Sports

Chaos Unfolds In Berkeley As Cal Students Breach College Gameday Set Under The Guise Of Darkness

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Cal Berkeley College Gameday Fans Chaos Rush
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Absolute mayhem proceeded to unfold in the wee hours of Saturday morning as ESPN’s College Gameday descended upon Berkeley for the first time in the show’s 36-year history. Cal fans were eager to get inside the grounds to support the Golden Bears more than 12 hours ahead of their ACC After Dark bout with Miami.

However, there was not enough security in place to prevent the students from storming onto the set!

College Gameday built its stage and famous desk at the center of Memorial Glade, which is essentially Cal’s quad. Located right in the middle of campus, the back drop features the school’s most famous buildings: the Doe Library and the ‘Campanile’ bell and clock tower.

The weekly broadcast begins at 9:00 a.m. ET, so 6:00 a.m. local time. Fans who wanted to attend the show were allowed to arrive at midnight on Saturday morning. The ‘Pit,’ which holds 400 fans right in front of the stage, opened at 3:30 a.m. Everyone else was invited to watch from elsewhere on the Glade.

Students started lining up on campus around 5:00 p.m. PT with plans to camp out overnight.

Some of them had to wrap up some homework before they could officially start the party.

Come 11:00 p.m., no less than 800 students were waiting to get onto the Glade. They breached the gates at approximately 11:30. It was uncontrolled chaos.

A second group broke through at midnight, which was when the gates were supposed to open anyway.

Despite the lack of security to prevent any additional incidents elsewhere on campus, there were enough people in place to defend The Pit. Most of the Glade was full — about 100 students deep all the way across — but The Pit was secure!

Things finally calmed down around 2:00 a.m. One kind man, who goes by Dab McAfee, did his best to keep things chill.

Food arrived about an hour later.

The haters said that Cal was not ready to host College Gameday. They said nobody would show up.

The haters were wrong!

Memorial Glade was packed to the gills by the time that ESPN cut to Berkeley on SportsCenter at 5:30 a.m. It was a raucous crowd that kept the party going all night after breaching the gates before midnight.