From the 1930s all the way up to the start of the 2000s, the USC - UCLA dual meet had the reputation of being the greatest rivalry in college track & field history, with Cal and Stanford being two of their toughest mutual opponents. Now, UCLA and Cal have nearly 50,000 student populations (some 33,000 undergraduate) each, while the challenges of becoming a traditional adult (i.e. buying a house, affording and starting a family, establishing job security, etc.) are as tough as they've been in decades in California. School leaders get this to an extent, and emphasize academics over sports much more than they used to.
For those who can't shake their obsession with DEI and 'wokeness', I can tell you (as a former teacher, career & college counselor, and researcher-author) that the vast majority of young people at Cal and UCLA don't really give a crap about politics, when push comes to shove. They care about finding good paying & meaningful work. And this business about Cal and UCLA going downhill as institutions because of their wokeness, well, according to the latest global university rankings by U.S. News, Cal ranked 5th and UCLA 11th (in the London Times global rankings, Cal was 9th and UCLA 18th). You won't ever find the likes of Oregon, Alabama, Ohio State, or UT-Texas on a list like this; they value football and sports the way schools like Cal and UCLA value academics.