I know Culberson took a knee to the back of the head while trying to dive for a tackle. Could be a concussion.

Culbertson didn't come back in the game and had his pads off on the sideline. I'm sure they are evaluating him for a concussion.

Luckily DB is one of our deeper positions right now. Hoping things turn out alright for him. He's had a rough history with injuries.

Maier was 19-24 for 258 yards, 2 TD's and 2 picks.
Doss hauled in 8 passes for 181 yards and one TD for an average of 22.6 per catch.
Total yards: SDSU 513 Ags 315
Passing yards: Ags 258 SDSU 237
Rushing yards: SDSU 276 Ags 57

Kelly has already been impressive at UCLA in practice.

57 yards rushing.

Convoluted press release summarizing the game. Nice comments from Hawk.

http://www.ucdavisaggies.com/sports/m-footbl/recaps/09

I nominate Modise for much more PT. Maybe Hawk kept him back bc he was worried about injuries with his slight build. True Frosh Logan Montgomefy had 3 receptions.

There were some flashes, some definite progress. I feared that options with CJ would be predictable, and they were. I think CL could be a special situation FB, but a long shot. We're missing one WR? We truly missed Josh Kelly. QB Maier looked very solid, considering the circumstances.

Respectable showing against a tough team.

Just got home. Good game and way for UCD to turn it on at the end, even if it was against the second string. I tentatively *want* to say that the Ags will be fine against FCS competition but I also suspect SDSU might be a little worse this year.

Alumni "tailgate" (if you can call an air-conditioned indoor social a tailgate) was really well put-together and had a great air of optimism. Didn't get a chance to speak to Chancellor May but he was making the rounds and seemed very supportive of athletics and approachable in general.

Also, inspection looks like the Ags do indeed have new away uniforms with an updated font. Nothing fancy; the block CAs on the home jersey are replaced with the horseshoe logo here.

http://grfx.cstv.com/photos/schools/ucda/sports/m-footbl/auto_aa_storywide_new/12822020.jpeg

The shiny gold helmets with blue pants are a slick look IMO. Not very traditional I guess but a solid option for non-rivalry/homecoming games.

Modise showed some explosiveness and lateral agility towards the end of the game against the reserves. He did manage to average 4.4 yards a carry which isn't bad, it's just that we only gave the ball to him 10 times.

Agreed on the CJ plays. SDSU sniffed those out easily and that was without tape on the offense. Other teams will know what to expect now. The only thing we have going in terms of those plays is that physically we should be at a more even playing field from here on out.

Honestly, I have followed the Ags for years after my playing days ended...there were a lot of bright spots Saturday night. SDSU is a good FBS team...not Alabama but they are athletic and good. Their first string could score almost at will which is expected however we matched up well with their 2nd stringers which is more indicative of playing against FCS players. Hawk has them going in the right in direction - remember Rome was not built in a day. Go Ags from Western North Carolina!

Looking back on the game, I think we may have landed a real diamond in Maier. He threw 1 bad interception, but he completed nearly 80% of his passes and that includes tossing bombs downfield. A lot of times when you see crazy high completion percentages its because the QB is doing nothing but check downs and screens, not the case here. He was also pretty darn accurate when on the move in roll outs and play actions. I really liked what I saw from him in his first division 1 game especially considering he was thrown into the shark tank.

It's also only been 1 game though. I hope he can keep clicking we Doss because that connection was a thing of beauty against SDSU.

Coach Long calls Doss a class act, says he could start for any DI program. (Post game interview.)

Said in the 4th quarter we moved the ball against their 3rd string, who he said played "horrible".

That first interception ...

After 1 game, Doss' 181 yards is good enough for 2nd in all of FCS for receiving yards per game. Let's hope he can keep that pace up!

Maier looked okay for a first start. One bad int. Didn't see much fly actions on offense one was a big gain. Wonder if we failed it down to not show too much? That Aztec runner is good and qb killed us when we stacked the box. Stadium was absolutely dead even with big crowd.

That's crazy considering some FCS schools played FCS or even DII opponents this week.

That's Qualcomm Stadium for you. Literally the only redeeming aspects are the fact that it has a football field in the middle and its proximity to campus. Doesn't help when many people are just there for the fireworks and it's like 100 degrees out.

The only receiver to have more yards was a guy from Richmond and they played Sam Houston State in a game where there was almost 1000 yards of passing between the 2 teams (Richmond - 546, SHSU - 411).

Some post-game comments from Hawk:

“It seems sometimes overly philosophical to people, but one of our goals is to start fast and finish strong,” said Hawkins, whose team ultimately dropped the nonconference game 38-17. “That’s life, you want to finish strong. Forget about the score. You always play hard when you’re hit and you never give up when you’re behind. That’s what we want.

“That’s when I pulled them together and said, ‘Let’s forget about what the score is. Let’s finish. We got 15 minutes of football. Let’s play.’ They did a nice job.”

http://www.davisenterprise.com/sports/not-the-drive-but-aggies-provide-a-catalyst/

“Attitude was great. Sparkle in the eye was great. Their togetherness was great. The work ethic was great. All that was awesome, and we can build on that.

“We have a chance to be a good football team, but we have to hang together.”

http://www.davisenterprise.com/sports/daunting-aggie-football-opener-in-san-diego-shows-fire-promise/

Failed it down? You mean tuned it down?

U San Diego no slouch... I'm wondering likewise if we limited the playbook a bit for various reasons (1st game, new guys, etc.), which will open up in League play.

I'm overall happy with the result - team certainly was not embarrassed, had flashes and apparently few injuries (fingers crossed on Culberson). Looking forward to next week when I can watch live with my own eyeballs rather than through the FB live feed.

Fun fact: UC Davis scored more points against SDSU than 7 different FBS teams in their schedule last year. In fact the Ags scored more against SDSU than Fresno, UNLV, SJSU, and Hawaii combined.

And the margin of victory for State was smaller than in 4 of those FBS games.

I think the Ags will be all right, or SDSU is in trouble. Maybe both.

If SDSU's o-line can make openings for that running back, I think SDSU will be just fine.

UC Davis has to beat USD this Saturday! If not, we could be looking at a 0-11 or 1-10 season.

They need a win even if it is only by 1,2 or 3 points...a win is a win however ugly or small the margin may be!

After USD we are facing:

#9 Portland State
#5 Weber State
#1 North Dakota
#2 Eastern Washington
#3 Northern Arizona
#4 Cal Poly

With a new (young)team and coaching staff, if we are at 0-9 at this point it will be very difficult (not impossible) to keep the motivation and belief high enough to finish out the season with a win.

The last 3 games...

#13 Idaho State
#7 Southern Utah
#12 Sacramento State

Portland State has played against two D1 programs and have a week off to prepare for UCD. Then we go against the top 5 schools in the conference!

Welcome to the boards, Big Easy!

Kim Orender had a nice piece in a special to the DE.

Nice to see several unheralded players stud out. I don't recall us talking much about Mason Moe from Hawaii or 6'2" Cummins from Clovis, only a Soph (like Maier). Another sweet recruit by former assistant coach Pat McCann. Jared Harrell is the WR who is out.

USD is no pushover.

Nice. Maier's numbers also may have topped the Aztec QB... their TE was on the postgame video, he is huge. ... their QB was chewing gum while answering questions...

Modise was the most effective back and he is really quick. The issue is going to be "is there going to be any other effective backs". No others really showed anything. Maybe someone will develop/step up.

meant toned down. Ran that simple dive play after play. We didn't have speed to get to the edge on the simple give. Only remember a couple fly motions, one for solid gain another to Spenser for big loss.

One nice thing about Qualcomm is that trolley runs there from old town where we stayed. Trains every fifteen minutes. Very short walk to stadium the pa was as bad as ours and our new video board might be better than theirs

Are we better a this point than in the Gould era?