Follow UC Davis: Twitter |  Instagram  |  Facebook

Purchase season tickets, UC Davis Children's Hospital Family Pack, or a Mini Plan

UC Davis football is not even a week into summer camp and the emerging storylines for the 2019  season are compelling.

As work continues on the new practice facility at the north end of the newly named UC Davis Health Stadium, a different kind of work on nearby Jim Sochor Field is getting serious.

On Friday, head coach Dan Hawkins greeted 100 new and returning Aggies. Two-a-day practices consisting of walk-throughs and regular workouts are off to a dazzling start. Hawkins is delighted that his squad — which returns 16 starters from the school's most prolific Division I campaign — seems hale and hardy.

While players reacquaint themselves with Aggie basics, Hawkins promises plenty of wrinkles and surprises during another campaign in which the locals should be among the nation's most potent offenses.

After going 10-3, sharing the Big Sky Conference crown, winning a playoff game and coming with 90 seconds of advancing to the Final Four, the Aggie cat is out of the bag.

Just this week, STATS FCS preseason poll ranked UC Davis at No. 5, which followed HERO Sports' preseason No. 3-ranking for UC Davis. 

Earlier, quarterback Jake Maier was named to the Walter Payton Award watch list. Last month, Maier had been picked as a first-team All-American by both HERO Sports and Athlon. Running back Ulonzo Gilliam earned a place on that Athlon poll, too.

Kicker Daniel Whelan was assigned to the Augusta Sports Council Punter of the Year watch list. Both Maier and wide receiver Jared Harrell were voted to the conference preseason first team by media types.

This embarrassment of riches, all in the hands of Hawkins, the reigning Eddie Robinson Award Coach of the Year, just hints at the excitement ahead.

Here's a closer look at storylines that make the upcoming season one of the most anticipated in the history of UC Davis football:

The schedule
Just down the road, the Aggies open 2019 with an Aug. 31 encounter at Cal. As inviting as that Golden Bears game is, it's just the beginning of an other-worldly 12-game slate that includes five game against STATS FCS-ranked schools. 

After a home-opening tilt with Lehigh on Sept. 14, the Aggies travel to No. 1 North Dakota State the following week. After that non-conference tilt featuring two of the top teams in the nation, the Aggies' Big Sky schedule provides additional matchups fans will love.

Montana, ranked No. 25, visits on Sept. 28; No. 8 Weber State is in town on Oct. 26; and No. 14 Montana State gets a dose of UC Davis Health Stadium on Nov. 16. And then the regular season ends with the Causeway Classic (Nov. 23) at Sacramento State.

Even San Diego (Sept. 7) and North Dakota (Oct. 5) — both on the road — are receiving STATS-poll votes.

Punch your ticket by clicking this link to reserve your seats inside UC Davis Health Stadium. 

Offensive line
It was one of the youngest O-lines in the nation. Turns out, it was one of the most accomplished.

Now juniors, Colton Lamson (Union Mine and Sacramento City College) and Kooper Richardson (Folsom High) join sophomores Connor Pettek (Thousand Oaks High) and Jake Parks (Serra High in Southern California) as four-fifths of a line that did some amazing things in 2018:

• Protected Maier enough for the senior transfer from Long Beach City College to throw for 3,931 yards and 34 touchdowns — while along the way he earned Big Sky Offensive Player of the Year honors.
• Allowed Merced High's Gilliam (976 yards) and Tehran Thomas of Goodyear, Ariz. (686), to help UC Davis gain 2,159 ground yards — including 27 rushing TDs.

Both backs were freshmen a year ago.

Defense
Herein lies, perhaps, the storyline of the year. If the Davis defense can improve this season over last by the same linear measure it did from 2017 to 2018 — watch out, FCS teams, because UC Davis allowed 27.3 points a game in 2018 — almost a touchdown less than the previous season.

Sure, gone are mainstays in linebacker Mason Moe and defensive backs Vincent White and Isiah Olave. But Aggie defensive coordinator Robert Tucker knows the recruiting bounty and returning veterans will bring the wood this fall.

Modesto's Montell Bland (Central Catholic High) and captain Nas Anesi (St. John Bosco High) anchor a still-deep linebacker unit; Erron Duncan (Weston Ranch High), Isaiah Thomas (Chaminade High of Van Nuys), Richmond's Devon King and Jordan Perryman (from Hanford) are on hand to bolster the secondary.

Tucker reports that those injury woes of last season's front line should be a thing of the past — and if this Aggie defense opens the campaign literally loaded for Bear (remember, Saturday, Aug. 31), this could be a season for the ages.

Life after Doss
Whoa, boy. Keelan Doss, the greatest receiver in UC Davis history, is now an Oakland Raider. Gone are his 4,019 career yards and 28 touchdowns. but the cupboard is hardly bare.

"Tight end Wes Preece and Jared Harrell are back, and the evolution of Justin Kraft and Carson Crawford continues. There are just so many of those guys," Hawkins points out.

Maier told us the off-season brought the same diligent work effort to training, spring camp and player-organized workouts.

Rocklin High's Preece, now a senior and the owner of 18 touchdowns in the past two years, is a 6-5, 240-pound tight end who also is on Maier's radar. Harrell, another St. John Bosco product, finished with 896 receiving yards, and found the end zone five times in 2018. Kris Vaughn is another speed demon who figures prominently in the wide-open offense that is expected to come from the Blue-and-Gold.

So, whaddya say? Let's get this party started!

— One of the most well-known and respected sports writers in the industry, former Davis Enterprise sports and managing editor Bruce Gallaudet joined the UC Davis Athletics staff as its feature writer in the summer of 2018. Since then, visitors to UCDavisAggies.com have enjoyed his unique perspective on campus student-athletes, coaches, teams, individuals, programs, events and projects that represent the fifth-ranked public school in the nation.