Sacramento’s Cal Buddy System goes from Placer County to the Berkeley Bears
They grew up together as pals. Football was their common brotherhood bond, including dirt and collisions.
Will Craig has always been the big-guy pile-mover and Evan Tattersall the brutish runner or run-stopper. Both continue to beam a broad grin before games and after, but never during a contest.
Their combo fun started in Placer County, as kids in youth tackle leagues when Craig and Tattersall stood out. The theme continued during a four-year championship stop at Granite Bay High School. And their “Buddy System” journey took them to Berkeley as scholarship players at Cal.
What started as high hopes of climbing the football ladder now includes being named last week as starters for the upstart Bears. The 6-foot-5, 290-pound Craig gets the nod at left tackle and the 6-2, 230-pound Tattersall at middle linebacker.
They are both redshirt sophomores, eager to get a long-delayed season started amid COVID-19 concerns, confusion and delays that have led to off-campus learning and masking up when not wearing helmets.
”We’ve always been teammates and always friends,” Tattersall said. “Once the recruiting process started when we were in high school, we got closer. Now we’re roommates for the third year.”
Ah, roommates. This arrangement includes five total Cal players packed into a Bay Area dwelling. Imagine a scene out of the movie Animal House, current era: piles of laundry (clean or otherwise), pizza boxes, water bottles, phone chargers and a lost television remote control.
”We try to get a maid to come in once a month to clean, and towards the end of that month, the place looks pretty bad,” Tattersall said with a laugh. “My mom and Will’s mom, before COVID-19, would come down here to cook and clean, to be here with us, to help, to be moms. We can’t appreciate them enough, and not having them come by makes us miss them even more.”
Family has always been a constant source of support for Craig and Tattersall. The players are pained to know they won’t have fans or family in the stands for games any time soon as county health guidelines will determine when and if that is allowed in the effort to deal with the coronavirus pandemic that led to a late-season kickoff.
COVID-19 even stalled out the momentum of opening night. Cal’s scheduled home opener Nov. 7 against Washington was canceled and ruled a no contest when the school announced it could not field a “competitive roster.” A Cal player tested positive for the virus, and contact tracing left several others in quarantine. The Pac-12 pulled the plug on the game per conference policy.
Craig and Tattersall maintain they can only control what they can control, but that doesn’t mask their frustration.
“We’re just ready to play,” Craig said.
Big thinkers beyond football
Craig and Tattersall are big thinkers, more than just blockers and tacklers. In an interview with The Bee, they talked about how football allows for a release from the frustrations and stop-and-start themes tied to COVID-19, of being good students at a prestigious university and of the importance of voting.
They define the student-athlete, dating back to their Granite Bay Grizzlies days. At Cal, Craig is a political science major and Tattersall an economics major.
The COVID-19 concern will hover over all of football, the players said. It’s how they deal with it that counts.
“We go through all these precautions, and we take it very seriously with all the testing, social distancing, doing it right,” Craig said. “To be on the field for two hours in practice or for a game and not have to think about COVID-19 and just football? We need it.”
Said Tattersall, “The seasons go by so fast, and we’re busy every single day. It’s just nice to have a season.”
Craig is a political junkie and proud advocate of what’s right. He participated in peaceful protests in Placer County shortly after the pandemic hit. Craig studied the voting results carefully. He and Tattersall expressed pride that their football program voted in large numbers.
”We have to vote,” Craig said. “It’s our way of letting our voice, as college students across the country, be heard. So many complain about the issues and things not getting done and don’t vote. You can vote, change your life and things around you.”
Said Tattersall, “We are the next generation, college students, that will lead this world, or this city or this country, for the next decades. It’s important to vote, to get involved, to have a basic understanding of why it’s important and what it means to vote, and that younger voices can be heard and not drowned out.”
In the starter’s blocks and treating people ‘better’
Craig started just one game a year ago, the opener against UC Davis, before a teammate rolled over his ankle in a practice leading up to the Washington game. He needed two surgeries, resulting in 14 screws drilled into his size 14 foot.
”It was a freak accident, tore ligaments, a lot of pain,” Craig said. “I’m glad to be healthy. It makes you appreciate football when it’s taken away.”
Craig’s position coach is Angus McClure, the one-time Sacramento State offensive lineman and longtime assistant coach. He tried to recruit Craig to UCLA when he coached there. Now he has his man. In a recent Zoom interview session, McClure spoke of Craig in lineman talk.
”I think he’s got extremely good feet,” McClure said. “He’s got good awareness. He’s got natural hip bend, which really helps for pass protection. He has the ability to run. So as an overall athlete, Will is excellent.”
Tattersall agrees, saying, ”A lot of people forget how good Will is, an awesome football player. I’ve watched him play since the sixth grade. He missed last year and people forgot about him.”
Tattersall has waited for his time. He played in 11 games in 2019 off the bench in earning Pac-12 Academic Honor Roll honors. Tattersall embraces a great challenge, and he has one here.
He not only helps head the defense in the wide-open Pac-12, he has the task of replacing All-American Evan Weaver at the position. Weaver is now with the Arizona Cardinals.
”I’m excited and proud,” Tattersall said. “I’m ready.”
Said Cal defensive coordinator Peter Sirmon, “Very pleased with Tattersall from when he first arrived here. He has the tools to be a very productive player. He runs well and is strong. He doesn’t surprise me.”
Craig and Tattersall said they made the right choice to come to Cal, and they had multiple offers to play across the country coming out of high school. They also believe in their coach, Justin Wilcox, beyond X’s and O’s and pregame speeches.
“Our coach was talking about how as a country, as a whole, we need to treat people better,” Craig said. “We don’t always talk kindly to each other, and things can get so heated and messy in politics. That’s a great message. We agree.”