Golden Bears defeat Sun Devils

Cal's Longshore passes for 198 yards and three TDs

Nate Longshore passed for 198 yards and three touchdowns in his return to the starting lineup, and California held off punchless Arizona State in the second half of a 24-14 victory Saturday.

LaReylle Cunningham, Cameron Morrah and Nyan Boateng caught scoring passes from Longshore, the senior two-year starter who lost his job in training camp to Kevin Riley.

Cal (4-1, 2-0 Pac-10) reopened its quarterback competition this week after the offense made slow starts in its last two games, and coach Jeff Tedford kept the winner's identity secret until Longshore ran onto the Memorial Stadium field.

Longshore went 17-for-28 with an interception, and the Cal offense failed to score after the opening minutes of the third quarter. The Bears still did enough to overcome the absence of injured Jahvid Best, the Bears' top rusher and receiver, because Arizona State barely moved the ball for long stretches of its third straight loss.

Shane Vereen rushed for 93 yards and caught five passes for 51 more in Best's place during a fairly simple victory over the Sun Devils (2-3, 1-1), whose offense sputtered for the third straight week. Last season's conference co-champions averaged 32.3 points per game in 2007, but this Arizona State squad has managed just 44 total points during its first three-game losing streak of coach Dennis Erickson's short tenure.

Rudy Carpenter passed for 165 yards and threw two interceptions, while Keegan Herring didn't do much to help the Sun Devils' struggling rushing attack, running for just 37 yards in his return from injury. Kyle Williams caught Carpenter's only TD pass.

ALSO SATURDAY

ARIZONA 48, WASHINGTON 14: Rob Gronkowski matched a school record with three touchdown catches, Nic Grigsby ran for 113 yards and a touchdown and host Arizona routed winless Washington.

Willie Tuitama completed 17 of 21 passes for 193 yards and threw three touchdown passes for the Wildcats (4-1, 2-0), who are looking to end the Pac-10's longest active bowl drought at nine years.

On a breezy night in the desert, Arizona wasted little time putting away the woeful Huskies (0-5, 0-3). Arizona took a 10-0 lead midway through the first quarter when Gronkowski caught a screen pass and raced 37 yards for a touchdown.

Grigsby added a 4-yard run to give Arizona a 17-0 lead after one quarter.