season-opening 42-26 loss at USC<\/a>. Bates missed most of last season after suffering a season-ending injury against Stanford in Week 4. He rushed for 119 yards on 20 carries against Eastern Michigan, allowing the Spartans to lean on the run game more than they did in the season opener against USC.<\/p>\n\u201cIt felt great knowing that I put the work in just to really get this role and understanding what it takes to be able to take on 20 carries, just taking care of my body, having a good mindset, just staying relaxed throughout the game,\u201d Bates said.<\/p>\n
Bates\u2019 emergence gives San Jose State another weapon in an offense that has shown plenty of depth through the first two games.<\/p>\n
The Spartans have rotated receivers throughout the season, with freshman Jase Nix also recording his first career touchdown against Eastern Michigan. In all, 10 different Spartans have caught a pass this season.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe got a lot of depth out there. It\u2019s good because it creates a little bit of friendly competition in the room,\u201d Stutzmann said. \u201cBut what it does is when somebody\u2019s maybe not feeling it, we got the next guy in there and we can roll.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bates and the Spartans will look to keep things rolling as they try to move to 2-1 against a Cal Poly team that enters Saturday\u2019s game undefeated. The FBS Mustangs are 2-0, including a 1-0 record in Big Sky play, after beating Central Washington 24-17 last week.<\/p>\n
San Jose State, which was an underdog in each of its first two games, is a 20.5-point favorite against Cal Poly. The game kicks off at 6 p.m. and will stream on MW+.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not like we\u2019re Ohio State or anybody; it\u2019s not like we\u2019re LSU. We\u2019re not a football juggernaut,\u201d San Jose State coach Ken Niumatalolo said. \u201cIt\u2019s not like we can overlook anybody.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hoch also will look to build on the momentum he created in the season opener, when he made a diving catch against USC and finished with two catches for 24 yards, surpassing his season high from last year. His performance against Eastern Michigan could make him a leading candidate to emerge from a deep nine-player receiver room.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been a long journey for me, but I always knew that if I kept working I\u2019d be able to get on the field and go make a play,\u201d Hoch said.<\/p>\n
Senior quarterback Luke Weaver will also make his first start in front of the home crowd Saturday. Weaver is coming off a strong performance against Eastern Michigan, completing 23 of 39 passes for 316 yards and three touchdowns.<\/p>\n
Despite two turnovers, Weaver said the focus this week is on cleaning up the mistakes and getting the offense off to a faster start.<\/p>\n
\u201cReally just clean up all of the mistakes we\u2019ve been making, starting fast, also preparing for the looks that we\u2019re gonna get and playing our style of football,\u201d Weaver said.<\/p>\n
The Spartans have been slow out of the gate in both games this season, falling behind 28-0 against USC before rallying in the second half and trailing Eastern Michigan 7-0 before scoring in the second quarter.<\/p>\n
Cal Poly presents a different challenge on offense, led by fifth-year quarterback Anthony Grigsby Jr. Grigsby, a Stockton native who got his collegiate start at the College of San Mateo, has thrown seven touchdowns without an interception this season and completed 15 of 27 passes for 204 yards and three touchdowns in last week\u2019s win over Central Washington.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019re a good team, they got a quarterback that can throw it and that can get out the pocket and use his legs,\u201d defensive coordinator Bojay Filimoeatu said. \u201cThey run the ball well, they execute their run scheme to a high level.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"San Jose State returns home Saturday looking to build on its first win of the season when it…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":460582,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[7,1471,1327,266,88,90,89,198,127],"class_list":["post-460581","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-jose","tag-california","tag-central-coast","tag-college-sports","tag-northern-california","tag-san-jose","tag-san-jose-headlines","tag-san-jose-news","tag-santa-clara-county","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/460581","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=460581"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/460581\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/460582"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=460581"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=460581"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=460581"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}