On Friday, we found out that they’ll go about that mission without starting left tackle Christian Darrisaw — not just for week 16 vs the G-Men — but for the rest of the season, after the stud left tackle was placed on injured reserve.

Minnesota Vikings lose young safeties coach to Cal

But the Vikings aren’t just losing players today. They also lost their safeties coach, Michael Hutchings. According to NFL insider Jordan Schultz, the fast-rising 30-year-old coach is being hired as the California Golden Bears’ next defensive coordinator.

Sources: Cal plans to hire #Vikings safeties coach Michael Hutchings as their new DC.

A former USC LB, Hutchings has quickly risen up the coaching ranks and was in his third season with Minnesota. Cal HC Tosh Lupoi was high school teammates with Hutchings at De La Salle. pic.twitter.com/xaQ98zwDEb

— Jordan Schultz (@Schultz_Report) December 19, 2025

The Golden Bears recently hired a new head coach, Tosh Lupoi, who’s been the defensive coordinator at Oregon since 2022. Schultz mistakenly notes that Lupoi and Hutchings played together at De La Salle high school in Concord, California.

While both coaches attended De La Salle, and grew up in the Bay area, Hutchings graduated in 2013, Lupoi in 2000. So while both are extremely familiar with each other, they’ve never actually coached together.

Michael Hutchings and Tosh Lupoi join forces at Cal

The closest they got was a near career-crossing between 2021 and 2022. That offseason, Hutchings was leaving Oregon, where he was a defensive analyst in 2021. Meanwhile, Lupoi was on his way there to take the defensive coordinator job he held from 2022-25.

Related: MN Vikings Finally Place Star O-Lineman on IR

Hutchings never made it in the NFL, as a player, but he did play four years at USC between 2013 and 2016 where he played in 45 games and totalled 118 tackles.

Unlike his new defensive coordinator, Tosh Lupoi played five years and graduated from the University of California, where he appeared in 8 games as a senior, finishing a quiet collegiate career with 15 tackles and 1 sack.

Get your calendars out Gopher Football fans! Three Rose Bowls and 4 National Championships from now, the Gophers will play two non-conference games vs the California Golden Bears.

#Gophers add home-and-home series with Cal. https://t.co/zoJF8saEGk pic.twitter.com/0pXEGmHZB6

— Minnesota Football (@GopherFootball) February 11, 2020

This will be the seventh all-time meeting between the two schools, with Cal holding a 4-2 advantage in the series. The teams last met in 2009 at TCF Bank Stadium and Minnesota’s last win in the series was a 32-23 home triumph in 1987.

GopherSports.com

Before the national dominance shown by Gopher football in the late-1930’s and 40’s under Bernie Bearman, the Cal Golden Bears were running the college scene in the early 20’s under Andy Smith.

From 1920 to 1958, Cal played in 8 Rose Bowls but while the Gophers were dominating the Early Big Ten, the Rose Bowl didn’t include a team from our historic conference.

The Pac-12, or PCC (Pacific Coast Conference) back then, has always been a part of the Rose Bowl festivities but the Big Ten didn’t become a regular participant until 1947, when Illinois introduced the two new rival conferences by embarrassing UCLA, 45-14.

Anyway, the Bears have never won the PAC-12, were co-champions of the PAC-10 once back in 2006, and co-champions of the PAC-8 once in 1975. They haven’t won the conference outright since 1958, when they were PCC Champions.

The Golden Bears haven’t won 10 games since that co-PAC-12 championship in 2006 but they’ve been trending gradually up since hiring Justin Wilcox back in 2017.

They finished 5-7 in year 1, before flipping the script to 7-6 in year 2, and then improving to 8-5 in year 3. If Wilcox continues on this path, Cal and the Gophers might be meeting in the Rose Bowl before these non-conference regular season matchups are set to take place in 2028-29.

via GIPHY

Eric Strack | Minnesota Sports Fan