Ok good effort to hang in there by the Aggies, but man that was a costly false start.

Five wins isn't a catastrophe but it sure looks like an underperformance to me. The "how" we got to five matters a lot. We beat the five weakest teams in our schedule. Most of the losses were pretty bad -- pretty much all the FCS losses except EWU and now Sac -- and there have been moments that really reflected inadequate coaching (bad special teams miscues, weirdly inconsistent playcalling, unpreparedness for 2-minute drill, etc).

We know we're not going to have the best talent at every position. But this team has smart players and an experienced staff so I expect the preparation, game-time decision making, and execution to be near perfect every single game without fail. Any less means the team is set up to fail against bigger, faster opponents in the conference.

I get to see a pretty good FBS team play week after week and to my untrained eye, I just don't see the inconsistency and sloppiness that Davis has. Talent and funding discrepancies are acceptable and expected but not preparedness and execution levels.

Hornets get the stop, just have to take a knee

Had an essay prepared but I'll wait. Come on Ags

And Doss is the best receiver in the country, or close enough for our purposes. And Maier is a top-10 QB. And... etc. There are too many stars aligning this season to justify 5 wins, or maybe even 6. We're not going to have talent and experience like this on the staff and roster every year.

I am very pessimistic about the future of this program right now, I'm not going to lie.

Turning this game off. If we lose this we'll have fewer wins against scholarship programs than Gould's first season and no Causeway trophy to show for the year.

This is not what a good program looks like.

Coming out flat again...

What happens if someone like Doss who's on track to graduate gets drafted in winter? (On the quarter system no less, which goes later.) Is he allowed to finish or does he have to report to the team immediately?

2012 was not the downpour of legend, though I think it did drizzle slightly. That was the weird game where the Ags stayed in it with only one offensive TD but had almost every variation of a special teams score

17-15 Aggies at then end of the 1st

The DE said Morgan, Rachel, and Pele have dubbed themselves the Splash Sisters. Somewhat bold talk but they do have the numbers and record to back it up.

I feel like we're in for another chippy game -- 32 fouls in a game speaks to very aggressive tactics and I bet PSU will be applying a lot of pressure to try to stop the offense from clicking. Sounds like PSU is also somewhat deep if they can make it to OT with four players fouling out.

Oh I don't deny all that; see my caution/pessimism in other threads. This team has a lot to work on. But in regards to the original point about the offense being able to produce an upset, that was a game where the offense did its job

We were a missed field goal away from taking EWU to overtime at home, and I like our chances of competing in that situation because the CJ Wildcat Special is as close to a guaranteed 2pt conversion that I can think of.

So that's our "upset" as far as I'm concerned, in that the offense largely did what it had to do to keep us in the game with an explosive team.

Michael also has the obscure distinction of being the only player left on the roster who saw minutes in the Hawkins era. He's probably had a ton of reps defending some top-notch players in practice throughout the years so it's gratifying to see it play dividends.

Morgan wins Player of the Week

http://www.bigwest.org/aotw.asp

UCD twitter says score was corrected to 74-59; must have been what Jim Les was checking up on with the officials towards the end

72-59 I think was the score, but ESPN weirdly is off on their box score.

Aggies put their foot on the gas in the final 10 minutes. Chima's 3-ball has the potential to be devastating if he can be remotely consistent

Close game, Ags playing aggresive defense as usual forcing a lot of TOs but also committing a lot of fouls.

Chima wasn't on the floor for much of the end of the half.

That last one was an excited observation, not a criticism.

But generally yeah, I'm going to on be pessimistic about Aggie Football until proven otherwise. Maybe it's just a perspective thing -- I've never seen UCD field a competitive football team since I've become a fan. Following this team for six seasons has entirely been an exercise in developing coping mechanisms and it won't be simple to let that part go.

I expect that the Ags will get pressured a lot this year because no opponent will want to let the shooters get into any sort of rhythm. Like 69Aaggie said though, it does seem like the athleticism is there to grind out wins.

Pregame senior celebration happened when I was a student, and I think Idaho State did it before our game last week. So my guess is it's common practice these days.

The hook-and-ladder looked suspiciously similar to a certain do-or-die play that Boise ran a year after Hawk left...