Valley Children’s Stadium will open its doors for the first time this semester for Fresno State Football on Saturday, Aug. 30.
After a 31-7 loss to the Kansas University Jayhawks, the Bulldogs are hopeful for a quick turnaround to get in the win column. The Week 0 loss was Entz’s twelfth of all-time as a Division I head coach.
“We can’t let one turn into two,” said Head Coach Matt Entz during a press conference. “We need to identify maybe the top two or three things on each side of the ball that we need to get better at and move forward.”
The Georgia Southern University Eagles are the second consecutive opponent the ‘Dogs will start history with. Head Coach Clay Helton enters his fourth season at the helm for the Eagles. They are 20-19 under his tenure with three bowl game appearances.
While the Eagles may be an unfamiliar opponent, Helton has history against the Bulldogs. As the former head coach of the University of Southern California Trojans, he beat the ‘Dogs three times.
The Eagles are led by quarterback JC French IV. 2024 was his first year as the Eagles’ starting quarterback. He completed 66% of his passes for 2,831 yards with 17 touchdowns and 11 interceptions. French also rushed for 239 yards. The transfer from the University of Memphis led the Eagles to an 8-5 record and a New Orleans Bowl appearance.
Expected to be a Sun Belt Conference (SBC) title contender, the Eagles retained key players on the offensive line that allowed them to run the ball with efficiency in 2024. However, the Eagles lost their leading rusher, Jalen White.
Senior running back OJ Arnold takes over the starting role. In limited action, he ran for 316 yards on 63 carries and reached the endzone four times last season.
Arnold averaged five yards per carry last season. The run defense for the ‘Dogs will be tested after letting the Jayhawks run for 204 yards.
The Eagles also lost their leading receiver from 2024, Derwin Burgess Jr., who led the team with 659 receiving yards.
Defensively, the Eagles ranked No. 85 in 2024 in points allowed per game in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). While the Bulldogs will face a different defense, Entz anticipates the Eagles to adapt some of the stunts that they saw last week from the Jayhawks.
“I’m sure they’re looking at this Kansas game, and [are] going to emulate some of those things that they can, or if they have it within their scheme,” Entz said.
One of the bright spots from the Week 0 loss to the Jayhawks was linebacker Jadon Pearson. He racked up 12 tackles and was all over the field in the losing effort.
“Learn, burn and return,” Entz said. “This morning was all about Kansas and closing the book.”
Aside from their opening drive, the offense struggled to sustain drives. Penalties and unforced errors killed any chance for the ‘Dogs to stay in the game, but Entz was still proud of the effort shown by the players.
“There wasn’t an effort issue at all,” Entz said. “I think offensively, for the first 25 minutes, we played pretty well. Defensively, we gave up seven points in the second half, had a shutout fourth quarter. I thought we got our cleats in the ground. We settled down a little bit more late.”
An aspect that the Bulldogs want to improve for the home opener is their rushing attack. In 2024, the ‘Dogs rushed for 98.2 yards per game, which ranked in the bottom 11 in the FBS.
The Week 0 loss was more of the same, with just 37 rushing yards on 29 attempts.
“We had—I counted them, 18 negative plays, or 31% of our plays had some sort of negative event happening,” Entz said. “We’ve got to trust our fundamentals. We’ve got to be more successful on early downs. Three plus three plus three equals punt.”
The Bulldogs are looking for some familiar success at Valley Children’s Stadium. Since opening its doors in 1980, the ‘Dogs are 199-66-2. They went 4-2 at home in 2024.
Kickoff for the home opener is set for 6:30 p.m. at Valley Children’s Stadium and will be aired on Fox Sports 1.
