But I would temper the comparisons of Maier to Joe Montana (Coach Hawkins), or contemplating Hawk's departure to rebuild some DI bottom feeder. IT IS ONE VICTORY!!! ... I recall the same thing happened when Laughrea logged a win, Scott Marsh asked Jim Sochor on the radio to compare Laughrea to Ken O'Brien!
Please. Compare him to Chris Peterson or Tim Plough. ... And Hawk went through a grind two times...when we roll Montana and advance deep into the playoffs, you can ring me. ... It could have been a different game without that huge first blocked punt.
Hahaha yeah I thought the Montana comparison was just a little bit over the top by Hawk, but to be fair Jake has consistently looked good this season (even against SDSU) and statistically has been one of the best quarterbacks in FCS so far. I hope we keep trending upward, next hurdle is Weber who will be hungry after a lackluster performance against Sac.
I think Hawkins will stay if the job is rewarding in the sense of wins and progress toward building something. He's done the move up from Boise to Colorado, and I don't think he found that personally satisfying. At his age money starts to mean less, as he's already probably financially secure and his kids are raised. Just a guess, as I don't know the man. If he gets frustrated with the situation he's probably out of here. I think he's sincere in viewing Davis as a sleeping giant. We all know the challenges to that but there aren't many D1 bottom feeders that would offer a better opportunity.
In regards to comparisons with Joe Montana, being like Montana in an FCS setting is not the same as being Joe Montana in the NFL. I think we see what Hawkins is referring to; Maier looks like a winner in that he is cool under pressure, sees the field, and makes plays.
I think Hawkins is all in for the long haul here. Remember, he often says, "UCD football was my baptism in excellence," and at his presser he said, "this is the right place, the right time, the right fit."
Hawk has been to the pinnacle at Boise State only to see the bottom fall out at Colorado. He brings a ton of experience and wisdom to Davis and he's certainly seen bigger paychecks than we could offer him.
He understands and embraces the the philosophy of Aggie Athletics. He is surrounded by former friends and coaching colleagues both on his staff and in the community. He has a chance to create something very special here and, in doing so, he can follow in the footsteps of the great coaches that influenced him so much as a young man.
Like he said in the legacy video, "the goal is to help create better students, better men, better football players and, ultimately having them going out into society and help create a better world."
I truly believe that he is grateful to have come full circle and return back home to Davis and, at this stage of his career and life, he's in it to give something back and to pay it forward.
There are a lot of #'s on that page and it sure is nice to see the Ags ranked, but it has New Hampshire at #21 and Holy Cross at #50. HC beat NH 51-26 yesterday. Seems like it needs to work out the kinks a bit.
I think Massey is one of the better ranking sites out there. It's just early in the season though. Most of these ranking systems have some problems early on in the season. You nailed my main point though. It's not necessarily about the exact placement for me, just that we are getting a little bit of recognition.
Then say he is cool under pressure... speaking of pressure, why put the comparison on his shoulders? ... he's what, 20, 21? Give it some time... chill a bit...
Probably also shouldn't compare him to Joe Namath, John Elway, Dan Marino, Albert Einstein or Michelangelo.... and why give your opponent ammo, motivation for their defense? ... Sochor played it low key, he didn't tell the Bison he had a 1st round pick at QB. He did the opposite, he complimented the opposition !
No one has mentioned the league had no book on us, and no reliable film ... SDSU a different beast, and San Diego a non scholarship school... promise you they'll be dissecting our film this week backwards and forwards.
we toss some good-old I-formation at them this week. the pass to Hicks was in my playbook back 35 years ago, although it never seemed to be called when i was in the game. even brought out the wildcat with C.J. and we ran through them like a hot knife through butter (that was their starting D). i think we'll be bringing out some wrinkles beyond the one or two gadget plays (like the reverse pass from CJ on the first drive.....that should have been a TD). that wildcat would get a sluggish run game going -> we just outman them, and have a QB who could toss a decent pass.
DrMike, when they put CJ in with the wildcat formation, it reminded me of the game at the Toomb when the starting qb went out with an injury (moroski?) and Johnny Lu went in. The opposing team had organized their D around a pocket passer, and as you know, Johnny Lu was a runner and had some huge gains. PSU was totally shell shocked when CJ tucked it up and ran. All good stuff.
I'm not sure if a full replay exists for the public. I looked on watch big sky, but they only have replays of the games that were on pluto and ours was on eleven sports. We put CJ in towards the end of the game and we basically ran wildcat every play from what I remember. CJ just went schoolyard on em and they didn't have an answer for it. I think we started the drive midfield after a fumble recovery. Don't quote me on that though.
Protecting him? It's one of the most dangerous plays in football and unless he's truly the fastest guy on the team I'm not sure it's worth an extra few yards on returns when they need him in top shape for the ensuing drive.
I'm actually concerned about SDSU using our two best RBs for returns, but they're just so dominant at it I understand that it's just too hard to make the call to pull them.
Yeah I'm perfectly okay not using Doss for kick returns. I wonder if we will eventually put Montgomery back there for returns. That kid is supposed to have blazing speed.
Holy cow I just went back and looked at Montgomery's special teams stats from high school. His senior season he had 16 kick returns for 431 yards (26.9 avg) with a long of 70 and 1 TD. He had 11 punt returns for 346 yards (31.5 avg) with a long of 66 and 1 TD.
I thought the win over San Diego was pretty unsatisfying. Beating a non-scholarship 1-AA, meh. However, PSU has been a tough opponent, and we've struggled on offense against them for years. Cautious optimism. I don't think we are built for as much read-option as we ran against San Diego in conference, but I like the fact we have shown so many different looks (spread, double tights, etc.). This team has a lot of talent, and now we have an offensive mind that doesn't think run-run-pass is a good strategy!
Oldaggiw, I think the San Diego game can't be discounted. Pretty similar to playing an Ivy, they give aid to athletes. Sure we should be favored, but what does Cal Poly think about whether beating them means anything? Showed we could defend against a pretty good experienced qb. They scared me by how well they ran the ball between the tackles, so it wasn't like playing an out classed opponent.
We get a lot of recruits out of San Diego area, I think we should play San Diego regularly.
But you are right that we haven't beat a top notch FCS team yet. Im looking forward to pulling of an upset against a better team. I think we'll see that happen this year for the reason you state. We are not predictable and we give opponents more to prepare for.
If the Stanford I saw Saturday shows up to the Aggie game next year, well, it's not going to be 45-0 I can say that. They're just slower, weaker, more imprecise, you name it than previous years.
Looking like SDSU was pretty underrated in the first few weeks though. Held back a possibly top FCS offense, then beat ASU in a game that some redditors said wasn't nearly as close as the score looked.