We will have to play a fundamentally solid, smart game and we can not make a bunch of mistakes if we want to be within any reasonable striking distance in the 4th quarter. We have a few big play makers and maybe lightening will strike for us a few times. The biggest challenge I see is how well will our defense be able to stand up to their size and speed for 4 quarters. I hope we can catch Stanford looking past us because no one will realistically be giving us a chance in this game.

Pepper is another great recruit for the Ags. He's a 6'3 PG and has led his AAU team in scoring this summer averaging 19.4 ppg and 5.6 rpg through 9 games. He was heavily recruited by Hawai'i, Lehigh, Montana and Bradley and also had an offer from San Francisco. He looks like he has great moves to the basket and he shoots a high percentage from distance.

Another sad article:

Jason Hairston Had CTE Symptoms Before Death — Here Are Other Football Players Who Had the Disease

https://people.com/sports/prominent-nfl-players-diagnosed-with-cte-the-degenerative-brain-disease/

Davis Enterprise article: Aggies overcome third-period hiccup, win, 54-21

Excerpt: San Diego coach Dale Lindsey was gracious in defeat, praising the Aggies for their skill and speed.

“I saw a pretty good-looking, swift-executing Davis team,” Lindsey said.

“They had good speed outside and ran the ball well on us. We were honestly more worried about Keelan Doss and their tight end (Wesley Preece). Davis is a very explosive team with a lot of gimmicks and a lot of good stuff. I was impressed with their skill people. We wanted to hold Doss and Preece down and we did that, but their other nine guys played pretty darn good.”

https://www.davisenterprise.com/sports/aggies-overcome-third-period-hiccup-win-54-21/

Oh man, what a tragic, heartbreaking story. CTE has become the curse of this great game.

Beautiful!

I love those trick plays...when they work!

Another excellent article about Hairston from the Enterprise a couple of years ago:

Former UCD linebacker succeeding off the field

Excerpt: His top choice was Stanford, who offered him a scholarship, but backed out at the last minute after signing someone they preferred.

By that time, that late in the recruiting process, Hairston had few options left other than to field a call from UC Davis head coach Bob Biggs.

Biggs had earlier attempted to recruit Hairston, but the SoCal native rebuffed the efforts due to the program’s status as a D-II non-scholarship school.

After considering a late scholarship offer from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo nearly two months after signing day that Hairston didn’t love, he finally visited the UCD campus.

“It was the most underwhelming recruiting trip I’ve ever been to,” he said. “We didn’t have a locker room, we didn’t have a weight room, the facilities were terrible, (Toomey Field) was ugly, it was like a high school football stadium. It was cold, it was foggy. And my gut told me this was where I was supposed to go. I just followed it and decided to go play football at UC Davis.

“And it was by far the best decision I’ve ever made in my entire life.”

https://www.davisenterprise.com/sports/former-ucd-linebacker-succeeding-off-the-field/

Davis Enterprise article: Former Aggie Hairston dead after CTE battle

Excerpt: “There’s a lot of people that use fear and excuses of things not to do something. It’s all possible. Whatever you want to accomplish in life is totally possible. I’m a perfect example,” Hairston said just two years ago. “Am I the most talented football player in the world? No. Am I the most talented business person? No. But if you just focus on doing all these little things, the big things can actually open some day.”

Hairston’s Dixon-based company thrived. Some put its value at $50-60 million.

https://www.davisenterprise.com/sports/former-aggie-hairston-dead-after-cte-battle/

Here's the post-game interview with Nas Anesi also:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MhgwhBfr3I4

So we actually ran a successful hook and ladder? How many yards did that play get us? I can't remember the last time we tried one of those.

I wasn't able to attend or even watch the game due to a previous commitment to a great dinner party with some old friends. I did manage to sneak off and saw how close the game was in the 3rd so I was surprised when I saw the final score.

Oregon State 48 SUU 25
San Diego State 28 Sac State 14
Weber State 24 Cal Poly 17
South Dakota State 45 Montana State 14
Oregon 62 PSU 14
Montana 48 Drake 16
South Dakota 43 Northern Colorado 28
Washington 45 North Dakota 3
Idaho 56 Western New Mexico 10
EWU 31 NAU 26
Aggies 54 San Diego 21

Montana 48 Drake 16 Final
Oregon 62 PSU 14 Final
South Dakota 43 Northern CO 28 Final
Idaho 21 Western NM 10 with 12:00 to go in the 3rd
Montana State 0 South Dakota State 0 with 13:35 to go in the 1st

Montana 31 Drake 10 at the half
South Dakota 34 Northern CO 14 at the end of the 3rd
Oregon 62 PSU 12 Final
Idaho 7 Western NM 3 at the end of the 1st

Oregon 35 PSU 7 at the half
Montana 3 Drake 0 with 4:22 to go in the 1st
South Dakota 14 Northern CO 7 with 4:50 to go in the 1st

I was trying to find some information on San Jose's RB Tyler Nevens to see how he was doing after what appeared to be a serious spinal injury. I couldn't find any updated information. The only thing being reported was that his injury occurred "from a helmet to helmet hit." There was no penalty on the play. I hope he is recovering well. Those kind of injuries are always scary.

https://www.heraldonline.com/sports/article217632485.html

I had forgotten that we had offered Nevens in 2017 and he chose SJSU over the Ags, Idaho, Montana, Montana State, NAU, PSU, and San Diego. Of course, we landed Olonzo Gilliam, Namane Modise and Tehran Thomas...not too bad!

That's good to hear. A lot of things are changing with equipment and rules so, hopefully, the game will continue to become safer for the players.

I only played a couple of years in high school before it became crystal clear to me that ramming into players who weighed up to 130 pounds more than me was going to get me killed! I got knocked silly several times and saw stars floating around but they were inside my head.

Our coach even had a drill he called "head knocking" that we all hated. He'd have us form two lines: one with the big guys facing the other line with the smaller RB's and receivers etc. Then he'd place two cones about 10 feet apart and then he would throw the ball to small guy and we'd have to run head on into the bigger guy barreling straight at us and stay within the cones. Obviously, the laws of physics favored the big guys every time and I always took a wicked hit. Being the smallest guy on the team, I was nearly ready to puke each time he'd make us do that. Eventually, I swallowed my pride and decided I'd have more fun with cool cars and pretty girls...

Soccer has really come under scrutiny lately as you noted. The scary thing about CTE is that it isn't necessarily just the big concussions that are damaging but it appears that the repeated smaller hits to the head like heading the ball in soccer can create a cumulative effect over time. Our brain simply wasn't designed to be repeatedly bumping into the interior of our skull.

I'm not privy to any information concerning Hairston's injury but I feel quite certain that, here at Davis, he was given the best medical advice available at the time and, was at some point in his recovery, cleared by the medical staff to play again. Most of the documented cases of football related CTE have come from autopsies of professional players and Hariston only briefly played in the NFL. We do know that lingering depression, suicidal ideation, anger and impulse control have been associated with CTE and Hairston was quoted as saying he felt he had symptoms of CTE. There's a lot about CTE that we still do not know and, unfortunately, CTE is the elephant in the room with the game of football.