{"id":462075,"date":"2026-09-13T00:32:08","date_gmt":"2026-09-13T00:32:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/462075\/"},"modified":"2026-09-13T00:32:08","modified_gmt":"2026-09-13T00:32:08","slug":"kingston-lopas-3-interceptions-help-california-take-down-syracuse-21-18","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/462075\/","title":{"rendered":"Kingston Lopa’s 3 interceptions help California take down Syracuse 21-18"},"content":{"rendered":"

SYRACUSE, N.Y. — – Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele<\/a> threw for two touchdowns, and Kingston Lopa<\/a> made three interceptions as California beat Syracuse 21-18 in an Atlantic Coast Conference opener for both teams Saturday.<\/p>\n

Lopa returned the second interception for a 24-yard touchdown with 4:51 left in the fourth quarter to cap the scoring. The third came on Syracuse’s final drive with 54 seconds left.<\/p>\n

Syracuse had a chance to tie it at 21-all with 1:35 left but Tripp Woody<\/a> missed a 46-yard field goal.<\/p>\n

Sagapolutele was 21-of-34 passing for 182 yards for Cal (1-1). Adam Mohammed<\/a>, who had 120 yards rushing in a loss to UCLA last weekend, rushed for 74 yards on 19 carries. Chase Hendricks<\/a> and Jordan King<\/a> each had a touchdown catch.<\/p>\n

Steve Angeli<\/a> finished with 306 yards on 24-of-49 passing with one touchdown and three interceptions for Syracuse (1-1). LSU transfer Ju’Juan Johnson had 46 yards rushing and a touchdown in the third.<\/p>\n

Syracuse, which led 12-7 at halftime, forced a turnover on downs to open the second half, but Lopa picked off Angeli and returned it 53 yards before King’s 2-yard touchdown catch gave Cal a 14-12 lead.<\/p>\n

The Orange amassed 436 yards of total offense to 249 for the Golden Bears.<\/p>\n

The takeaway<\/p>\n

California: The Golden Bears collapsed in the second half last week against UCLA. Thanks to Angeli’s mistakes and a few penalties, Saturday’s second half was the opposite.<\/p>\n

Syracuse: Daunte Bacheyie<\/a> impressed, and the Orange’s kick returners showed much to fawn over, but Syracuse must stay disciplined as its schedule gets tougher.<\/p>\n

Up next<\/p>\n

California: Hosts Wagner next Saturday.<\/p>\n

Syracuse: At Pittsburgh on Thursday.<\/p>\n

——<\/p>\n

Sign up for Top 25 poll alerts here<\/a>, visit the Top 25 here<\/a> and see AP’s full college football coverage here<\/a>br\/]<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2026 ESPN Internet Ventures. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SYRACUSE, N.Y. — – Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele threw for two touchdowns, and Kingston Lopa made three interceptions as California…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":462076,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[182114,7,3369,9,8,1321,750,13637],"class_list":["post-462075","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-182114","tag-california","tag-california-golden-bears","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-college-football","tag-espn","tag-syracuse-orange"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/462075","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=462075"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/462075\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/462076"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=462075"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=462075"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=462075"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}