As the season went on, the UC Davis defense got better.

The Aggies did not always get rewarded in the win column for their defensive effort, but they did in Saturday's season finale against Sacramento State.

The Aggies' defense did not allow the Hornets' offense a touchdown until the final play, and UC Davis came away with a 23-19 victory in the Causeway Classic in front of an announced crowd of 12,874 at Hornet Stadium.

Colton Silveria rushed for 170 yards and a touchdown, and Sean Kelley made three field goals as UC Davis (4-7) took a 41-18 lead in the rivalry.

The Aggies held the Hornets' offense in check most of the way. They only had trouble keeping quarterback Garrett Safron from rushing for 93 yards, including a 30-yard touchdown as time expired. Sac State (4-7) ran for 114 yards.

Safron completed 11 of 31 passes for 155 yards and was sacked three times.

"What's been frustrating this year is we haven't come out and started fast," said Aggies strong safety Byron Gruendl, who had a team-high nine tackles and forced a fumble. "In this game – for the past couple games – we came out and set the tempo early, and we were fortunate enough to keep them out of the end zone until the last play."

Sac State's other touchdown came from its defense when lineman Ben Cowger forced UC Davis quarterback Randy Wright to fumble on an end-zone sack and recovered the ball with 10:34 left in the first half.

Instead of a two-point conversion try, as Sac State coach Marshall Sperbeck has wont to do, Jason Diniz kicked the point-after touchdown to give the Hornets a 10-3 lead.

Wright took the blame for the play and credited his team's defense for leading the way to the win. He completed 14 of 23 passes for 171 yards.

"We didn't want to put our defense in a bad position," Wright said. "They played their butts off. They only gave up six points, so that speaks for itself."

Silveria gave the Aggies the lead for good, 17-13, on a one-yard touchdown run with 7:34 left in the third quarter.

A 66-yard run by Silveria set up a 23-yard field goal by Kelley that put UC Davis ahead 23-13 with 1:22 to play.

The Aggies struggled with their running game for much of the year, but Silveria sparked them Saturday with 54 of their 71 first-half rushing yards. That carried into the second half, and UC Davis rushed for a season-best 206 yards.

"When we started off, we were doing a lot of things right," Silveria said. "The O-line, they were blocking really, really well. All I can do is run behind them."

Sperbeck said the offensive inconsistencies of both teams made it a defense-dominated game. The teams combined to punt six times in the opening quarter and 14 times overall.

"Both defenses have played well to the tail end of the season, and both offenses have struggled," Sperbeck said. "I know we certainly have had better offensive days. We haven't had good consistency."

Gruendl said the Aggies were prepared for whoever the Hornets started at quarterback. Jeff Fleming did not play for the second straight game because of a concussion. With Safron starting, the Aggies expected him to run, and when he threw, they figured he would key on wide receivers Brandyn Reed and Morris Norrise.

Reed and Norrise combined for nine catches for 148 yards but were kept out of the end zone.

"Those guys are really good receivers, and our DBs did a great job all day long of defending the pass," Gruendl said.

© Copyright The Sacramento Bee. All rights reserved.