Mountain West Conference play has proven the great equalizer for San Diego State University’s football team.
The Aztecs started the non-conference portion of their schedule 1-3 but are now 2-0 in MW play following identical 27-24 victories against Hawaii (Oct. 5) and Wyoming (last Saturday). Moreover, both conference wins came in late come-from-behind fashion.
SDSU (3-3) enters a bye week to regroup even further before it engages Washington State in a final non-conference match-up on Oct. 26 to celebrate homecoming.
The Aztecs return to MW play on Nov. 1 at longtime MW power Boise State, then host New Mexico on Nov. 8 to cap Fleet Week. Road games follow Nov. 16 at UNLV and Nov. 23 at Utah State before closing with a home game against Air Force on Nov. 30.
There’s plenty of time to mature offensively and defensively to reach the MW championship game in early December.
“It’s good to be back home after a nice road win and sitting in a good position at 2-0 in conference play,” SDSU head coach Sean Lewis said. “I’m really proud of the team and the effort we put forth. It was a complete team effort with getting points defensively — any time that you get an opportunity to do that greatly increases your chance of winning.
“Obviously, there’s opportunities to get better, but finding ways to make plays in all three phases of the game. It was a really good team effort where we were met with some adversity in all phases of the game, but the guys responded. And that’s the beauty of this sport. It’s a lot like life. You’re going to be met with some adversity and you have to persevere; you have to persist through and you’ll find ways to have success.
“There are guys that are doing great jobs that don’t necessarily show up in the stat sheet, but, you know, lead to those wins. We have so many guys in the locker room that are just unbelievable teammates and are embracing their jobs and their roles and what we’re asking them to do so that they can help the team win. And that’s what we got done up there. It was a great team win, overall effort, and I’m pleased to where we are as we sit in the bye here.”
Quarterback Danny O’Neil (Indianapolis) earned MW Freshman of the Week honors for the second consecutive week by passing for a career high 254 yards in leading the visitors to back-to-back scoring drives in the fourth quarter capped by a 28-yard field goal by junior Gabe Plascencia (Oakland).
In five career games, O’Neil has accumulated 1,045 passing yards and six touchdowns.
Eastlake High School alumnus Trey White continues to rack up defensive points with two sacks to give him 11 in six games to threaten both the SDSU and FBS record for most sacks in a single season. The Aztec record is 21 set by Mike Douglas in 1976. Brett Faryniarz (1987) is second on the list at 13.
His 1.83 sacks per game is just ahead of NCAA record pace. On the season, White has logged 32 tackles (second on the team) with 24 solo stops.
O’Neil tied the game, 24-24, on a 27-yard scoring pass to Fontana freshman Jordan Napier (four catches, 91 yards) with 13:54 left.
Holiday Bowl slated Dec. 27 at Snapdragon
The DIRECTV Holiday Bowl is moving to Snapdragon Stadium after a two-year stay at Petco Park. The sightlines expect to be more football friendly while the competition should remain top-notch with participating teams from the Pac-12 Conference and Atlantic Coast Conference set for a Dec. 27 get-together at 5 p.m.
The Pac-12 will retain its existing bowl partnerships for the 2024 and 2025 football seasons despite the near wholesale breakup of conferences across the face of college football.
Among the current and former Pac-12 teams, the Holiday Bowl will share the second selection after the College Football Playoff with the SRS Distribution Las Vegas Bowl. The Holiday Bowl will continue to host a top tier team from the ACC.
“The DIRECTV Holiday Bowl is excited to be able to make this announcement,” said Mark Neville, CEO of Sports San Diego, the group that organizes the annual bowl game. “This is absolutely what is best for our bowl game, the San Diego community, and for the entire bowl system. We look forward to staging one of the nation’s premier bowl matchups at Snapdragon Stadium this December.”
The 101.5 KGB Sky Show will follow the game for the third consecutive year.
Last year USC defeated Louisville 42-28 before a crowd of 35,317 at Petco Park.
Petco Park hosted the Holiday Bowl in 2022 and 2023 while the 2021 games was cancelled because of the COVID-19 protocols. Padres CEO Erik Greupner said hosting the event was an “honor.”
“Keeping the game in San Diego at a time when there weren’t any other viable options was vitally important to the Holiday Bowl, our community and local economy,” Greupner said.
The Holiday Bowl made its San Diego debut in 1978 and was played at San Diego Stadium in Mission Valley through 2019.
“The Holiday Bowl is a great event and wonderful San Diego tradition,” Greupner said. “We will continue our promise to be more than a ballpark by hosting world-class concerts and events at Petco Park in the future. We wish the Holiday Bowl many years of successful and exciting games at their new venue.”
“The DIRECTV Holiday Bowl had a great run at Petco Park, and we are so appreciative to the San Diego Padres for being tremendous hosts,” Neville said. “The Holiday Bowl is an important event for San Diego, and the Padres were there for us when SDCCU Stadium was razed. Petco Park is an incredible venue, one for which our community is lucky to have.”
In 2024 DIRECTV Holiday Bowl fans will have the opportunity to enjoy several days of bowl game events that include the Snapdragon Bowl Bash — a downtown San Diego Street party, and the Port of San Diego Holiday Bowl Parade presented by Kaiser Permanente.
The Oregon Ducks topped North Carolina Tar Heels, 28-27, to win the 2022 Holiday Bowl game in front of 36,242 fans. UCLA’s last-minute withdrawal caused the cancellation of the 2021 contest against the North Carolina State Wolfpack.
SDSU evolving with changing face of college football
The face of college football in 2024 is vastly different following the breakup of several conferences, most notably the Pac-12.
USC, UCLA, Oregon, and Washington have decided to pull out of the Pac-12 and instead migrate cross country to the Big Ten while and Colorado, Arizona, Arizona State and Utah have chosen to land in the Big 12.
Then news broke that Cal and Stanford would be going to the Atlantic Coast Conference in 2024. That leaves just two teams left in the Pac-12: Oregon State and Washington State.
New horizons
Oregon State and Washington State have officially made a scheduling deal with the Mountain West for this season. This year’s matchups will not count in the MW standings and neither former Pac-12 team will be eligible for the MW championship.
MW teams will play seven games against league opponents with another against either OSU or WSU. SDSU will play both, meeting Washington State on Oct. 26 at Snapdragon Stadium, 7:30 p.m. kickoff.
A merger between the MW and the two former Pac-12 schools remained a possibility prior to the start of this season, and it became a reality in a sense on Sept. 12 when the Pac-12 announced it had added five MW schools to its roster, at least becoming for now the “Pac-7.”
The Pac-12 needs one more member (eight total) to be considered an autonomous conference by the NCAA.
It’s unknown how many more schools will become expansion members.
The newest members of the Pac-12 include SDSU, Boise State, Colorado State, Utah State and Fresno State. They will play out the current MW season and the 2025 season before becoming full members of the storied conference on July 1, 2026. The Aztecs will not play a Pac-12 schedule until 2026.
It’s a blockbuster move for SDSU as it joins a nationally recognized brand.
“I’m thrilled for San Diego State, our fans, our alumni and our donors,” SDSU director of athletics John David Wicker said. “We’ve worked hard for this, and we have invested in San Diego State, our institution has invested … This has obviously been (in development) over a number of years.
“I think that the key to this is constantly improving yourself. We always want to not just look at the short term, but what is going to be the potential long-term gain. We think this move is going to give us the best opportunity as you look at revenue generation and cultural payoff in NCAA basketball and all the other sports. I think something that gets lost with people is the Pac-12 enterprises, the network, is a massive asset that’s sitting there. It was, quite frankly, a big reason why we considered this. As you look at the opportunities: one, what you can do on campus with that, but two, the revenue streams that it can potentially generate down the road. We look at this as that next step forward. It may not be the step that we looked at last year, but this is definitely a step forward for San Diego State.
“We’re willing to make the investment to be at the highest level that we possibly can.”
Besides the obvious financial windfall, athletic recruiting takes a major leap forward. That should have an impact while still a MW member.
Wicker said SDSU will compete for MW championships over the next two seasons before finally ending its MW tenure.
“We have two years left in the Mountain West Conference, we play for Mountain West Conference championships, and we’re going to do that over the next two years,” Wicker said. “We’ve had great success in the conference. We’re the all-time leader in championships. We’ve been the leader each of the last three years.”
Meanwhile, MW membership drops to seven teams, needing another team to reach eight schools.
Movement may just be starting.
