California Golden Bears vs Oregon State Beavers Prediction, Odds and Picks for Saturday, 08/30/25

Old PAC-12 rivals are set to meet Week 1 when the California Bears travel north to take on the Oregon State Beavers. California embarrassed Oregon State last season in California with a 44-7 victory. Still, both teams finished their 2024 seasons with a record below .500 and will be looking for better results this time around. In their first season in the ACC, California finished with a record of 2-6 in conference. The Bears managed to win 6 games, which resulted in a bowl game appearance, but they ended up falling short to UNLV in the Art of Sport LA Bowl. Oregon State is 1 of 2 teams remaining in the PAC-12. They were able to win their 1 conference game, but ended up falling short of qualifying for a bowl game with a record of 5-7. The Beavers will look to improve in head coach Trent Bray’s 2nd season.

There were a lot of changes for California this offseason through the transfer portal, as the Bears brought in 32 combined new players on offense and defense. Their quarterback transfer from Ohio State, Devin Brown, surprisingly is unlikely to be the starter in this game. It seems California is leaning towards true freshman Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele right out of the gate. Sagapolutele will be the only true freshman to start for the Bears in California’s history besides Jared Goff. Goff threw for 450 yards in his debut in 2013, but the Bears still lost to Northwestern by a pair of touchdowns. Sagapolutele had initially signed with Oregon this offseason, but ended up transferring to California shortly after.

Oregon State will certainly have more continuity on its roster than the Bears. Returning will be senior running back Anthony Hankerson, who ran for 1,082 yards and 15 touchdowns. He will be paired with quarterback Maalik Murphy, who transferred in after a good season with Duke. Murphy threw for 26 touchdowns and 2,933 yards last season, and he will be a very solid quarterback for the Beavers starting from day 1. You never really know what you will get from a true freshman in their first game. I feel much more confident leaning on Murphy and Hankerson to generate points on their home field.

Cal vs Oregon State prediction: Oregon State -1.5 (-110) available at the time of publishing. Playable at that number.

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