The Cal Poly football team’s 19-9 loss to San Jose State on Saturday doesn’t sound much better than the previous week’s 28-10 loss at Ohio — but it was.

Against the Bobcats, it never really felt like the Mustangs were in the game. Their only touchdown came on an interception return against an Ohio true freshman backup quarterback after the benches cleared.

Against the Spartans, another Football Bowl Championship Subdivision opponent, Cal Poly took the initial lead with a 53-yard touchdown run by Jono Grayson midway through the first quarter and held it until midway through the third quarter.

It felt like the Mustangs were not only in it all night but in control for most of the evening, too.

But first-year head coach Tim Walsh was anything but satisfied with the loss. He gave the media this quote after the game, and it was in a grouchy voice:

“I was real pleased with some progress,” Walsh said. “I’m just not pleased with the outcome of the game. We don’t like losing. This program’s not used to it, and I don’t care who we’re playing. I’m not happy about it.”

Mustangs fans have to be encouraged by the statement. They’d come to expect a certain level of success under former coach Rich Ellerson, who led the team to at least seven wins in each of the past five seasons.

Walsh seems very concerned with keeping that momentum going. I was staring him straight in the face, and he looked genuinely pissed off.

It didn’t come off like some kind of an act, but if it was, it was Academy-Award caliber — or at least Daytime Emmy. And that’ll work.

It seemed like Spartans coach Dick Tomey was impressed with Walsh. He gave Walsh a compliment in his post-game press conference — even if it was just an excuse to praise a former assistant coach and disciple of his own.

“They’re a very well-coached team,” Tomey said, “and coach Walsh, Tim, has obviously done a great job taking over for my dear friend Rich Ellerson, who’s as good a coach as there is in the United States of America. And so I think these guys reflected a lot of good coaching.”

I was not surprised to see LeCharls McDaniel, a defensive back on Cal Poly’s 1980 Division II national championship team and a former NFL player, featured in the San Diego Union-Tribune.

Frankly, the story deserved some kind of mention just for McDaniel’s return to San Diego State.

Now in his fourth tour of duty as an assistant coach with the Aztecs, McDaniel is the only San Diego State coach to have survived the changeover between Chuck Long, who went 2-10 and dropped the season opener to the Mustangs last season, and first-year coach Brady Hoke.

What makes it more interesting is that McDaniel was rumored to be among the finalists vying for the head coaching job when it came open at Cal Poly following Rich Ellerson’s departure.

True or not, McDaniel obviously received a lot of respect from Hoke to be the lone coach kept on staff. Paso Robles High alumnus Bob Cantu has been able to pull off a similar feat a couple times with the men’s basketall program at USC.

Just food for thought. And just as a reminder, receive information on the Cal Poly football team’s game at Ohio at my Twitter account HERE.

Following the lead of Tribune preps reporter Donovan Aird, I’ve started a Twitter.com page for this blog so I can give updates from the road, specifically, this week’s Cal Poly football game at Ohio.

If you have an account, you can follow along at Twitter.com/SLOcollegebeat. Twitter.com/blogginwithscroggin was too long.

If you don’t have a Twitter account, you can find my tweets by coming back to this page and CLICKING HERE. I’ve also set up a link in the links section on the right rail of the blog.

I plan to begin tweeting updates of the game around kickoff time, which is set for 4 p.m. PST. If it turns out to be an appreciated feature, I’ll try to work it in for home games as well.

Your feedback would be most welcome. Please feel free to post here or write in anytime.

Former Cal Poly receiver Tre’dale Tolver, the Mustangs’ return specialist and second leading receiver this past season, had been settling into a high school coaching job with his brother in Orange County this fall.

That was after a tryout with the Cleveland Browns last spring failed to net him an NFL contract. Now it appears Tolver will be playing pro football after all.

I just got off the phone with Tolver, and he is in Arizona preparing for training camp with the United Football League, a new four-team supplemental league being coached by Jim Fassel, Dennis Green, Jim Haslett and Ted Cottrell.

Tolver received a contract Wednesday from the California Redwoods, which will be based out of the Bay Area and play their games at AT&T Park in San Francisco.

Tolver said team rosters are up to 60 for the start of training camp and will be reduced by 10 before the start of the league’s eight week season on Oct. 8.

So, he’s not yet guaranteed a spot, but come the start of the UFL season, Tolver could join former teammates Ramses Barden (New York Giants) and Mark Restelli (Edmonton Eskimos) as 2008 Mustangs in the pros.

Here’s another link du jour.

It’s from some kind of trade publication and talks about the company who manufactured the new video scoreboard that’s gone up at Alex G. Spanos Stadium, where the Cal Poly football team will open its season against Sacramento State on Saturday.

Cal Poly is apparently one of 30 universities to get some type of video upgrade from Daktronics. Mustangs athletic director Alison Cone is even quoted in the story.

Really, Cal Poly’s video board is state of the art. It doesn’t look much different from the screen I saw in Fresno at Bulldog Stadium this past weekend, where UC Davis took a 51-0 pounding from Fresno State.

According to the article, the Mustangs video board is from the same company that outfitted big-name schools like Florida, Missouri, Rutgers, Notre Dame, Oklahoma State and Texas.

But one school on the list jumps out at me a little more than the others — a CSU I’d never even heard of: California University of Pennsylvania – California, Pa.

I did a little research and found this place was actually called California State University until 1983.

I bet that school is big with international students. It must be disappointing though to travel all the way to the U.S. thinking you’re going to California and end up half way between Pittsburgh and Morgantown.

I was stumbling around on the Web site of one of my old newspapers, the Merced-Sun Star, and I was surprised to see a Cal Poly mention.

Football coach Tim Walsh came up on Sun-Star sports editor James Burns’ column this week.

The story’s about a Merced woman who used to work for the Raiders. Apparently, she put on a workshop for high school football moms, sisters and grandmas to help them understand the ins and outs of the game when watching their loved ones.

That’s how Walsh came up. He was a featured speaker in a video presentation. Wish I could have seen it. I’ll ask him about it next time I see him.

It’s an example of the lengths Walsh seems willing to go to get exposure. An instructional video for moms in Merced? That’s definitely obscure, but when we’re talking recruiting, moms are the key.

I was talking with former Cal Poly wrestling coach Lennis Cowell today about former Mustangs wrestler and former UFC champ Chuck Liddell. Even Liddell showed up to his Cal Poly recruiting visit in the late 1980s with his mom by his side.

I know. It’s hard to imagine a legendary tough guy like Liddell being led around by a mom, but we all were at some point. Walsh knows what’s up.

We’ll see how many recruits come in from the Merced area. Running back Fred Gaines of nearby Chowchilla was one of Walsh’s signees this past season. And the Central Coast has imported things from Merced before (aside from just myself and Blue Diamond almonds).

Arroyo Grande High got its fly offense in the early 1990s from former Merced High coach Mark Speckman, who’s spent the past 15 seasons at NCAA Division III Willamette. And San Luis Obispo High football coach Dave Kelley played football at Merced College.

It’ll be interesting to see what might trickle in.

Bishop Manogue (Reno, Nev.) girls golfer Alex Phillips is playing in the First Tee Pro-Am at Pebble Beach this week.

She’s being caddied by Hall of Fame women’s golfer Patty Sheehan and is coupled with legendary men’s golfer Gary Player as a partner, according to the Reno Gazette Journal.

But that’s not the news that concerns us here in SLO County.

A Reno TV station also did a story on Phillips and threw in at the end that she’d committed to play at Cal Poly. Check out the video HERE.

Big ups to former Tribune preps writer Eric Branch, who now writes for the Santa Rosa Press Democrat.

While all of us down here are wondering whether it will be Tony Smith or Andre Broadous at quarterback for Cal Poly, our boy Branch is looking ahead at another QB who could be a Mustang — one his coach calls the “high school (Tim) Tebow.”

HERE’S THE STORY. It’s about Cardinal Newman quarterback John James, a linebacker expected to bring the same type of hard-nosed attitude as the Heisman winner from Florida.

I think Cal Poly already has about a hundred quarterbacks, but I’m not sure. Still, might as well bring in James if you’re the Mustangs. Sounds like he could work out at linebacker, too.