Give credit to ISU. They had everything to gain and nothing to lose and they were mentally prepared to play and they really took it to us in the first half. Unfortunately, for the Aggies, this is a bad loss. Although several Top 10 teams lost this week, none lost to an 0-4 team who many felt was bringing up the bottom of the Big Sky and playing without their starting QB.

There's a lot of football yet to be played and the Big Sky is generally a dogfight each year. We may see more upsets or EWU may run away with it. A loss like this can carry a lot of negative weight if we are in a tight race for a playoff position at the end of the season. We'll need some impressive wins going forward to offset this loss.

Obviously in retrospect it was a bad call. The Titanic should have gone further south.
However the choice was punt and probably give them the ball at the 20, or try to get a first down with slim chance of making it. And give them the ball at the 43. Note: We’re down two touchdowns.

Looks really stupid because defense gave up six straight completions. Who’s to say they wouldn’t have got a touchdown if they had to go twenty yards further?

A lot of speculation and "ifs" for sure. Sometimes big risks pay big rewards. Las Vegas makes a killing off of people buying into that mindset and, consequently, the vast majority of people go home empty handed. I just don't think the risk in this instance was worth taking.

It wasn’t a bad call in retrospect. It was just a bad call that ended up having the worst possible consequences come from it.

If they get the ball at the 20, maybe they don’t even try to move the ball since they’d need to get 50 yards just to get into field goal range as opposed to 25. I don’t think Idaho Stare was thinking TD there at the beginning of the drive. They probably would have been happy with 3 to make it a three score game.

It’s 4th and 17. If we had Patrick Mahomes as our QB the odds would be slim of picking that up. How many passes did we complete in the 1st half? Wasn’t many. If it’s 4th and short you could sell me on it. But the slim chance of actually picking that up isn’t nearly worth the risk of what happens from giving Idaho State good field position.

ISU highlights. Short.

https://youtu.be/KlgVKT3Ia9w

Agree completely that going for it 4th and 17 was not wise, and did not put TT in a situation for success. With a passing qb, maybe.

Yet this is the most talented team the Aggies have ever fielded, per coach. My money is on the thought that we learn from this and finish strong. But it was painful to watch.

That final three game stretch is looking pretty daunting (not to overlook the next two). 2 out of three might be required.

This is pure speculation but, with this glaring loss, I would think we would need to run the table to be a lock in the playoffs. If we lose respectively to EWU and win the all of the other games, we could make the field but probably not be a first round host.

Lots of football to be played and we simply need to take care of business week by week though.

9-2 in the Big Sky with wins over Weber and Tulsa and we’d almost definitely host a game. It would probably be a first round game though so we’d be seeded 9-16 rather in the top 8 like in 2018.

That also assumes Weber continues to at least be decent also. Weber’s next two are home to Montana State and at EWU. If they get blasted in those games, all of a sudden our win over them doesn’t look that great anymore.

8-3 I bet we still get in assuming we don’t get annihilated in those two games though. Very unlikely it would be a home game though.

Our 2018 resume wasn’t that great either if you just look at who we played. Beat a 1-11 San Jose St team (Tulsa already has 2 wins) and San Diego, who made the playoffs but lost their first game. After that our best wins were Montana and Idaho State at 6-5. But San Diego was the only playoff team we beat. EWU annihilated us. Now, the difference is that team was putting up 40 every game besides Stanford and EWU, and besides Idaho State, was hammering teams. So it’s not a perfect comparison. But that team still got a 6 seed and proved in the playoffs that it deserved it.

I think the difference is that in 2018 the team passed the "eye test" with soaring colors in every game but EWU. Yeah most of our points against Stanford were at the very end but we kept it competitive for three quarters. Our offense basically scored at will vs SJSU.

And even though Montana wasn't doing that hot, what the Ags did in Wa-Griz was unprecedented, so I think anybody following that box score basically counted it as a quality win

I agree. My main point was that a 9-2 Big Sky team with an FBS win and a win over Weber is getting a home game. 9-2 where we don’t beat anyone good by virtue of lucky scheduling is a different story.

This team would have to win out to get a 1st round bye like the 2018 team did. Of course we’d probably believe in them more then we do now if they did win out.

In 2019, first year with 24 teams, Big Sky had 4 teams in with byes. All were 9-3. The Montana’s had 2 conference losses. So I don’t think running the table is a must. I’d be thrilled with a 4-1 record.

I think those teams all had better resume's than a 9-2 UCD team would this year. Us losing to Idaho State is way worse than any loss those teams had. Of the 12 combined losses, 6 were to FBS teams, 5 were to each other and the last was to North Dakota, a 7-5 playoff team. But your general point is correct that when you're in a good conference, like the Big Sky/CAA/MVFC, you get the benefit of the doubt. A 7-5 team in those conferences is still a pretty solid team. Look at the 2019 Aggies, who went 5-7, which looks bad. However, we lost to Cal, NDST (National Champs), Montana (6 seed, QF), North Dakota (playoffs, 1st round), Weber (3 seed, SF), Montana State (5 seed, SF) and Sac St (4 seed, R16) and the only team we really got hammered by was Montana. Weber you could argue since we down 22 in the 4th but we were also only down 5 mid 3rd. That team was good, only losing to playoff teams, and still went 5-7.

.500 Big Sky teams are nothing to scoff at, which is why the conference gets the benefit of the doubt, ditto for the CAA and MVFC. In the 8 years since it's moved to 24 teams, those three conferences have had 27 of the 32 semifinalists, and Sam Houston St. made up 4 of those remaining 5.

I don’t know how much the committee looks at bad losses and good wins; I figure they are taking the top four BSC teams to the 24 team bracket. Sac is undefeated and has Montana coming up. Besides us and NAU (home),the rest of their schedule is weak. Game with us is big. The others ahead (MSU, EWU, Montana) have tougher schedules.

One loss shouldn't be earth shattering, but it sure is a Wake Up call.

Its been said that it’s hard to win two games against a team in a season.
An example would be us playing Eastern in playoffs after getting blown out in regular season.
If this is true, the same effect would likely be seen in playing opponents we played in the spring, Weber, Eastern, Idaho, Idaho State and Cal Poly. We beat Weber in the rematch, beat Idaho in a tougher than expected game and lost to Idaho State, so maybe there is some validity to it, in all three games so far the loser in the spring would have at least covered the spread, and won two out of three outright.

Thanks again to Wally the Bronco Too

https://www.davisenterprise.com/sports/no-surprise-aggies-tumble-in-poll/?fbclid=IwAR2UaFQNYWTbwCK0tAsBWH1MjW8Wvf8N6WbrUhlBHU_IA9qhH3xO8qblk8I

“I kept thinking we’d eventually have a breakthrough and get things going like we have all season, but it just didn’t happen,” said Aggie head coach Dan Hawkins at his weekly press conference.

“A true sportsman will tip his cap to Idaho State. They made the plays they needed to make to win and we didn’t. They came out swinging and they gashed us with some heartbreaking plays, some real knockout blows,” Hawkins added. “I told our guys that you can lose the game, but don’t lose the lesson. If it can make you better, then it’s a good thing. We’re still a good football team. We’re still 5-1. I know my greatest learning experience as a coach has always been when something bad happens.”

Hawkins let Idaho States best player beat us in the first quarter. Maybe he and the defensive coordinator should learn from that.

The 235# wide receiver / track star.

Looking back, the decision to go for it on 4th and 17 was an unwise gamble.

“Life’s going to remind you that it’s not about perfection,” Hawkins said of the unexpected loss. “I’ve had a number of championship teams in my career, but I’ve never had an undefeated season. We’re still a work in progress.”

For his part, Idaho State head coach Rob Phenicie, whose team is now 1-4 overall and 1-2 in the Big Sky, said, “We got a monkey off our back. We were 0-5 against UC Davis.”

Phenicie sensed an upset was possible by the way his team practiced all week.

“Our kids talked the talk on Monday and they walked the walk today. It was cool,” he noted shortly after the final gun sounded. “I was expecting we’d have to score a lot of points to win this game. Davis has a really good offense and a great system. But we had a great game plan and getting those three turnovers really helped.”

The Aggies had an uncharacteristic three interceptions in the game, including several that killed promising drives.

Noted Hawkins, “I always say that whoever wins the turnover battle is likely to win the game. Two of those interceptions
came in the red area, so that really hurt us.”

https://www.davisenterprise.com/sports/no-surprise-aggies-tumble-in-poll/?utm_source=DE&utm_campaign=bd5d4f53c7-Daily_Newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_be64fee185-bd5d4f53c7-171004309

Maybe we should have had had Whelan try a sixty yard field goal. I read he kicks them in practice.
Here is a 72 yarder in high school practice:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qv0p0pWpnmc