Have a feeling they are going to be much improved. They brought a bunch of great players in.
Looking Forward to See Sac State
- Thread starter ILOVETROJANFOOTBALL
- Start date
They were already pretty good the last time we saw them. Big Sky Co-Champs.
But, yes, they should be improved. Hopefully the super long lay off doesn’t hurt them too much.
But, yes, they should be improved. Hopefully the super long lay off doesn’t hurt them too much.
Well, they surely didn’t look very good tonight. I realize they had 91 weeks between games, but still. Dixie State wasn’t very good. A former D2 program playing D1 FCS for the 1st time.
Sac State’s offensive line was atrocious in protection and blocking the DE’s on run plays. The defense was decent, but lots of blown coverages and they were extremely lucky not to surrender 2 long TD’s.
They still don’t put the ball in Elijah Dotson’s hands in space enough. That’s been the case since Taylor took over the program. I’m not sure what the issue or logic is there.
Asher O’Hara can run the ball, but can he sling it? He rarely had time to find out.
UNI fared pretty good against Iowa State today. Without some major improvement, it may be a really bad week next week.
And Montana beat UW today.
The Hornet team I saw tonight couldn’t compete with either UNI or UM. Hope that changes.
IDK what’s up with the new high level talent Taylor and Co. brought in. I didn’t see Ariel Ngata or Deshawn Lynch play a snap, among others.
Sac State’s offensive line was atrocious in protection and blocking the DE’s on run plays. The defense was decent, but lots of blown coverages and they were extremely lucky not to surrender 2 long TD’s.
They still don’t put the ball in Elijah Dotson’s hands in space enough. That’s been the case since Taylor took over the program. I’m not sure what the issue or logic is there.
Asher O’Hara can run the ball, but can he sling it? He rarely had time to find out.
UNI fared pretty good against Iowa State today. Without some major improvement, it may be a really bad week next week.
And Montana beat UW today.
The Hornet team I saw tonight couldn’t compete with either UNI or UM. Hope that changes.
IDK what’s up with the new high level talent Taylor and Co. brought in. I didn’t see Ariel Ngata or Deshawn Lynch play a snap, among others.
I think you also have to take into account the familiarity between Taylor and Dixie St HC. Dixie St HC was the DC on the same staff as Taylor in the past. Dixie State had a year to prepare for Sac St offense who was repping 3 qbs (2 new) all off season.
Dixie St also has a ton of SJS kids.
Dixie St also has a ton of SJS kids.
Dixie St. brought a ton of blitzes of all varieties vs Sac St. New qb, and ol. Hard to pick up all that vs an aggressive Defense in your 1st game.
O'Hara missed Dotson twice on a wheel route off of their pin n pull package that could have blown the game open.
I thought Sac St was in control all game. Not to mention the Dixie St qb playing like superman, avoiding huge losses only to turn into big 1st downs.
O'Hara missed Dotson twice on a wheel route off of their pin n pull package that could have blown the game open.
I thought Sac St was in control all game. Not to mention the Dixie St qb playing like superman, avoiding huge losses only to turn into big 1st downs.
I certainly did take Paul Peterson into account. Still doesn’t matter IMO. Sac State has superior talent. And also had equal time to prepare for a familiar face.
The offensive line was horrible most the game unless it was straight ahead power blocking. They were super slow with their pulls and the coaches didn’t seem to make great scheme adjustments through out the game.
Yes, you’re spot on about the throws to Dotson — but Dixie State also missed two easy TD throws on blown coverages over the top.
As for Dixie’s QB, he was pretty much helpless when pressured from the edges. He was a sitting duck. When they pressured up the middle and allowed him to escape outside, he made some nice plays. But on the whole he wasn’t very mobile or elusive.
I do recall one play where they countered with a beautifully blocked QB draw to combat the edge pressure Sac State was hurting them with.
I’m a big Troy Taylor fan, but I didn’t feel he or Kris Richardson were very sharp in this one. Andy Thompson does wonders with what he has defensively, but they still have issues on the back end.
I hope we get a look at Kaiden Bennett in the next game or two. Asher O’Hara looks like he might be a player, but Jake Dunniway is average at best IMO.
Bumping this thread for obvious reasons.
Congrats to Coach Taylor and Richardson for building the foundation of a very good program.
The first 65 years of SAC’s history, they won 3 conference titles but now have won 2 in the past 3 seasons (they opted out of 2020 of course).
This 2021 BSC title was won outright. 8-0 conference record with wins over Montana in Missoula and UC Davis on their home turf.
I hope they perform well in the postseason, but it’s been a helluva turnaround already regardless. From 0-8 in conference play in 2018 to 15-1 the past 2 seasons they’ve played. Undefeated on the road in FCS play.
The Hornets have a lot of talent on both sides of the ball. Hopefully neither Coach Taylor or DC Andy Thompson are lured away anytime soon.
Congrats to Coach Taylor and Richardson for building the foundation of a very good program.
The first 65 years of SAC’s history, they won 3 conference titles but now have won 2 in the past 3 seasons (they opted out of 2020 of course).
This 2021 BSC title was won outright. 8-0 conference record with wins over Montana in Missoula and UC Davis on their home turf.
I hope they perform well in the postseason, but it’s been a helluva turnaround already regardless. From 0-8 in conference play in 2018 to 15-1 the past 2 seasons they’ve played. Undefeated on the road in FCS play.
The Hornets have a lot of talent on both sides of the ball. Hopefully neither Coach Taylor or DC Andy Thompson are lured away anytime soon.
Last edited:
Enjoy the Troy Taylor era at Sac State, with the success that follows him, this poster is guessing its gonna be a short one.
StingersUp
StingersUp
Congrats to the Hornets! It’s nice to see the entire Big Sky conference get the love and respect it deserves
Others have said the same. Maybe so.
But since Taylor accepted a substantial pay cut to come back home and since his values seem to be more about family, friends and love than anything else, I’m hoping he‘s more interested in the challenge of building up a program like Dan Hawkins and Chris Petersen did at Boise or Jim Sweeney and Pat Hill did at Fresno State rather than just being the next link in the chain for an already established program/university.
I suppose the big test will be if CAL fires their current HC then makes a call to Taylor. Obviously that’s his alma mater, so it’d be naive to believe he wouldn’t have a lot of interest.
But if it were me, I’d prefer the challenge of transforming Sac State into a relevant program that could ascend to FBS rather than coaching at Berkeley where I don’t ever see them being a top PAC12 program consistently.
IMO that program/university will forever be in Stanford’s shadow in the Bay area and won’t ever be able recruit the amount of athletes/talent needed to compete with Oregon, USC (when they right that ship), and probably even UCLA. I believe they are destined to be a middling program in the PAC12. I don’t see growth potential. They are as high as they’ll ever go
Meanwhile SAC has nowhere to go but up and has a ton of room for growth. Any coach that builds that program into a perennial winner, gets new facilities built and pushes them into FBS will really have accomplished something. SAC is a top 20 media market and the nearest FBS competitors are 2 hours away so maintaining it after it’s built could be a lot easier. There’s less competition close by and it’s located in the middle of a recruiting hotbed. Give the local kids more of a reason to play in front of their family and friends and not leave home.
But that’s just me. Most others are motivated by other factors. I just hope Troy Taylor isn’t one of them.
Cal isn’t firing Wilcox but he may take the UW job which would open the Cal job
$ometime$ there are A LOT of rea$on$ out there that guide deci$ion$ that aren’t necce$arily our preference$.
😜
$$$ isn’t everything. After all, it can’t buy a second of time or ensure happiness.
Look at someone like Bob Ladouceur as an example, who had many offers to coach up and make a lot more money.
Those that are well-balanced and content inside and know what makes them truly happy don’t ever have to be a $lave to those other reason$ and never make decision$ ba$ed upon them.
Didn’t sac state pony up pretty big money for Taylor relative to other big sky coaches? I want to say he’s in the 350-400k range which I know is peanuts compared to what he could be making but that is good money in Sacramento and as others have stated it’s not about the money. Quality of life, family, and community are huge factors. Cal is a real challenging climate to traverse and finances are not ideal. Certainly hope he stays and I think he will but I would imagine his phone is buzzing big time.
Taylor’s salary at Sac State is $240k not horrible by Big Sky standards
Everybody has their reasons to take a job or decline a job. For me, if you are in a situation that you are well supported and have access to players that fit your program, that would be hard to give up.
That should be enough for family to live comfortably in exclusive suburbs like Folsom or El Dorado Hills, or of course a 3000+Sq tract home closer to Sac St. I’m not sure where he lives or the ages of his children or if wife works as well. I know Tim Walsh stayed at Big Sky foe Cal Poly for many years and made a good salary and lived in an upscale suburb, him and his wife become part of the community. He had some good teams too, until the last few years. Since he left they haven’t been good either.
At the end of his career Walsh was making around $250k, but he was also very tenured. I doubt he had to pay for many rounds of golf. 😎 The cost of living on the central coast is significantly more than the Sacramento area. Walsh’s replacement Beau Baldwin also makes about $250k, so that makes Taylor’s salary even more attractive. Former Cal Poly assistant coach Aristotle Thompson is now the running backs coach at Cal and surely makes more than Taylor or Baldwin.
Last edited:
Taylor can also make up to $100,000 in performance-based bonuses such as winning a national championship, being named coach of the year or academic success. I believe winning the Big Sky also nets him something extra.
In 2019 he accomplished at least 2 of those incentives, so he very well may have made well over 300K and may do so again this season.
According to the SACBEE former men’s basketball coach Brian Katz was the highest paid non-administrative employee at around $286K.
If they could pay Katz that amount, it shouldn’t be a problem raising Taylor’s salary above that amount, especially considering the recent success of the football program.
Get that salary closer to up over 300-350K before incentives and maybe it’ll help to keep him longer. Obviously that is peanuts compared to what CAL can offer, but if it’s enough to live rather comfortably it could help keep someone not overly motivated by $$$.
Taylor was making 525K at Utah before incentives, so he clearly isn’t solely motivated by the $$$.
I actually think Taylor is more incentivized by accomplishments and proving what he can do, even more than the money. $300k is truly peanuts compared to what he could make at a Power 5, or even a west coast Mid-major. I know some close with the school, the program, and his staff, and from what i can tell, he is a “shoot for the stars“ type. I simply don’t think he’ll be satisfied in the long run as a FCS Head Coach, no matter how successful.
Hope I’m wrong….but I’d bet I’m right.
Hope I’m wrong….but I’d bet I’m right.
Last edited:
Yeah, I couldn’t believe it either. But it’s true. Probably because Katz had been around for a long while and the basketball program won 21 games that one season. Still, he was drastically overpaid based off accomplishments and also when compared to Taylor.
Hopefully with Katz retired now they can reallocate some of that $$$ and give Taylor a much deserved raise and show they really value and want to keep him.
If I was Mark Orr that’s what I’d be doing ASAP
Last edited:
I agree that his motivations are different. I think he showed that taking a near 300K pay cut to come back home. Sure, it was for a head coaching gig that could lead to another HC gig — but there were other higher paid paths available working toward the same goal.
I think he may very well be the type more interested in building something from scratch and being a catalyst than just another spoke in the wheel.
Making CAL relevant certainly wouldn’t be easy and would be a nice accomplishment, but it would be much more of an accomplishment to turn SAC STATE into the next Fresno or Boise.
Transforming the Hornets into a consistent winner is step 1. Step 2 is getting facilities built/upgraded and making the move up to FBS.
I’m hoping those are the types of stars he’d like to shoot for.
FWIW, he has been quoted as recently as the end of his 1st season as Hornets coach saying the following:
Attitudes and goals can change over time, of course. The CAL job officially becoming available and offered might change things too. But he has at least said and done things indicating that his desires may be a bit different from most others.
Last edited:
I like the Fresno state comparison TR. Dream big. Success yields a lot of positive things.
I believe Head Coaches are all wired a little differently. You look at Urban Meyer who stepped up from program to program with a lot of success along the way and some national championships. I am sure he had a nice house and stable job at Bowling Green, but he wanted more; more money, more success, more challenges. As mentioned earlier Bob Ladouceur never left a program he built.
I don't know Taylor at all, but my guess since he already went from a top high school program (that he built) to college, is the he too will eventually want more. And if a bigger program comes calling he will listen. I know he is saying all the right things now, but Nick Saban was never going to leave the Dolphins either.
www.espn.com
I don't know Taylor at all, but my guess since he already went from a top high school program (that he built) to college, is the he too will eventually want more. And if a bigger program comes calling he will listen. I know he is saying all the right things now, but Nick Saban was never going to leave the Dolphins either.
Saban: 'I'm not going to be the Alabama coach'
Nick Saban again adamantly denied that he's headed back to the college ranks, denouncing rumors that he is interested in the Alabama coaching job.
It can be done. Coastal Carolina did not even have a football program until 2003. They moved up to FBS in 2017, and have been a top 25 team the last couple of years.
will be interesting to see how they do once Chadwell moves on they have had 1.5 good years under his watch, the real telling thing will be if they sustain it down the line with the next coach
In writing my last reply, I had a sneaking suspicion someone would invariably bring this up. As a longtime suffering Dolphins fan don’t me started on Nick Saban and his BS. Lol.
Seriously, isn’t he an outlier? How many coaches have you ever heard make similar denials while being so indignant and defiant about it to then do exactly the opposite of what he said mere days later?
Most are very hush hush and don’t make comments in one direction or the other. They keep things close to the vest.
In this case, Taylor has definitely made comments committing to a particular direction rather than being noncommittal about it.
That tells me he’s really thinking and leaning that way. It doesn’t mean things can’t change. But I definitely don’t see shades of Nick Saban in how he conducts himself.
Without knowing Troy (only met him once), I kinda agree with something I read recently that postulated that the only job Troy might leave SAC for is CAL. It’s relatively close by and is his alma mater. But beyond that gig, it’s my understanding his family didn’t like going to Washington or Utah and that played a part in returning to SAC.
And I’m still not convinced he’s gonna leave SAC ST for even CAL until he’s really laid down a foundation and accomplished something. As he said himself, that takes time. 2 seasons ain’t that.
We shall see, I suppose.
Last edited:
In his first season, he took a 2-8 football team and won a share of the Big Sky conference. In his second season, he won the conference outright. That's the kind of trajectory that gets noticed. There are a ton of FBS head coaching openings, possibly 5 within the Pac12 alone. Understand he is not doing it for the money, but when the $$$ are 10x his annual salary it can influence decision making.
Of course it’s doing something. No doubt.
But in terms of drastically transforming a program, one or two seasons of success isn’t really doing anything.
Using HS football as an example and what Taylor and Richardson accomplished at Folsom, if they had all departed circa 2012 or 2013 after just a couple seasons of success — would Folsom had been transformed into the area power they’ve become?
Prior to 2009/10 Folsom wasn’t known as anything but the small school program it used to be and never talked about among the premier programs in the area. They weren’t attracting kids from outside the area as they do now.
Same thing will happen to SAC ST if what’s happening with the program now doesn’t continue for the next 5+ years. As Taylor acknowledged “those things take time”.
That’s where my line of thinking was when I was talking about accomplishing something. The long term transformational change.
I hear ya. Can’t argue against any of what you said. Perhaps he will fall in line with the majority in his profession. I’m just hopeful based upon his past actions and somewhat recent comments that he’ll fall more in line with a Bob Ladouceur — who is clearly an outlier.
Here comes the possible first test to Taylor’s commitment to Sac State.
Kalen DeBoer was making 4-5x Taylor’s base salary this season, Taylor will be on the shortlist if he wants to be.
Kalen DeBoer was making 4-5x Taylor’s base salary this season, Taylor will be on the shortlist if he wants to be.
Last edited:
Maybe I’m wrong, but I don’t see it as a test at all.
Based upon Taylor already leaving a much higher paid position than the one he’s got now and both his past and recent comments regarding outside interest, I just don’t see Taylor leaving for an FBS program that’s not in a P5 conference.
As for P5 programs aside from CAL, I don’t see any of them willing (or able to convince their boosters) to hire someone that only has 2 years success coaching an FCS program. It took much longer for North Dakota State’s 2 previous coaches to move up and they won 7 Nat’l titles between them.
However CAL has a special connection to Taylor thus just might be more motivated to hire the FCS coach. And could sell the hire to boosters much more easily than elsewhere.
DeBoer taking the UW job seems important as it had been rumored that Cal’s current HC Justin Wilcox might take that job thereby opening the Cal gig.
I’m of the strong the belief CAL that is the potential opening Hornets fan should be most concerned about. As long as Wilcox stays put, I think Taylor stays put (he may regardless).
With regard to the Fresno gig, it’s not P5 — and also based off his previous and recent comments — I think he believes he can transform SAC into Fresno, which means he’d eventually have the same job and not have to leave home for it.
Like anything, we shall see.
Based on the past few years the gap between the group of five and the power five continues to narrow especially regarding the Mountain West, soon to be WAC. No doubt Taylor has done a great job at Sac but there’s plenty of work to be done to be considered one of the best in the FCS and this weekend’s game against MVFC South Dakota State will be a big test.
Yes there is. Taylor‘s team has yet to win a playoff game and SDST is no easy task.
In fact , they are better than the Austin Peay team the Hornets faced last postseason. SAC‘s top 3 offensive players were out or limited that game, which surely affected their performance that evening, but no excuses this time. Hopefully Pierre Williams is good to go, as he’s the only major question mark I’m aware of.
SAC is the home team but will likely be the underdog. The Jackrabbits are really good. A W over SDST would be a benchmark win for Taylor and his program.
Hopefully they find a way to get it done.
I’ll be rooting for Sac State in this game. SDSU can be beaten. By far the biggest win of my son’s time at Cal Poly was at SDSU his redshirt freshman year. The Mustangs went in there and beat the #7 ranked Jackrabbits 42-35. CP rolled up 442 yards rushing and 161 passing by Dano Graves Including a TD pass. Local legend Joe Protheroe was a man among boys that night!
