SAN DIEGO, Calif. — This Saturday's game at San Diego is a homecoming of sorts for Tim Plough, who will take his Aggies into San Diego for the first time as UC Davis' head coach. The San Diego-area native prepped at Ramona High School in the Eastern Inland area of San Diego County about a 45-minute drive from where the Aggies will take on the Toreros on Saturday evening.

Plough considered staying home and attending USD to play baseball but when he decided football would be the sport he would pursue in college and the Toreros were a non-scholarship football school his decision to look elsewhere became easy.

"My parents were teachers and there was not always a lot of money in the house," Plough said about his decision to take a football scholarship at UC Davis in 2004. "It was a goal of mine to help them."

It ended up being a great decision as Plough would become a four-year letterwinner at quarterback for the Aggies (2004-07) then coach nine seasons as an assistant over two stints and eventually return to his current role as the program's head coach in 2024.

Even though Plough has never played or coached for a San Diego team since his high school days, he does have plenty of memories of the games between the Aggies and Toreros. 

The Aggies boast a 9-1 all-time record against San Diego and Plough was involved in each of the first eight as either a player or assistant coach. The Aggies may have a dominating record in the series but it hasn't always been easy.

"There have been close games that have come down to the wire," Plough said before specifically bringing up a 38-35 win in 2019 in San Diego the most recent time Plough was a member of the Aggies' coaching staff for a game against the Toreros. 

He also remembered the lone loss he has suffered in the series, a 28-20 decision in his first campaign coaching in 2008 and a win as a player over a Jim Harbaugh-coached Torero squad in the first-ever meeting between the teams in 2006.

His parents still live in the area and will be in attendance at Saturday night's game, along with his old college roommate and other friends and coaches from the area, and his fond memories of his hometown also run deep.

"I'm from San Diego," Plough said with pride at his press conference on Monday. "You're not going to hear me say anything bad about any of the places down there. It's beautiful. I always say I try to stay down there for short stints of time. If I stay down there too long I'll start asking why did I ever leave."

He's hoping he can stay just long enough this time to share a quick meal with family and friends after a win.

"Hopefully, we can figure out a way to win and I can get a California burrito after the game," Plough said about the version of the classic fare with roots in San Diego that replaces a burrito's standard rice and beans with crispy fried potatoes

With more than a dozen Aggies from the San Diego area on the current roster, he might want to order a few.

• UC Davis leads the all-time series, 9-1, including a current seven-game win streak (2010-22) after a 28-20 Torero victory in San Diego in 2008 that was the Toreros' lone win of the series. The current three-year gap in meetings between the teams is the longest since they did not play for five straight campaigns from 2012-16.
• UC Davis won a pair of games by a field goal in 2007 (49-46) and 2019 (38-35) while their other victories have all been by more than a touchdown.
• The Aggies were a 53-7 winner the last time the teams played in San Diego in 2021 and took home a 43-13 decision in the most recent game between the clubs in 2022 in Davis.

GAME 1 RECAP NOTES - UC DAVIS 31, AT PORTLAND STATE 24 (AUGUST 29, 2026)

• UC Davis scored 31 second-half points to erase a 21-point halftime deficit en route to a 31-24 comeback victory at Portland State in the season and Big Sky opener for both teams at Hillsboro Stadium.
• QB Treynor Cleeland connected with WR Laviel Pickett for the 22-yard game-winning score with 0:27 seconds remaining.
• Cleeland finished his first collegiate start 22-of-39 for 287 yards with two touchdown passes and one interception. In the second half, he was 16-of-21 for 232 yards with both touchdown passes and the pick.
• Cleeland's favorite target was WR Samuel Gbatu Jr., who had team highs of eight receptions and 107 receiving yards for the 10th 100-yard receiving game of his career including seven last season.
• Pickett finished with three receptions for 53 yards, as well as the game-winning touchdown and game-tying two-point conversion catch.
• On the ground, the Aggies went to another preseason All-American in RB Jordan Fisher, who finished with 14 rushes for a game-high 65 yards and his two third-quarter scores. 
• DB Hayden John, LB Porter Conors and DB Drew Cofield co-led the winners with eight tackles and Cofield also caught the Hail Mary out of bounds on the game's final play. Jaden Few contributed six tackles, as well as 2.5 tackles for loss (-9 yards) and 1.0 sack (-5 yards). The Aggies finished with 7.0 tackles for loss (-18 yards) and 2.0 sacks (-7 yards).
• RET Zach Jones had four kick returns for 116 yards despite having a touchdown on a kick return called back. He also had an apparent long punt return nullified by a penalty.
• The Aggie offense gave up just a single sack for 11 yards.
• The game marked the earliest the Aggies had ever played a conference game.

PLOUGH ON GAME 1 WIN
"I can't say enough about these kids, how hard they work, and the belief they had. It's pretty special. You've got to find a way to win road games, you've got to find a way to win weird games on the road. To find a way to win this early in the season and get a conference win when a lot of teams would have shut it down, I think it speaks to our program, strength and conditioning, staff, players, everybody involved. That's the magic of Aggie pride."

MORE ON THE 2026 AGGIES

• UC Davis is currently No. 6 in the AFCA FCS Coaches Poll, which is the highest the Aggies have been ranked since the 2019 preseason when they were No. 5.
• UC Davis has six players on its roster who earned preseason All-American honors in DB Drew Cofield, LB Porter Connors, DB Rex Connors, RB Jordan Fisher, WR Samuel Gbatu Jr. and TE Winston Williams.
• Each of the team's preseason All-Americans also earned All-Big Sky recognition prior to the 2026 campaign, along with DL Trent Carrade, OL Zaier Collier, P Dylan Mauro and DL Rayne Mayo Jr. to give the Aggies a total of 10 preseason All-Big Sky picks.
• Gbatu Jr. (Water Payton Award) and Rex Connors (Buck Buchanan Award) are on preseason watch lists honoring the top offensive and defensive players in the FCS.
• The Aggies have a total of 13 starters (7 offense, 6 defense) and 20 players (12 offense, 8 defense), as well as four specialists from its two-deep of a year ago returning.
• The team returns both a 1,000-yard rusher (Jordan Fisher; 1,141 yards) and 1,000-yard receiver (Samuel Gbatu Jr.; 1,169 yards) from a year ago. The pair combined to get into the end zone 22 times in 2025 with each reaching paydirt on 11 occasions (Gbatu Jr. - 11 TD receptions; Fisher - 8 TD rushing, 3 TD receptions).
• QB Treynor Cleeland, who was named the starter during training camp, got into two games in 2025 (2-4, 26 yards) as the Aggies' third quarterback. UC Davis' 2025 starter was Caden Pinnick, who transferred to Washington State and won the Cougars' starting job in training camp. Grant Harper, who was Pinnick's primary backup a year ago, completed his collegiate eligibility in 2025.
• The Aggies return four players who had more than 30 tackles in 2025 in LB Jackson Sieves (67), DB Rex Connors (45), DB Drew Cofield (36) and LB Sam Goligoski (33). Goligoski was a frequent visitor in opponents' backfields a year ago with 9.5 tackles for loss (-52 yards) and 6.5 sacks (-37 yards) that were both second on the team, while Sievers had 5.5 tackles for loss (-16 yards) and 2.5 sacks (-12 yards), and Cofield picked up 2.0 tackles for loss (-3 yards) and a team-high-tying two interceptions. Sievers also had two forced fumbles and one fumble recovery.
• P Dylan Mauro is back after posting a 44.4 yards per punt average in 2025 as are both of the Aggies' top two kick returners in Zach Jones (8-224, 28.0 ypr) and Samuel Gbatu Jr. (8-146, 18.3 ypr).

ABOUT UC DAVIS ATHLETICS 
UC Davis, ranked No. 2 among public universities by the Wall Street Journal in the value of a college degree, is home to 40,000 undergraduate students and 12,000 employees. Ranked top in the United States in agriculture and forestry as well as No. 1 in veterinary medicine, UC Davis is located in a true California college town nestled between world-class destinations such as the San Francisco Bay Area, Napa Valley and Lake Tahoe. Over 650 Aggie student-athletes compete in 25 Division I varsity sports, with 16 sports transitioning to the Mountain West Conference beginning in 2026–27. 

For more information, visit ucdavisaggies.com/.