Apparently Pinnick had a rough go of it in WSU's last scrimmage. Threw 3 interceptions though 2 were off tipped passes.

I doubt that he is getting anywhere near the coaching at WSU that he got at Davis. We will see and I hope ,him well.

I'm noticing Davis will be ranked below Montana no matter what

2024UC Davis30–14Missoula, MT
2023Montana31–23Davis
2019Montana45–20Davis
2018UC Davis49–21Missoula

Interesting that in the last 4 meetings, the visiting team has won. Aggies were clearly the better team in 2024 and 2018. 2023 Lan was out due to injury.

Montana rides the name reputation but I would say UCD program has been equal to them since Hawk.

2024 held Gilman to 21 on 8 carries. Long 24 yards and other 7 carries -3 yards. Gilman is very good - just don’t let him slide to the outside.

Weber St a trap game with Utah Tech the following week? No.

The football instagram page has the defense preview up now as well. Here are video links to both.

Offense Preview
https://www.instagram.com/p/DcOkayoBIju/

Defense Preview
https://www.instagram.com/p/DcT6CstBt6T/

We are catching up on the off-field stuff. If we can get to a point where we are competing or beating them the other 364 days of the year, like Plough talks about, watch out for the Ags.

Looks like the boys got updated home jerseys from Adidas. Added Cal Aggie logo on the shoulder and new number font to match “UC DAVIS” lettering. Still no names on the back, and no CA logo either. They look sharp.

Attended the pre season gathering today which included the showing of the “last causeway classic” movie. Its a great movie diving into the planning of the game, Aggie Pride, Davis philosophy, and some analysis of the game. They also gave out some cool game-day yard posters. Overall a very fun afternoon.

I honestly was not impressed by how he read the defense last year. He threw a lot of interceptions the second half of the season. Looked like he was not reading the field well.

differences I noticed for the blue home jerseys
1. New Adidas Jersey Template
2. The gold in UC Davis word mark is no longer solid behind the “U” and the “A”. Now there is a space where blue shows in the “U” and “A”. (I am happy about this)
3. The numbers are now the same font as the word mark. (Matching looks good, but I would have liked the word mark to not be slanted but hey, it doesn't look bad.)
4. No more TV numbers. Those have now been replaced by a gold “CA” logo.
5. I did not see a “CA” logo on the back of the jersey. I’m going to assume it won’t be there anymore as it would be redundant to have it on the rear and both shoulders.

These updates look good.

I hope they use the “Davis” logo more on the blue and white helmets. Again, it would be very redundant to have the “CA” logo on the helmet, jersey shoulders, and pants. I did see the gold “Aggie Pride” logo on the white helmet.

Sarcasm, right? Find a better stretch of qb play at Davis over the last 20 years.

he can play well and still have things he can improve on. He was a freshman, he isn’t going to be a perfect qb. He threw a lot of interceptions from not reading the field well in the second half of the season.

It would be cool for the team to use these logos.

Nope

Since it's the last week for offseason talk I wanted to share a hare-brained idea I had, based loosely on a thread on the Montana forum about potentially playing an entire schedule of Big Sky games. An alternate proposal in the thread was to spin off the perennially weaker conference teams then play a round robin of only the stronger BSC teams.

My proposal is a bit of a hybrid where BSC operates in a 2-division pro/rel structure (similar to European Soccer). It's easier to visualize with an even number of teams so I'll outline it assuming at some point there are 14 teams in the BSC:

• 7 Teams in BSC A that play a round robin, the highest of which in the standings wins the auto bid.
• 7 Teams in BSC B that play a round robin
• Each team plays 3 teams in the other division, with preference given to protected rivals. These count for tiebreakers in standings.

At the end of each season, the bottom two (or three) teams in BSC A are swapped with the top two or 3 of BSC B. All teams are eligible for the playoff, but only BSC A teams are eligible for the conference championship and autobid. The idea is it promotes good SoS for the likely playoff teams but also makes the season meaningful and doable for your UNCs and PSUs. A team could theoretically go 4-6 and still have an exciting last week of the season by getting promoted to BSC A with a key win.

Two divisions would weaken the second tier teams recruiting further. ( Look what the FCS label does)
The teams added were teams we that were on many big sky teams schedules anyway, so what problem are we trying to solve? I guess missing out on playing identical schedules. Probably Montana fans griping that Davis doesn’t play Montana State

I mean, 2018 Jake Maier and 2024 Miles Hastings are at least in the conversation. Far from a football expert here so I'm not going to say they were better than Pinnick. And you can debate the talent around each player, their age, etc.

WSU just announced Pinnick as their starter

They had no choice as that is where they invested their dinero... Never heard of a portal acquisition QB not starting!

Rushing Yards (Net), recent starting quarterbacks:

Caden Pinnick - 437
Hunter Rodriguez (21) - 240
Jake Maier - (-82)
Miles Hastings (-153)

CP clearly brought a new dimension, and wasn't limited to being a "game manager".

The only way we can keep our good players is to 1. Move up to FBS. And 2. Have competitive NIL offers. UC Davis needs a NIL collective like the one Kevin Kennedy (who is an UC Davis Alumnus) runs at Cal. We have a lot of rich alumni, it’s just about getting people excited about football and getting them to donate.

But then again the main focus is getting right now $50mm for the stadium renovation, I know we are all in the dark on how that’s going. And then we’ll need more money for a 10-15k seat expansion.

Davis Enterprise 8/22 says this is the starting line.
Plough said AJ Hasson right tackle
David Main right guard
Zaire Collier center
Jayden Montanez left guard
David Porotesano left tackle

Pinnick was an effective play-extender with speed and moves to pick up extra yardage when he left the pocket. Most of his rush yardage came via the scramble. He often scrambled when he didn't need to because he was young and short. That will be a problem at the higher level. QBs must have pocket awareness and understand protection schemes and where to step up to and where to escape to, or else they will get splattered. Plough didn't design a lot of QB runs because he's a QB guy and he knows all this, and he knew that the little QB was fragile.

Cleeland, Kollock, and Eason are all built different. Cleeland and Kollock are built like brick houses. Eason is tall and thick and faster than both of them. I wouldn't be surprised to see designed QB runs this season and beyond, but mark my words, Plough will not major in running his Quarterbacks.

I recall several months ago that left tackle was our weak link for all positions. Does that still hold true?

I think that perception was based on losing Eli Simonson, who Mike Cody called the best blocker he has had. if the Enterprise is correct, left tackle is now filled by David Porotesano who has substantial starting experience at right tackle. Time will tell if that is a weak link. Porotesano is a redshirt sophomore, its rare for a o lineman to have played as much as he has in first two years.

How would you describe our offense?

We hit lightning w CP last year, we have to now see the new pair.

Nice to see the local Davis kid start at RT (Hasson)

Good question. As far as finding a descriptor, I would call it a Pro Style Offense. They are a 11- and 12-personnel base, lots of motion and window dressing (similar to McVay with the Rams) to present core concepts, and so many shifts and motions (Shanahan-esque in that regard). Get the ball out quick to the playmakers, and take vertical shots with play action. Nice mix of zone and gap scheme runs, great screen team. Pro Style in the McVay/Shanahan/Lafleur mold.

Porotesano is a very good football player. You can't play as much for a top program like he has and not be. Is he Left Tackle material, meaning, long enough, to play LT for a National Championship contender? Time will tell. Skill and technique are there though.