I wonder what kind of cash he got from them?

I stream it on my tv and the volume is better than on my phone. But you can also turn on closed captions and that helps.

Those redbirds are some tough hombres. Great game

Dawson has been more effective in the second half.

The cats look really tough. I haven’t seen the stats, but their D appears to be limiting ISU #5 who might have cost us our game with them.

“ I've had the same thought. Also, I wonder if the staff can void a scholarship as soon as they hear of the portal sniffing?”
Once the player is in the portal, the institution can revoke their scholarship, i assume immediately, or not. Its at the discretion of the institution.

Plough will adjust his offense to take advantage of our strengths. For example, when we had Lan, we saw a lot of wildcat plays. With Caden, we didn’t see much of that. But his theme is Shredville. Rack up points quickly. I don’t see this changing.
The QB room will be interesting to follow in the spring. I just don’t know how Davis can navigate the waters with limited resources to keep talented players in the program. Where can we get the $2M + annually to compete with the Montanas and Dakotas? We need annual cash flow to sustain the program, and now, big dollars for the renovations.

Some interesting tweets from Plough:

“ Except conversations exist outside those authorized by the portal.”
Exactly. I know for a fact that several of our guys were offered big numbers during the season. I suppose if they were going to jump, they could wait until the last day to enter the portal. And like 52 said, this whole system needs to be rearranged. The other issue to consider is that once they enter the portal, their scholarship can be dropped at the institution's discretion.

“ We have a very balanced 2026 schedule, and our two hardest games (on paper) are before the end of September in @ Southern Methodist and vs. Montana.”

Yep. Dr. Mike and i were talking about this at the basketball game. Got to beat Hauck in our house. SMU, well, that’s our money game. Lets see what our team looks like after spring practice. Maybe we’ll have somewhat of an idea once the portal opens up.

https://paybee.io/quickpay.html?handle=ucdfootball#campaignList

My wife and i have tickets. The Palace hotel, next to the event venue, is supposed to have “safe” parking and a special Aggie rate.

As a freshman Rawlings is getting some good minutes. I think he’s going to be an impact player going forward. He was a star at Folsom High.

We seem to play to the level of our opponents.

Awesome write up. Thanks for doing this.

We’ll be there but likely not the whole contest unless its close.

It’ll be interesting to see what kind of turnout we get for the February fund event in SF, and how much money they generate.

“ I thought we paid Lan and TY Johnson last year. Are we paying anyone this year?”

I think you’re correct. I didn't articulate my thoughts very well. I’m thinking in terms of program wide resources. For example the Griz pay each player an equal amount. I don’t remember the exact figure, but its either 20k or 50k per year. Tim has commented several times that they have 500 donors that contribute 1k each year. We have about a 100 similar donors. But beyond our specific situation, the current system of money schools able to buy away top players from programs like ours is troubling to me. That’s what i was referring to regarding some sort of realignment. I’m happy for many of these kids, especially those that come from challenging environments where the money is life changing, but there must be a better way forward.

The top FCS schools, except us, have paid athletes as well. Certainly not paid to the same level as the big FBS schools, but still pulling a paycheck. The position we’re in at this point reminds me of our D2 days when we were non scholarship and competing with scholarship programs. Plough has said many times, give me the resources comparable to the Montanas and Dakotas, make it a fair fight, and we will win. Somehow there needs to be realignment with all this.

No question the redbirds played great down the stretch, especially considering they were unranked and had to travel all over the country to get to the finals.
BTW, i don’t know what the attendance was for the semi final game, but the stands looked sparse. Maybe winter break hurt their attendance.