Minnesota Golden Gophers vs California Golden Bears Prediction, Odds and Picks for Saturday, 09/13/25

One of the more under the radar matchups on the Week 2 college football slate comes in Berkeley, where the California Golden Bears will host the Minnesota Golden Gophers in a showdown between a couple of undefeated teams looking to make a move in their respective conferences this season. Minnesota was a team that I was looking to fade heading into the season, and while the Gophers did look a bit better than I expected in their season opener, we still got to the window with the Bulls in that spot and I expect PJ Fleck’s group to struggle with this west coast road trip to close out the nonconference portion of their schedule.

Given the fact that Minnesota is still breaking in 5 new players on the offensive line and starting a redshirt freshman quarterback, I have a hard time believing that the Gophers will do anything but keep things simple in his first road start at the collegiate level. With that in mind, the Bears defense (39th in success rate allowed, 28th in EPA per play) should be able to key in on star running back Darius Taylor and at least somewhat limit the explosiveness of the Gophers ground game. On the other side of the ball, the Gophers defense has looked great to this point, but it’s important to remember that this team still hasn’t played a quarterback with a pulse yet. In steps true freshman Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele, who has looked outstanding in his first couple of games at the collegiate level. Let’s back the Bears on the money line to pull off the outright upset as short home underdogs. 

Minnesota vs California prediction: California ML (+120) available at time of publishing. Playable to +110.

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