College football: 69th Causeway Classic more than just a game for Sac State and UC Davis
.jpg "Troy Taylor won his first Causeway Classic as Sacramento State’s head coach when the Hornets beat the UC Davis Aggies in 2019. Old rivals meet again Saturday in the 68th Causeway Classic with a lot on the line for both programs.")
Andy Fiske has experienced both sides of this rivalry. He wore UC Davis colors for five years, shook hands, handed out business cards, shared ideas, including as general manager of UCD sports properties.
Of late, Fiske is neck deep in all things Sacramento State green as the school’s senior associate athletic director. Saturday marks the 69th Causeway Classic between the Aggies and Hornets, and here’s Fiske hustling about like a man on a mission with a good product to sell.
How are those ticket sales going, sir?
“It’s looking good,” Fiske said, in typical good cheer. “I never say it’s a sellout. That’s like saying he’s pitching a no-hitter, but we’re pacing really well.”
The Causeway Classic expects to sell out at 21,195-seat Hornet Stadium for reasons much larger than just old rivals preparing to crash into each other. Both teams have a ton riding in the line.
Sacramento State is ranked second in the FCS, rolling at 10-0. An 11-0 showing would secure a Big Sky Conference championship three-peat and surely would secure a top seed in the FCS playoffs, meaning more home games. The Hornets are coached by a homegrown son in Troy Taylor, and the Cordova High School graduate talks of his players love for the game, for one another. In a sport rooted in violence, this is a refreshing twist with striking results.
UC Davis is ranked 15th nationally and has overcome a 1-4 start amid the most challenging schedule in program history to peel off a five-game winning streak. At stake for the 6-4 Aggies here is a shot to stall momentum for their chief rivals and to jump back into the FCS playoffs for the third time in five seasons, all under coach Dan Hawkins. The fiery coach who goes by “Hawk” is a UCD alum who played fullback on the program’s most accomplished team, the 1982 group that reached the NCAA Division II championship game.
Early this season, Hawkins declared that this Aggies outfit was the best in school history, certainly in terms of overall skill, speed and depth. A win over a 10-0 team ranked second might hammer home that point. And Hawkins also speaks of the love he has for his team and that they have for one another. Hawkins is a big-picture thinker and doer, marveling at tackles who are engineering majors more than winning touchdown drives.
Taylor and Hawkins lead with positive reinforcement, which is the opposite of so much of what college football was about for decades with face-mask grabbing hot heads rampaging the sideline. The approach works. Sacramento State is 22-1 in the Big Sky since Taylor took over. The last time the Hornets lost a Big Sky road game was in 2018, in the oddest Causeway setting of them all. That contest was held in Reno as wildfire smoke in Yolo County made hosting an impossibility. UCD rolled, giving Hawkins and the Aggies their first Big Sky championship.
Taylor took over before the 2019 season, got the Hornets humming in quick order and now oversees the best team in program history.
“We’re playing really well, but we haven’t played our best game yet,” Taylor said.
Hawkins never reached for the panic button after the slow start. Trust the process. Hang in there. The Aggies did, and they’ve looked every bit like a ranked team down the stretch.
“We’re a playoff team,” Hawkins said. “We’ve got to show up and play. I love our guys. I love what we’re doing.”
Biggest Causeway yet?
So, really, might this be the most important Causeway Classic of them all?
It’s certainly up there. Consider this, too: In the history of this rivalry, only twice before have both the Hornets and Aggies been playoff teams at the same time. Just twice. Might this be the third?
In 1988, Sacramento State beat UCD in the Causeway, halting a dreadful 18-game skid to the Aggies dating to 1970. For good measure, the Hornets topped the Aggies in the Division II playoffs. The other time both programs reached the postseason together was in 2021.
Mark Young was part of perhaps the biggest Causeway moment, in 1988, when he scored the game-winning touchdown to lead Sacramento State past UCD 31-28 to halt the 18-game skid. He was recruited out of Sacramento City College by way of Cordova by coach Bob Mattos specifically to give the Hornets a speed element to beat the Aggies. Sacramento State’s 35-14 playoff win over UCD also represented the final game for famed UCD coach Jim Sochor.
Young still watches replays of 1988 regular-season Causeway game. It gives him joy in an otherwise painful year that has included cancer treatments and a stroke — and losing two beloved sisters to heart issues. Last month, Sacramento State honored the 1988 Hornets team with a Hall of Fame induction.
“I was going to go even if I was on my deathbed,” Young said. “It was that important to me. The Causeway’s always been huge. I remember the night before the 1988 game, the third game of the year, and we had a dinner, and old-timers who had never beaten UCD were crying — ‘Kick their butts!’’
“They brought out this old carriage that goes to the winner, and it was dusty, dirty, bird crap all over. This is what we play for? The next day, it was all cleaned up. It was great. It was awesome. It’s taken 34 years for Sac State to have a better team than our 1988 team, and I’m so proud. I’m having the time of my life.”
He added about Mattos and Sochor, both of whom have died, “Those two great coaches would be so tickled about these teams and this game.”
Brutish backs lead the 2022 charge
Sacramento State and UC Davis are led by coaches who appreciate wide-open passing but understand that football is still about the trenches and running the ball.
Ulonzo Gilliam Jr. is a senior from Merced who is UCD’s all-time career rushing leader. He is closing in fast on 6,000 career all-purpose yards. Gilliam’s 40 career rushing touchdowns are an Aggies record, and he’s coming off a 164-yard, three-touchdown effort at Idaho to earn national FCS Offensive Player of the Week honors.
Hawkins has raved about Gilliam’s ability, humble nature, and that he is a three-time captain, voted on by teammates. Gilliam enters his final Causeway Classic with 1,132 rushing yards and 12 touchdowns, though all he will say about it is that there’s more work to be done.
While Gilliam is winding down his college career, Cameron Skattebo of Sacramento State is just now hitting his stride. The sophomore running back from Rio Linda leads the Big Sky in rushing with 1,154 yards. He does it all: run, block and catch, and he craves contact. So he stiff-arms guys, hurdles guys, and runs over guys.
John Volek coached in his share of Causeway Classics when he led the Hornets from 1995-2002, and he knows a good back when he sees one. Volek even has a nickname for Skattebo.
“He’s The Iron Tumbleweed!” Volek said with a laugh. “Skattebo is like a tumbleweed running across the Oklahoma plains. I haven’t seen a guy play like Skattebo in 50 years. I mean, wow.”
If fans are looking for a local flavor, the rosters are dripping with it. Sacramento State has 39 players who graduated from high schools in the immediate Sac-Joaquin Section region and UCD has 24.
‘Golden age’
Fiske, ever the promoter of all things good locally as associate AD of the Hornets, offered up the Causeway for an ESPN showcase this week. No one listened.
The popular ESPN College Game Day broadcast chose Bozeman, Montana, for this week’s appearance of a big event between rivals Montana and Montana State. That telecast will gush about two other Big Sky programs facing off with a lot to play for in the 121st “Brawl of the Wild.”
UCD’s mantra this week is “Brawl for it All” - a moniker created by UCD football color voice Doug Kelly - as a loss very well might end the Aggies’ season. Sacramento State hasn’t attempted to coin a “Brawl for the Fall” or “Brawl to go 11-0”. None of that works.
Kickoff temperatures in Bozeman will be a nippy 27 degrees. Kickoff temperatures in Sacramento for the 2 p.m. Causeway Classic will be a bit more bearable 63 degrees. No one will be scraping windshields of ice at Sacramento State, and the tailgate scene will rage on without the need to chain up before departing.
“This will be high quality FCS football in our own backyard, and it doesn’t get any better than that,” Fiske said. “This could be the golden age of college football locally. ESPN Game Day, we have a game just as enticing here, and it’ll be much warmer. We’ve been bantering with the Big Sky about this — ‘Don’t forget us!’ We’ve got great teams, a great rivalry, no snow. We’ve got it all.”
Fiske, local to the core, having graduated from Jesuit High School, worked for five years at UCD. He arrived at Sacramento State in February.
“It’s fun to have been on both sides,” he said. “I’m either on the right side of the Causeway now or the wrong side, depending on whom you ask. I’m good friends with a lot of people at UCD. This week, we’re rivals, not friends. Come Saturday night when the game is over, we can talk again.”
This story was originally published November 16, 2022 at 5:00 AM.