Rough start for Cal

Cursed by Lee Corso? Maybe. But California has a lot of other things to worry about after getting pasted by Tennessee on Saturday.

Corso, the ESPN pundit, had picked Cal to win the national championship days before the season-opening loss. That already may be out the window, and the 35-18 loss — it was 35-0 at one point — has the Golden Bears looking at an uphill climb.

One newspaper columnist in Tennessee went so far as to call Cal “fraudulent” after the game. And Volunteer wideout Trooper Taylor piled on when he told a reporter that Tennessee’s offensive coaches had been able to read Cal’s defensive signals, making for easy throws from quarterback Erik Ainge to his wideouts.

“I don’t know if some of that is overblown. We had three people sending things in,” Cal coach Jeff Tedford said of the sign-stealing. “I think it’s difficult to do … (But) the guys on the sideline, yes, offensively you could do that if you felt you had a bead on who was sending signals in.”

Tedford said he had seen the reports out of Tennessee and as a result his team was making some changes to its signaling routine.

Of equal concern was its play in the secondary, however, where cornerback Syd’Quan Thompson did not play well after replacing Tim Mixon, who went down with a knee injury in fall camp. And quarterback Nate Longshore, after missing almost all of last season with an injury, looked equally shaky.

“There will be no changes this week,” Tedford said of his personnel. “It’s how we played. We can play much better.”

Stewart swell

Oregon head coach Mike Bellotti said running back Jonathan Stewart should be ready to play this weekend after spraining an ankle against Stanford last week.

The sophomore ran for 168 yards on 22 carries and added two touchdowns, but was injured when Bellotti left him in well after the game had been decided.

Bellotti said Tuesday morning he expected the running back to be in an air cast that day after spending Monday in a boot with some swelling.

“He probably easily would have passed the 200-yard mark,” Bellotti said. “He feels along with our trainers that he will be fine and totally ready to play.”

Notes

Washington’s win over San Jose State was its first to open a season since 2001. … UCLA quarterback Ben Olson won Pac-10 offensive player of the week honors after throwing for 318 yards and completing 25 of 33 passes. … Count Walt Harris of Stanford as one coach not surprised to see multiple I-AA teams beat I-A teams over the weekend. Harris’ Cardinal team lost to UC-Davis last season. “A lot of those I-AA opponents that people think are no good are pretty good,” Harris said.