And our defense?

4-2 Nickel I guess since they tend to play with 3 Safeties out there. They list one DE as a LB, but it's a 4-down structure at the end of the day. Those dudes never really drop except on rare occasions from what I saw. I would like to see more 4-3 maybe, or 5-down against the heavier, 12 Personnel looks they see in conference play. Hopefully MSU and Illinois State taught them that lesson

How is this different than West Coast? WCO more short yardage, ball control?

Illinois State? We were really banged up.

Cleeland and Kollock are built like brick houses. — Pacifico2

Cleeland as QB1 is exciting. I mentioned while watching the scrimmage I attended that he was way faster than I anticipated. He is indeed built like his dad. These Cleeland boys are big, tough dudes.

If he has a firm grasp of what to do out there on every play, we are going to be in business. I have another hunch....we aren't going to miss Pinnick at all.

*edit* I'm not knocking Pinnick. He's a tremendous talent.

Traditional West Coast Offense is 21 Personnel, use of an outstanding, pass catching Fullback rather than a 3rd receiver. Think 80s 49ers. Roger Craig was a college fullback turned tailback. Rathman in the 90s (pure FB). If you hunt down any Bill Walsh play diagrams online, you'll see the Fullback and the Tight End are huge in that offiense.

The West Coast was an offshoot of Paul Brown's great offenses of yesteryear. Walsh gives him the credit, along with Don Coryell. As I've studied the game, what is known today as the Air Raid (Mumme, Leach, Kingsbury, Lincoln Riley) is actually the West Coast from 10/11 personnel with the QB in the shotgun. Leach was greatly influenced by Walsh and the West Coast guys at BYU, he just didn't have Fullbacks and Tight Ends when he started calling his own plays so he evolved. At least this is how I understand it.

I have another hunch....we aren't going to miss Pinnick at all. — SochorField

Trial by fire for Pinnick:

I'm calling a 4-win season for the Cougs: Duquesne, Utah State, SDSU, and Colorado State. Huskies and K-State in back-to-back road games in incredibly difficult places to win may influence the story of the entire '26 season.

From the local stories, WSUs defense is impressive, and they have offensive weapons. They seem to be picked to be middle of the conference. Why are you so down on SDSU?

Does anyone have a depth chart or well informed best guess of what the defense will look lik?

Game notes posted
https://ucdavisaggies.com/documents/2026/8/25/26FBGameNotesvsPortlandState.pdf
Depth chart near end page 37

This years defense features 12 positions on defense. I think they’ll be varying the number of players at each level as Pacifico2 hoped.
Some true freshmen on the depth chart. Backup center, backup cornerback, backup safety and maybe a starting nickel back and a kick returner

Thanks for the link! It’s decided that Treynor Cleeland is our starting quarterback now? Page 5

This forum has known for a few days, apparently it was announced to the team, but I think this game note is the first public “announcement”

Matteo Perez is the RB2 over Chauncey Sylvester?

Tyler Hennessy also WR2 over Zach jones, ladanian streets and laviel Pickett?

Thanks for the clarification! I must have missed that. I’m excited to see him play.

i wouldn’t read to much into the wide receiver order. Much of the time we have three on the field.
Plough was excited about Boogie Sylvester, in yesterdays press conference.. By the way Sylvester ran for 136 yards against Portland last year.

They ran qb trap with Pinnick out of the gun. Even at UW which was really playing with fire. They also had a lot of boot options so the designed qb run game did exist. His legs and ability to extend drives was the reason behind that late season surge with a defense that was banged up and couldn’t stop anyone.

Thanks for the insight on the QB trap, that is absolutely playing with fire but they must have seen something in a formation they liked. I agree that the QB run is an option in boot concepts, absolutely. Most of the play action I witnessed was pull protection stuff in the pocket. He would get outside with a TE or WR bluffing or on a quick flat route, which would be the first read. Moving the QB and varying launch points is good football in my opinion

Soch often had small TEs. Did he recruit much?

Young linemen on depth chart.
Braiden McKenna, an OL who committed in May of this year is tied for 2nd on the depth chart at center with Roice Cleeland. Quite impressive. Suspect he might be a walk-on as his commitment wasn’t mentioned by the school
Jace Denning, a 2025 walk-on, is 2nd on the depth chart at left tackle

Back in those days, the TE was essentially an extra Tackle. If they were undersized and catching passes they were sort of outliers. I remember the Biggs-era having some longer, athletic Tight Ends ahead of today's curve. Guys they would send vertical at times, which in the 1990s-2000s was very unique.

I recall Chris Sinnett, maybe 175 pounds.

Jeez that's small! What year would that have been?

Sochor’s teams were different between early and late in his tenure. In 1972 Davis has a standout tight end/fullback who had to retire do to a series of concussions. I don't know his size but i remember Davis had a 210 or 220 lb starting guard, who didn’t lift weights but swam for training. 240 lb tackles at most.

God bless the fullbacks with their concussions out there, they were a breed apart. I found it funny as the Spread evolved to 11/12 personnel groupings and coaches tried to get 6'4"-6'6" Tight Ends to do the Fullback's job. Those fools would crumple and fold

The defense was sick that game and the team had limited bodies.

It wasn’t a one game issue. Teams deviated from their normal game plan to run on Davis. Example, Rhode Island hardly ran at all against Central Connecticut, 82 yards but had 173 against Davis. Sac, who won their previous game against idaho by passing chose to run almost exclusively against Davis. Davis had a big flashing vulnerability and teams played accordingly.

So how's our projected run defense now?

Again the team was lacking bodies. There is no strategy when you do not have the bodies to stop the run. The line is much better depth wise. Let’s see how the schemes work now.