Wasn’t Boise State ranked 4 or 5 when we played them? We hung with them for most of the game, too.

It didn't take long for someone to suggest an 11 team D-1 "California Conference"

https://www.bakersfield.com/opinion/joe-mathews-the-california-conference/article_bda6504a-3d74-11ee-b154-07109aa0afdb.html

I’m sympathetic to the arguments about football not being as big in West Coast culture compared to Montana or the South. Having said that, Sac State has basically the same cultural environment and apparently is drawing an average of 15k per game. So while I’m under no delusion that we’ll one day draw 25k like in Montana or Texas, 15k should be a realistic goal for us.

I’m not saying there isn’t room for improvement, but I don’t think we should let the outcome of Causeway or selection Sunday create such dramatic concerns. Has Sac State grown as a program? Of course. Haven’t we also? Absolutely. At the end of the day, I would take Hawkins over Taylor in a heartbeat purely for the intangibles that honestly have nothing to do with football. The fact that he understands Aggie Pride, his philosophy on coaching, hearing him gush with pride a couple years ago over the fact that the entire OL was engineering or science majors, etc. It’s the little things you notice: I forget who it was, but one of the players during a Monday presser this season said he had FBS offers but UCD was the only school that allowed him to pursue an engineering major. I do think Taylor is a better on-the-field coach but I wouldn’t trade that for what Hawkins brings to the program and university.

And on the subject of Sac State’s progress vs. ours, here’s some counterpoints to hopefully make us feel better when we play the comparison game:

Causeway as a metric: Both teams were in this game. There’s nothing about losing by 6 points in the last second of the game that screams “Sac State is clearly on the better trajectory.”

Playoff selection as a metric: We can’t let a handful of lazy ADs sitting on the selection committee define the season (let alone our trajectory as a program) for us. It of course sucks we didn’t get in but everyone on this board (and many on AGS) understand the nuances between our 6-5 and Sac State’s 11-0. Swap schedules and both teams likely would have gotten in. Admittedly the difference between their season and ours is they found a way to win their close games and we didn’t (although we didn’t have the benefit of a cheap targeting hit taking out the opponent’s QB or Weber State’s long snapper handing the game away) — I think that says more about coaching (and the Hawkinses can still improve here) than it does about our overall trajectory.

Season win/loss records as a metric: I alluded to this above, but it’s a little unfair to compare the two programs’ trajectory based on (and draw conclusions from) their wildly different 2022 campaigns. Not only was our schedule much more challenging in terms of the teams we played, but I also think it would have made a world of difference if the scheduling gods gave us even one of those games (MSU/WSU/SDSU) later in the season. It would have given us more time for our offense to click before these games. Our FG kicking, which was the difference in SDSU and WSU, dramatically improved later in the season. Playing the tough teams later in the season would have also helped the rankings situation even if we still lost those games. Starting 1-4 is too big of a hole to climb out of in terms of national recognition in the polls. If you rearrange our schedule and we start 5-1 only to go 1-4 in the last 5 games, we would have been a top 10 team losing to 4 teams in the top 10 and likely still staying in the top 15/20 by selection Sunday (basically Montana’s season). Who knows if that would have made a difference to the playoff committee but at the very least we wouldn’t have felt as much like an underdog in Causeway. Sac State’s 2022 season is the inverse of this experience… they played Montana when UM was still highly ranked, they got WSU later in the season when the wildcats were on their decline and their offense was clicking, and of course they just had fewer quality opponents to play.

Attendance as a metric: Yes, Hornet Stadium drew 23k people on Saturday. But that's because both teams have been successful, and it was the highest stakes Causeway in the history of the series. That says just as much UCD as a program as it does about Sac State given how close the two schools are and how many fans in blue attended on Saturday. If we throw game day experience into this metric, I would say UCD Health Stadium is way ahead of Hornet Stadium... parking was a nightmare and I missed the first half because of the massive line to get in.

Playoff performance as a metric: In an alternate universe, the line judge stopped the clock to move the chains and we threw a TD in the last second of the game to win (not too far fetched). We actually make it into the playoff field. This Sac/UCD comparison doesn’t happen until after both teams finish their playoff runs and probably has a much different tone. In our actual universe however, even when we do this analysis now, UCD is arguably leading in this metric for actually winning one of its games and almost making it to the semifinals. So there's that.

Bottom line: I know we finished 6-5 and they finished 11-0, and I'm sure this has many implications including national/regional recognition, recruiting, retention, etc. But I don't think things are as dire as the different outcomes suggest, once you dive a little deeper into what happened this season or even what's happening to the programs overall. In my opinion, Hawkins is the right coach for the kind of program most of us want this program to be, and remembering that helps me come to terms with an otherwise disappointing end to the season.

“3. Montana has good buddies on the committee.“

Montana is literally ON the committee. Their AD is a member through 2024.

Montana AD being on the committee probably didn’t hurt…

UT Martin needed the coin flip. Both SEMO and UTM would have gotten in if UTM won the coin flip, but since SEMO won UTM will likely be left out.

Burning 10 seconds trying to do some fancy and dangerous laterals at the 2 yard line with 48 seconds left also didn’t really help…

yes the winner of that game went to Sac State. It could happen again this year too if we get in

No I think after the seeds the rest of the field is determined based on geography (with the home team being the one that has a higher $$ bid)

It would also make Montana that much less likely to get in, and the committee is much more likely to give the Big Sky 4-5 spots (and it’s hard to see Idaho getting in with UCD being left out) instead of 6.

No, this is last week’s poll. The scores are up-to-date but the positions on the poll are from before Week 11’s games. I don’t think the coaches poll comes out until Monday morning each week.

If Idaho beats sac they have an inside track to the conference title

we’re not winning the title (let alone the auto bid, which arguably matters more) with two losses. Just look at Montana state’s remaining schedule.

Position in the bracket matters too, so it’d be nice if sac state isn’t *only* halfway decent by the time we play them. Then there’s the fact that 6 win teams sometimes have a shot too (like UNI recently) as long as all their losses were against quality opponents and not just half decent ones.

the only way we get into playoffs as a 7-4 team is by beating a quality Sac State … hate to say it but gotta hope for as good of a Sac record as possible before Causeway especially against the teams that we don’t play

Wtf is with these seemingly unnecessary time outs??

Didn’t SDSU have a FG hit the upright and land inside for 3 earlier in the game?

Weren't there 3 Big Sky teams in one bracket in 2018? I think Weber was #2, EWU was #3, and UCD was #6.

Selfish because Brown is the only member of the team who would benefit from a show of support against racism? White folks are harmed by racism against black people too, even if they don’t realize it.

What is so controversial about anti-racism that it would be considered “politics” at the gymnastics meet?

2006 NDSU @ UCD footage of the last quarter comeback by the bison that I found lurking on the Bison boards: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=sMON9TWhYsI

I still remember this game like it was yesterday. We led 24-0 at the half and NDSU scores 28 points in the second half to take the lead with 6 seconds remaining in the game. They had like 4 3rd/4th down conversions of over ten yards each on that last drive. Complete heartbreaker. Was a freshman at the time still being introduced to Aggie football, feel very fortunate I got to see one year of Toomey, Jon Grant, Tony Kays...

The video is a blast from the past! I had no idea it was televised.