Cal Poly football announced its 12-game schedule this past week, including a Nov. 15 home game against rival UC Davis.
Maria Zelada
Special to Mustang News
Cal Poly’s twelve-game football season schedule for 2014 was announced this past Wednesday.
The season is set to begin Thursday, Aug. 28 against New Mexico State in Las Cruces, N.M. It will be the first Thursday game for the program since 2002, when the Mustangs played at Toledo. The game will be just one of many road tilts played next season.
“We play 12 games in all, and we play seven on the road,” head coach Tim Walsh said. “Any time you have seven road games, that’s a lot of road games in one year.”
Though Walsh said having so many road games might be a setback, he is excited to be playing UC Davis, Southern Utah and Montana State at home.
“Since I’ve been here, it’s definitely the most exciting home schedule we have, even though it’s five games,” he said. “Those games, to me, are great home games.”
The Mustangs will be play one conference champion (San Diego) and a pair of runners-up (Northern Arizona and South Dakota State), though they won’t play defending Big Sky champion Eastern Washington.
Cal Poly will hit the road in the Big Sky against Northern Arizona on Sept. 27, Weber State on Oct. 11, Sacramento State on Oct. 18 and Idaho State on Nov. 8.
“Every season, our goal is to win the championship, period,” Walsh said. “Bottom line is we want to win the Big Sky championship.”
Walsh acknowledged his team will lose several of its top defensive players who are graduating and knows other players will have to step up to the job to fill the void, but he is confident they can do that.
“I feel very strongly that we can be every bit as good as we were two years ago when we did win the championship,” he said.
Middle linebacker Nick Dzubnar also said he hopes the defense will be strong next season.
“I would like to pick up right were we left off, because I think we had a really good defense last year,” Dzubnar said. “I do think we have talent and can continue to pick up right where we were last year.”
Dzubnar said the team is working hard to prepare for next season.
“We are going to do our best, especially in the offseason, so we can have a better season next year,” he said. “We want to come out with a vengeance.”
Dzubnar also said he would love to see more community support for the team.
“The more people we can get to the games, the better,” he said. “We love community support.”
The homecoming game against Montana State will be held on Nov. 1, and the Montana game, taking place on Oct. 25, has been designated as Parent and Family Weekend.
The Mustangs are set to end the season on Nov. 22 with a game at San Diego. All kickoff times will be announced at a later date.