The 1921 California Golden Bears football team, also known as the Wonder Team, was an

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team with ...

team that represented the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

in the

Pacific Coast Conference The Pacific Coast Conference (PCC) was a college athletic conference in the United States which existed from 1915 to 1959. Though the Pac-12 Conference claims the PCC's history as part of its own, with eight of the ten PCC members (including a ...

(PCC) during the

1921 college football season The 1921 college football season had no clear-cut champion, with the ''Official NCAA Division I Football Records Book'' listing California Golden Bears, Cornell Big Red, Iowa Hawkeyes, Lafayette Leopards, Washington & Jefferson Presidents, and V ...

. In their sixth year under head coach Andy Smith, the team compiled a 9–0–1 record (4–0 against PCC opponents), won the PCC championship, and outscored its opponents by a combined total of 312 to 33. In the postseason, the Golden Bears played a scoreless tie against Washington & Jefferson in the rain-soaked 1922 Rose Bowl. There was no contemporaneous system in 1921 for determining a national champion. However, California was retroactively named as the national champion for 1921 by the

Billingsley Report The Billingsley Report is a college football rating system developed in the late 1960s to determine a national champion. Billingsley has actively rated college football teams on a current basis since 1970. Beginning in 1999, Billingsley's ratings ...

(using its alternative "margin of victory" methodology),

College Football Researchers Association The College Football Researchers Association (CFRA) was founded in 1982 by Anthony Cusher of Reeder, North Dakota, and Robert Kirlin of Spokane, Washington. The CFRA took a vote of its members from 1982 to 1992 to select an annual college football n ...

, and

Jeff Sagarin Jeff Sagarin is an American sports statistician known for his development of a method for ranking and rating sports teams in a variety of sports. His ratings have been a regular feature in the ''USA Today'' sports section since 1985, have been use ...

, and as a co-national champion under the Boand System. Two California players, end Harold "Brick" Miller and tackle

Dan McMillan Dan McMillan (June 29, 1898 – October 22, 1975) was an American football player. McMillan was a prominent tackle for the USC Trojans football teams of the University of Southern California for two seasons until his sporting career was interrupt ...

, were consensus first-team picks on the 1921 All-America college football team. Additionally, California took eight of eleven first-team spots on the

United Press United Press International (UPI) is an American international news agency whose newswires, photo, news film, and audio services provided news material to thousands of newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations for most of the 20th c ...

' 1921 All-Pacific Coast football team: quarterback Charles F. Erb; halfback

Crip Toomey Irving Francis "Crip" Toomey (November 10, 1895 – June 28, 1961) was an American football and baseball player, coach of football and basketball, and college athletics administrator. He attended the University of California, Berkeley, where he pl ...

; fullback Archie Nisbet; ends Robert E. Berkey and Howard Stephens; tackle Dan McMillan; and guards Webster V. Clark and Lee D. Cramer.

Schedule

References

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

California Golden Bears football seasons College football national champions Pac-12 Conference football champion seasons College football undefeated seasons

California Golden Bears football The California Golden Bears football program represents the University of California, Berkeley in college football as a member of the Pac-12 Conference at the NCAA Division I, NCAA Division I FBS level. The team plays its home games at Californi ...

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