I would guess that we won't have fans until the spike in infections really goes down.

Post-game comments from Les and Pepper:

“I’m really proud of our guys for everything they’ve had to overcome in the last few weeks,” said Aggie head coach Jim Les.

“We’ve been asking them to live like hermits and not socialize and not go to restaurants and they’ve taken it all in stride. Plus, it’s been hard to practice with so few players.”

“I’m a little bit tired,” admitted Pepper, who played all but a minute and five seconds of the game.

“It means a lot to finally get to play a game again and we’re just taking every time we play as if it’s our last game. It was a great team effort and we played hard and with a lot of heart.”

“There’s no substitute for getting back to playing a real game,” said the Aggie coach.

“There were times where we weren’t playing Aggie basketball, but our guys really stepped up late, especially on defense. As coaches we’ve run out of creative ideas for making practice interesting and fun. We told our guys we have no excuses. We needed to come out and get a win and that’s what we did.”

https://www.davisenterprise.com/sports/basketball-uc-davis-rallies-to-beat-uc-san-diego/?utm_source=DE&utm_campaign=a73d8d1fee-Daily_Newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_be64fee185-a73d8d1fee-171004309

From the Enterprise:

UCD started the game with the league-minimum seven players, losing two to injury and three to COVID protocols, but managed to pull out a gut-check victory thanks to some strong defense and a second-half explosion by Elijah Pepper.

We had TWO turnovers! That’s incredible — DrMike

WOW! That must be a record for the least amount of TO's in a game...

I was finally able to watch the second half after having guests over for dinner and quite a bit of excellent scotch. Great win for the Aggies after a long layoff. Too bad no fans were able to attend.

Ags fall again 59-56 and start the conference 0-2.

Tied at 44 with 9:20 to go.

Ags are cold as ice shooting 20% and trail 19-9 after the 1st quarter.

The Big West Conference is apparently going to try and reschedule the cancelled games.

In an abrupt change of policy, Big West Conference officials announced that men’s and women’s basketball games that have been canceled will now potentially be made up if possible.

Previously, the policy was that COVID-canceled games would not be made up.

However, since cancellations have become the norm rather than the exception, there was a fear that some teams might play very few games this season if previously canceled contests were not rescheduled.

According to UC Davis Director of Athletics Rocko DeLuca, “Priority will be our missed games and will need to be played when openings become available.”

Furthermore, the Big West is awaiting guidance from the NCAA, which controls postseason eligibility.

Noted DeLuca, “We will likely discuss this again once the NCAA determines if there will be a reduced number of countable games for postseason eligibility. The NCAA basketball committees will discuss that specifically in a few weeks when they meet around the NCAA convention.”

https://www.davisenterprise.com/sports/college-basketball-big-west-conference-plans-to-make-up-canceled-games/?utm_source=DE&utm_campaign=3baa37eb6d-Daily_Newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_be64fee185-3baa37eb6d-171004309

TO's have been a big problem for this team this year. As you stated, poor, hurried, forced passes are the biggest culprit. Irvine was very aggressive and pressed the the Aggies the whole game. I think we'll see more of that by our opponents. The Ags handled the press pretty well but the pressure seems to get us playing faster, almost frantic at times, and that leads to poor passes and TO's.

Yes, Hall was hammered a lot and the officials let the game get very physical which was Irvine's advantage. Hall can can handle the physicality because she's so competitive and tough as is Turner. However, they both can try to do too much at times in reaction to the physicality and turn the ball over.

We'll likely see more pressure and physical play from our conference opponents since it worked for Irvine and since the teams know we have a tendency to get careless with the basketball.

The BW conference is apparently trying to reschedule the cancelled games. We'll have to wait and see.

Tough game for the Ags coming off a long, Covid break and playing without Stobbart and Burns. Irvine got hot in the second quarter draining several long 3's and the TO bug struck the Ags again. As a result, the Ags got themselves in a hole that they couldn't climb out of.

This is the first Aggie game since their win over Gonzaga on December 16th due to the cancellation of the Hawaii and UCR games. It will be interesting to see if the Ags have gathered any rust a result of the long stretch of no games.The Ags are now ranked #10 in the Women's Mid-Major Poll. LB State is #12 and San Diego is listed as also receiving votes.

It appears, from what I have read over on the UC Irvine Big West Boards forum, that UCI recently had 18 of 19 players test positive for Covid after an assistant coach tested positive. The UCI assistant coach came down with a positive test after the UCI game at USC where someone tested positive at USC. This virus can spread like wildfire. I fear it's going to be a problem for the entire season.

Going after largely overlooked, hungry players is typical of Aggie recruiting. The Ags are pretty good at finding diamonds-in-the-rough who can be developed into impact players.

Well crap! There must be a Covid issue in either one or both of the programs. There's not going to be much of a conference competition this year with the way things are going.

The Enterprise has published a lengthy and thorough article about the a possible student referendum to eliminate student fees that help fund Aggie Athletics.

If the referendum were to pass, UC Davis would lose about half of its $40 million per year athletics budget, with only a year or so notice before the funding is gone. “The campus would need to replace funds on an ongoing basis,” Topousis said. “An endowment would need to be established.” Because of University of California policies requiring that far more money be invested in an endowment than the amount withdrawn per year, UC Davis would need to raise more than $400 million to replace the funds generated by student fees. “The campus would not be able to raise those funds,” Topousis said.

As a result, UC Davis would either need to eliminate sports teams or dismantle other campus programs to replenish the athletics budget. Both options would involve laying off significant numbers of staff and student employees.

https://www.davisenterprise.com/news/local/showdown-looms-on-use-of-student-fees-to-fund-uc-davis-athletics/?utm_source=DE&utm_campaign=b1f9aa0047-Daily_Newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_be64fee185-b1f9aa0047-171004309

It's gonna be another strange season and that's if we end up with much of a conference season at all...

Long and slender at 6'4 and 175 lbs. I'm sure they'll have him in the weight room getting bigger and stronger if he commits. He currently has an offer from Redlands also.

I'd like to see MSU to bring the championship back to the Big Sky Conference. Go Bobcats!

Players today are not going to tolerate the "disciplinarian, borderline abusive" style of coaching nor should they. I think that it's a very good thing when coaches like that are shown the door as a result of players leaving their programs through the portal.