days at UCLA. More importantly, the guy has done an amazing job at a really tough place to get people to care about college football. He’s 18-7 the past two years at a program that hadn’t had a winning season since 2010. The 64-year-old Mora, who went 46-30 in six years at UCLA from 2012-17, has deep West Coast roots and was also the coach of the Atlanta Falcons and Seattle Seahawks in the 2000s. There’s interest in Mora in several coaching searches, we’re told, and Cal would be wise to look at him too.

San Diego State coach Sean Lewis has had a breakthrough season in his second year with the Aztecs (9-2), with a good shot at a Mountain West title. We’ve heard he’s getting a lot of consideration at UCLA and Stanford, but expect him to be in play here, too. Before going to SDSU, Lewis was briefly Colorado’s offensive coordinator under Deion Sanders, but that relationship didn’t last long. In his first head coaching job, he took over a hapless Kent State program when he was 31 and ended up leading the Golden Flashes to two bowl games, notching the first bowl win in school history.

New Mexico coach Jason Eck is another Mountain West guy to keep an eye on. He’s done a remarkable job in his debut season with the Lobos. They’re 8-3 with road wins over UCLA and UNLV at a place that hadn’t won more than five games in nearly a decade. Before taking over at New Mexico, he did impressive work as head coach at Idaho, and he was also the offensive coordinator at FCS powerhouse South Dakota State. The 48-year-old former Wisconsin offensive lineman is a charismatic, big personality who seems destined for a Power 4 job. Would he make a move now for Cal, though? We’re not so sure.

Alabama offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb is the other assistant we could see getting some traction for the Cal job. He helped put a spark back in the Tide offense when he reunited with Kalen DeBoer this year. Alabama is No. 10 in the FBS in passing offense and is sitting in a good position to make the Playoff. The last time he and DeBoer were together, they got Washington to the national title game. In between, he spent 2024 as the Seattle Seahawks’ offensive coordinator. The 49-year-old also spent five years at Fresno State, the last three as OC. Grubb runs a system that would be attractive, given Cal’s offensive pedigree.

One wild card to keep in mind is Delaware State coach DeSean Jackson, a former All-America wide receiver at Cal. The 38-year-old, who was one of the most dynamic players in Cal history, has one year of college coaching experience, but it’s been impressive. He took over a Hornets program that had gone 2-21 the previous two seasons and has wasted no time pumping life into Delaware State football, leading it to an 8-4 season. It would still seem like a long shot that Jackson would end up with the Cal job after only one year of college coaching experience, especially given the credentials of some of the other candidates we expect to be in the mix for this job.