Not a football expert but really disliking the halfback handoffs out of shotgun up the middle.
a) hasn't worked all game
b) didn't work particularly well when Plough was here last time
c) primary goal of this game is for LL to walk away healthy

Is it my imagination or are most of LL's touches just dives up the middle? Not much effort to to get any sweeps or pitches outside going?

I remember that was my frustration with Plough's offense in 2019, though Larison should be more successful against FCS defenses than a younger and smaller Gilliam

Did away uniforms ever have them? I seem to remember it being a home uniform thing

Don't like the lack of creativity in the red zone but the short-yartage run game and run D are only going to look better against Big Sky teams.

Also not having Tompkins significantly shrinks the playbook when you need 2 yards

Write for California previews are best-in-class for our usual opponents IMO. Always enjoy reading them.

Notably in the conclusion of what’s supposed to be a UCD Offense write up, the author spends much of the time talking about how Davis will have trouble with the Bears offense. May be a case of just getting ahead of themselves, but I guess you could read it as an admission that it isn’t a sure thing that Cal will be able to outright stop LL, just that their path to victory is to outscore and control clock

True, but 9-win season requires us to play perfectly outside of our games against the FCS top 5 -- and that includes on the road at a top-10 team. Not sure any team outside of the non-marquee teams of the Big Sky and MVFC would be held to that standard just to lock in an at-large spot.

Only sort of related but I've resigned my self for hoping for running up the score on the FCS games this season. Committee feels free to disregard SoS and H2H so Ags need to be ready to truly shred the PSUs and Cal Polys on the schedule so that they can't help but use the eye test.

I remember Marsh commenting on the radio feed that the SJSU defense basically looked overwhelmed on the first drive.

Important also to note that Rodrigues skewering the Tulsa defense with Shredville-like urgency in the first five minutes set the tone for basically that whole game, where the FBS guys had to play from behind.

If I had to put my money on exactly one start to the game, I'd guess a play action pass to our #2 or #3 receiver for 7ish yards with Tompkins out wide as a decoy, then 15 seconds later a screen pass to LL to pick up the remainder. Nothing particularly gimmick-y, just showing that the Ags will play fast and use everyone on the field

SDSU built a really cool student housing/mixed use complex of the sort right next to their main campus with a sports bar, chicken restaurant, breakfast place, and Trader Joe's when I was there -- seems the sort of thing a really smart, modern, and well-received UMall replacement should be.

https://housing.sdsu.edu/communities/south-campus-plaza

Takes a lot of vision and approvals to get that done in Davis I imagine, complicated more by the fact that it would have to be all private unless the university bought up the land.

Offense has been stagnant for some time at SDSU and I don't remember there being any lights-out backs on the roster last year the way there were in years past (like when Davis played them). I can totally believe Gould was getting the most out of the RB corps, blocking, and field position he had to work with, and that the Rams could see that.

There was an OOC game in 2012 where Hawkins had 30 and Sypkens had 28, is the closest I could come up with with some hasty Googling. Which just speaks to how crazy an accomplishment it is -- we're talking about two of the best shooters in school history having near-career nights on the same night, and even they couldn't get 60 between them.

TY when he’s in clutch time looks as prolific as any guard I’ve seen in the Aggie uniform. Also really nice to have our two go to guys also be solid at the free throw line, Pepper and Johnson both are just very good at taking whatever the defense gives them

Seemed like the Aggies were visibly frustrated in the second half with the physicality, reffing, and stars getting largely shut down for a bit. But that was a very good final minute of regulation + OT where Johnson and Pepper got in a groove.

Question for the board, what's the conventional wisdom on the final three seconds of regulation when the game was tied? Pepper got a rebound and made a move to drive down the court to the basket, but Johnson called a timeout with 2.6 seconds in order for Les to draw up a play, and I saw them exchanging some words after. My instinct would be that it's better to let the play run out because there's a chance the dribbler can get an open look or get fouled in transition, whereas on an inbound on the opposing court there are multiple ways to lose the ball in the final seconds. Is a chance for a timeout and the coach to call a play really that beneficial there?

I forgot we had a whole year with Lemar, Schneider, and Moneke starting (really shouldn't since that's the March Madness year), but it would make sense that some of the Ags' best multiple-scoring-threats games would be in that era

Probably some game where Corey Hawkins got 28 while Tyler Les and Josh Richart each hit minimum 5 threes as the Ags scraped by a .500 team in overtime. That’s what the whole 2015 roller coaster felt like anyway

My understanding from a brief read of some blogs and a general understanding of Davis aid is that students on partials are eligible for scholarships that the general public can apply for and Davis is almost unique among the non Ivy FCS schools in how robust the aid program is.

So I think what Hawkins meant by that is that they’re scoping out which recruits are in income brackets that would result in things like guaranteed grants to cover tuition and then giving them partials to just cover room and board, that kind of thing. Also perhaps even declining to give certain recruits scholarships if they’re eligible for almost everything covered anyway

$60k is better than a starting state job, which I suppose is the bar that you have to minimum beat for a professional job in this area. I wonder if "commensurate with experience" means they're willing to go up another 10k or more to actually bring someone in from another program, rather than promote a grad assistant or hire a graduating player.

Also noticed he put out a UC Davis mug conspicuously facing the camera for his recent Purdy video

I still think Daft or someone not mentioned yet are more likely, but this is a more fun route of speculation

Didn’t think about JT as a possibility, but it makes sense. I know he was a college athletics administrator for a while (I saw him raise an eyebrow at my Davis shirt in passing at SDSU) and now he’s got the pedigree of that excellent analysis series.

I did see he tweeted at Plough if we want to get very sleuthy about this

thank you for the hard hitting journalism, that was what I was hoping someone would ask