Say that real fast, over and over again, and it will sound like the house beat that banged until four in the morning at a club I had never heard of before last Saturday night.

Three friends and I decided to check out this semi-rave in San Francisco, sans drugs — which allowed us to witness a cornucopia of beautiful things we may not have noticed otherwise, like the couple dry humping in the walkway leading to the dance floor or the large man wearing a Native American headdress and glow-in-the-dark body paint, fist-pumping with spear in hand atop the bar.

A couple of beers later, it wasn’t that weird.

We were dancing so hard for so long, I thought I might pass out, so we decided to take a break and get some air.

While we were outside, a group of three gay men approached us and asked if this club was gay or straight.

“Who cares? It’s fun is what it is. Does it really matter if it’s gay or straight? Just come in,” one of my friends answered him. He then handed one of the guys some cash to pay for at least one of their cover fees.

“Oh, OK, thanks,” he replied. He looked at the money and gave it back to him. “No, actually, it’s OK, we’ll see you in there, though.”

About 10 minutes later the three dudes met up with us and we ended up dancing the rest of the night away together.

We left the club, sweating like pigs, ready to get home and crash.

On the way home, one of my friends mentioned that it was such a silly question to ask — if the club was gay or straight.

“I just don’t get why that matters,” one of my friends said.

“Maybe they wanted to make sure the club had good music?” I asked.

I mean, in my experience, gay clubs have definitely proven to supply better dance jams than most straight clubs — unless your favorite song includes the phrases “apple bottom jeans” or “boots with the fur.”

“I’m just saying people should feel accepted regardless of where they are,” he said.

“Well, I think it’s less about feeling accepted,” my other friend replied, “and more about the fact that if you’re gay and trying to meet someone, you don’t want to have to ask each guy if he’s straight before hitting on him.”

Of all the valid reasons as to why someone would ask whether a club is straight or gay, I found myself hoping it was not because they felt unaccepted.

I like to tell myself that as a society we’ve graduated from homophobia and racism, but when discussing the issue with others, it was apparent that the Bay Area is a bit of a bubble and I might be giving people too much credit.

When I thought about it, I remembered visiting my distant family member’s bed and breakfast in South Dakota a few years back.

The house was adorned with none other than the Confederate flag. This is a true story.

I told my mom I didn’t want to go in there, but she said we had to be polite.

There was also the time when I traveled to Europe with two of my best friends.

Both of my friends were Asian and there was more than one instance in which people came up to us, slanted their eyes and uttered the phrase, “ching chong ching chong,” before walking away and laughing.

My friends had no reaction and completely ignored them, but you could definitely hear me shouting profanities their way that had a little something to do with taking a dump in a box, lighting it on fire and leaving it on their doorsteps.

And finally, there was the time I went shopping one weekend and wanted to look at an expensive handbag that was stowed in a case.

When I asked to look at it, the sales woman told me she didn’t think that I could afford it and that I should look somewhere else.

At the time I was so shocked that I didn’t know how to react and I just said, “Wow. Alrighty then,” and walked out of the store.

I completely could have had her fired but the sheer asininity of the situation dumbfounded me and all I could do was leave. I didn’t know people like that existed outside of Lifetime movies.

Unnerving experiences to say the least, I was reminded that tolerance is far from normality and judging others based upon appearance, belief or religion is just a sad part of reality.

When that man asked if the club we went to was straight or not, my friend desperately wanted him to feel like he needn’t ask that question — he was hoping that he wouldn’t feel worried in any way about being judged simply for his sexual preference.

Which is all we could ever want: for everyone to feel accepted being themselves.

But unfortunately, we are so far from this utopian civilization I had believed was slowly growing until recently.

I can only hope that my children will be born into a more accepting world — a world without Kristen Stewart’s weird lips.

Just kidding, ’cause I still accept her, regardless.

For many schools, San Jose State University being no exception, the first and largest incubator for school spirit is its athletics.

“Athletics can be a rallying point for any campus,”  Marie Tuite, SJSU Athletics deputy director for internal operations  said. “More people come together at athletic events than any other events on campus. It brings many different constituencies together for one common goal: to cheer for the Spartans.”

Obviously the first goal in any competitive sport, and something which people can take pride in, is winning, Tuite said.

“Everyone is happier when you win,” she said. “Athletics (are) more fun when you win.”

Neelam Rattam, a lecturer of Psychology and Sociology at SJSU, said in her native Indian culture, when a school team won in a sport, it was a celebration that the whole institution took part in, and something the students identified with very strongly.

Upon arriving at SJSU however, she noticed the students attitudes towards athletes on campus were remarkably different.

“They seem to come in and go out, and nobody asks them ’did you win the game or not,’” she said. “There is a sense of indifference. I think it is due to (students being) overwhelmed. As fans at the events it may be different.”

Tuite said though victories for the athletes were a very positive thing, her real delight in the 2011 football victory over Hawaii was not the final score, but witnessing the students rushing the field ecstatically after the whistle.

“It was thrilling to see our students celebrate,” she said. “Athletics should be fun. It should be an opportunity for people to come together and enjoy the experience.”

Rattam said in her experiences athletics provided an opportunity for students to celebrate each others’ accomplishments, but it seemed that because of the demands of life in San Jose, students simply did not seem to have the time to listen to each other’s triumphs or defeats in the name of their university.

“I do seriously think that if we did have a winning team there would be more of a sense of ownership and identifying,” she said.

SJSU Media relations director Pat Lopes Harris said athletics was one of the best way to get future monetary donors to become reengaged in university life.

“I think what we are seeing is donors choose many ways to enter or re-enter life at the university,” she said. “Some choose to attend performances, some have a strong affinity to the athletic programs”

If alumni particularly are able to become involved in donating to the university even in just little ways, Harris said, evidence shows that those same donors usually go on to become larger and larger contributors, so long as they remain involved.

Harris said in addition to wanting the students to succeed at the collegiate level, the university hopes that by winning championships it will enable graduates to go on to become more successful and give back to the university as donors.

She equated the experience of playing for a championship as trying to get graduate students into the best available Ph.D programs.

Harris said the university views the opportunity to compete at a high level as another form of educational experience.

“I think the university wants to provide the best resource we can for the students,” she said. “We want more teams to be viable for conference championships.”

Tuite said the position of student athlete was one which indicated the students were receiving an education, even through their participation in sports.

“We are under the firm belief that athletics is under the umbrella of higher education,” she said. “I think sometimes people view athletics as a business operating in a Silo.

“We are strong believers in the academic mission of the university… We are firmly merged within the university’s footprint.”

Francisco Rendon, Spartan Daily

Information compiled from SJSU Athletics 2010 budget report.

They are responsible for their performance on a field, and in a classroom.

Despite the added stresses that this can bring, Trevor Siti, a sophomore child development major and defensive lineman on the SJSU football team, said he enjoys being in a position where he can play the sport he loves.

“It’s something where I can get most of my tension, or aggression, or just go have fun,” he said. “It’s something where I get to go get all my energy out, and just release it in a good way.”

Lauren Sanchez, a senior soccer player at SJSU, has played the beautiful game for 17 years.

She is a student athlete at SJSU, playing for SJSU with an athletic scholarship.

She usually spends her day at school, along with other classmates, many of whom work jobs, serve as teachers assistants, or learn at internships.

Sanchez and her team, however, do not head for a desk after classes. They eat, and brace themselves for an evening of weight lifting, conditioning and drills.

“It’s different every day Tuesday through Saturday,” she said. “Monday we have. Tuesday is our hard day because its mostly fitness day. Wednesday we have practice from 8 to 10 so its tough.

“We lift on Tuesdays and Wednesdays as well. Thursdays are usually easy depending on whether we have a game or not on Friday. Fridays are usually game days and Saturdays are usually recovery days.”

The lifestyle often proves demanding for student athletes across a wide spectrum of sports, but the demands offer vary, as exemplified in the forms of different athlete‘s needs for different diets.

Britney Helm, a sophomore softball player, said her dietary restrictions were not very strict, but her lifestyle as an athlete requires her to constantly be refueling her body.

This means that although she would prefer to always be eating healthy foods, it is not always the case.

Forest Hightower, a sophomore football player, said on his team, dietary restrictions varied according to position.

“Some need to eat more to gain weight and get bigger,” he said. “Some just have to stay quick so they can’t eat as much.”

Monique Cobol, a member of the women’s basketball team, said the team did not restrict her diet, but that generally, she would eat light before a practice and indulge in carbohydrate heavy foods afterwards.

The main point that her staff always pressed upon her is that she should always be drinking water and remain hydrated, she said.

Having been involved in athletics her whole life, Cobol switched sports several times before arriving at basketball.

Originally a gymnast for 9 years, she said she became quite proficient in gymnastics, until the point where she hit a ceiling.

“They said I couldn’t progress to the All-star team in gymnastics so I was kind of doing the same thing, the same routine everyday,” she said. “So I decided I was going to quit that.”

She then switched to swimming, where she encountered success but failed to find the same passionate drive to keep her interested in the sport.

“When I swam it was fun for me, but it just wasn’t the type of sport for me,” she said. “I didn’t like being synchronized.”

She said she started taking an interest in basketball at this time because her sisters played and she had been around it for awhile.

After beginning basketball, she said her height provided a natural advantage, and she quickly learned how play in the role of the low-post.

“It wasn’t until high school where I really started getting super focused with basketball,” She said.

Though she participated in volleyball and soccer, she became committed to basketball up until her career at SJSU.

“It’s pretty much the only sport I did spend the majority of my life playing.”

When asked if they played another sports, most athletes had a list of other sports that they would play with friends or had played in the past, but all made it clear that they had one area of expertise.

Tony Popovich, a freshman justice studies major and defensive lineman on the football team said being an athlete means that one cannot risk their health or injury in ‘stupid outside activities’ off the football field, providing an added layer of responsibility.

He said one the key skills being a student athlete teaches is learning how to detach oneself from emotions of frustration and exasperation.

“Not getting too tied up with having a bad day, having a bad week in school,“ he said. “Just trying to be able to let things go and fix it the next day.”

While members of different teams all have varying amounts of time off, Siti, Popovich, Helm and Hightower all said they enjoyed watching movies in their leisure hours.

Siti and Popovich also said they enjoyed spending time with their girlfriends and playing video games.

Cobol said she spent most of her spare time resting her body or going through light training exercises.

Trevor said that there were three main things that one needed to succeed as a Spartan Athlete at SJSU.

The first step, he said, was to brace oneself mentally, largely through the process of setting goals.

“Mentally, you have to prepare for what you’re trying to accomplish, you have to think about it dream about,” he said. “Take a second, visualize what you want to do and how you are going to achieve that goal.”

The next step of preparation was preparing the body to endure a full season of punishment and exertion, specifically through injury resistance training.

Finally, athletes must prepare themselves emotionally, because in all competitive sports, things sometimes go well and sometimes go wrong.

Sanchez said although the life of a student athlete is often grueling and difficult, the experience is one she finds rewarding.

“Yes its tough being a student athlete,” she said. “But its worth it. I would totally rather be a student athlete than just a regular student.”

Wesley Dugle, Spartan Daily

Drumer Patrick Carney (left) and lead guitarist and vocalist Dan Auerbach (right) rock out at their free concert at San Jose City College. Photo by Jeffrey Cianci / Spartan Daily

For those who are unfamiliar with the band, The Black Keys are lead singer and guitarist Dan Auerbach and drummer Patrick Carney.

The two longtime best friends from Akron, Ohio, started The Black Keys in 2001, but really gained following from their most recent album, “Brothers” in 2010.

Their unique sound of Auerbach’s grungy vocals and soulful guitar riffs and Carney’s tight crisp beats can be best described as blues that have been dragged through the mud and cleaned off with a splash of Jack Daniel’s, that makes you want to wear a leather jacket every time you listen to them.

“Brothers,” landed the duo five Grammy Awards in 2011 including Best Rock Song for their hit ‘Tighten Up” and Best Alternative Music Album.

The band’s music has been used in several different commercials including those for Zales Diamonds and Subaru.

Therefore it is not a stretch to say that Friday night’s show was simply workings for a Microsoft commercial.

While it is enjoyable to hear your favorite band’s song appear on television every now and then, I didn’t appreciate Microsoft’s complete commercialization of the band.

Concertgoers were given all kinds of goodies from free bottled water, Jamba Juice, Rubio’s tacos and pizza, as well as “I’m a PC” shirts and raincoats from Microsoft — leaving me wondering how such a grungy “rebel rock” band was talked into this promotion-palooza.

With Microsoft logos everywhere to be seen, many just wanted to see The Black Keys.

As the crowd waited for the band to arrive on stage, rain started to fall, making concertgoers unhappy and the stage slick, delaying the arrival of the band.

The Black Keys did eventually arrive and jumped into a 14-track set list that included many hits from “Brothers” as well as popular songs from older albums.

Beginning with the wailing guitar intro from one of their early tracks, “Thickfreakness,”  The Black Keys played track after track of their loud, soulful rock with an amount of energy I have not seen in many musicians.

The next track “The Breaks,” which isn’t a very fast or powerful track from ”The Big Come Up,” was performed with the band’s intense energy combined with falling rain that made for an awesome experience.

Auerbach thanked the audience for coming out and braving the rain, but did not say much else as the band tore through the rest of the set list in a little more than an hour.

With the help of their friends Gus and John on keyboards and bass, the band played through a good portion of “Brothers” including “Howlin’ for you,” “She’s Long Gone,” “Ten Cent Pistol” and “Chop & Change” which was featured in “Twilight: Eclipse.”

I enjoyed hearing a favorite track, “Chop & Change,” where Auerbach played guitar with maraca in hand, particularly because the song is a B-side track and isn’t available on iTunes unless you purchase the whole Twilight album — something I have no intention of doing.

The band closed their concert with “I Got Mine,” another thunderous performance highlighted by a back-and-forth jam session between Carney and Auerbach.

There was no encore and it would have been nice to hear some music from their album “El Camino,” which will be released Dec. 6. However, the set list was nearly identical to what I listen to on a daily basis and seeing the energy of Black Keys live was thoroughly satisfying.

undefined, Spartan Daily

Leonardo DiCaprio stars as the controversial American figure J. Edgar Hoover in Clint Eastwood’s new film “J. Edgar.”

With a creative team like Clint Eastwood and Leonardo DiCaprio, it seemed assured that “J. Edgar” would be a fighting contender in 2012’s Oscar race. A biopic following Hoover’s life, focusing on the creation of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and his prolific career as director of the organization, would have to be popular with the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

“J. Edgar” is an interesting portrait of one of the most powerful men in America in the 20th century, though ultimately, a flawed one. It carries the energy of a particularly droll feature on the History Channel, moving at a snail’s pace for much of the film and using the lens of a series of interviews Hoover takes with young agents to chronicle the era of the bureau’s rise.

In fact, the film moves irregularly slow. It relies on flashbacks to navigate the timeline, jumping between two differently aged versions of Hoover, both whom are played by DiCaprio, and the resulting transitions become hard to follow.

The only passion in the film comes from DiCaprio, who plays Hoover well.

He shows Hoover’s struggle to power in a series of events that pull on the heartstrings of the viewer, and he shows the emotions Hoover must have felt.

At the same time, I was confused to the point of mild frustration at Hoover’s actions. He seems to make so many decisions that fly in the face of one another, though this is probably more because of historical accuracy than dramatization.

Hoover’s close and sometimes romantic relationship with his right-hand man Clyde Tolson, who’s played by Armie Hammer of “The Social Network,” exemplifies the complexity of the two, though sometimes it’s hard to understand the reasons for Hoover’s choices and decisions.

Hammer does well as Hoover’s second-in-command, acting as someone for the audience to relate somewhat with and is more of a reliable narrator of true events than the embellishments Hoover provides.

With all the actors, the makeup was unbelievably distracting to me. Every time the plot shifts forward in time to the ’70s, we are greeted by DiCaprio’s bumbling Old Hoover who looks equal parts Dom Cobb from “Inception” and a balding Apatosaurus from the Jurassic Period.

Hammer’s Tolson is the clearly the worst of the aged though — after he is affected by a stroke, he becomes a trembling, liver-spotted Gumby whose skin has been replaced with some sort of artificial silicone that makes him look creepily nonhuman.

Too many things work against the feature for it to coherently walk the line of interesting and entertaining. It seems to me that it will be a strong performance for DiCaprio’s resume, but won’t do anything for him in terms of getting that Oscar nod he’s long awaited.

Eastwood’s direction in “J. Edgar” seems to have followed the confused way of his last film “Hereafter,” which was also met with mixed reviews. I have enjoyed much of Eastwood’s directorial features, and I hope that if he continues, it’s more on the track of “Gran Torino” or “Invictus” than the one he seems to be on now.

On a whole, “J. Edgar” falls flat. Though it is a moving portrait of a complex man, it is not interesting enough to be worth a watch in the theater, those going are probably already Eastwood or DiCaprio super-fans who will likely find disappointment.

San Jose police were searching for a suspect armed with a gun in Coyote Creek in the neighborhood between 17th and 19th streets and Santa Clara and San Antonio streets, seven blocks east of the SJSU campus, as of 3:00 a.m. Friday.

According to Officer Jose Garcia, a white Chevrolet Camaro was reported as being carjacked from the Third Street Garage at 95 N. Third Street at 7:09 p.m. Thursday night.

Officer Jeannette Siversten said the suspect fled into the creek after police stopped the car on 17th street between Santa Clara and San Fernando streets.

Garcia said the owner of the car might have been kidnapped, but the victim is now safe.

San Jose police officer Paul Hickey said the suspect is a tall, light-skinned black male with a chinstrap beard in his 20s. As of 3:00 a.m., the suspect was not in custody.

They were also searching the creek with floodlights atop search-and-rescue firetrucks on the bridges between Arroyo Way and 18th street on San Antonio street, and the bridge between 17th and 19th streets on Santa Clara street, as of 2:00 a.m. Friday.

At least 20 police officers, some with rifles and bulletproof vests, walked from the parking lot of the Walgreens Pharmacy at 780 E. Santa Clara St. into the streets surrounding the area at about 11:15 p.m. to try to find the suspect.

Helicopters began circling the area at about 12:00 a.m. early Friday morning and were still in the air as of 2:26 a.m.

Senior social work major Kevin Davis, who was walking past 17th and Santa Clara at about 11:00 p.m. Thursday, said he usually drives from his home at 19th and Santa Clara to school, but since his car broke down, he had to walk through the neighborhood.

“This is the scariest thing I ever had to deal with,” senior social work major Kevin Davis said.

Jack Barnwell, Spartan Daily

Herlinda Aguirre, president of students for a quality education and senior art history major, joins the California Faculty Association demonstration outside of King Library on Wednesday morning.

Faculty carried signs that showed Reed’s salary increases, wishes for a new chancellor for Christmas and others which stated Reed’s actions forced them to protest.

“Faculty are mad, and students are too, because students have had a raise of 106 percent in their tuition and while administrators and presidents Reed’s salary have gone up at least 25 percent, and faculty salaries have gone down 10 percent in that time,” occupational therapy Professor Liz Cara said.

Cara was dressed in a suit filled with fake cash, sporting a top hat and cigar in her mouth, with a tag identifying herself as Chancellor Reed.

As stated in a previous article in the Spartan Daily, the old contract was signed in 2008, but only one year of the contract between the California Faculty Association and the CSU was honored, and faculty now want those two years of back pay to be honored. Faculty members from all CSUs plan to meet at CSU East Bay and CSU Dominguez Hills to strike on Nov. 17, according to a CFA flier handed out at the protest.

“This is historic,” Cara said. “These one day strikes will be historic. This will be the first time the largest public university in the United State has had a strike.”

Anthropology lecturer Jonathan Karpf has been at SJSU since 1987, and said he hasn’t seen a contract situation as bad as the current one.

Karpf said there was informational picketing at all 23 CSU campuses on Tuesday and Wednesday. He said the one-day strike on the 17th would be the first strike in CFA history since the association started bargaining collectively in 1983.

“Our hope is that this will convince the chancellor that he has to come back to the bargaining table and deal reasonably with the faculty,” said Herlinda Aguirre, the current president for Students for Quality Education and a senior art history major

Aguirre protested with the faculty on Wednesday.

“I feel as though Charles Reed has treated the faculty unfairly,” she said. “He’s not offering any bargaining at all … As students I feel as though we should care about it, and we should ride with them in solidarity.”

Sociology assistant professor Preston Rudy said because the faculty’s contract hadn’t been honored, they had a right to protest against them.

“For the moment, the chancellor’s office isn’t really bargaining fully with us,” he said. “They are just sort of pushing us back and saying ‘you take this.’”

Rudy said he feels the chancellor’s office is trying to provoke something from the faculty.

“The ultimate message is to inform people as to what’s going on with their public higher education system in California,” he said. “Letting people know the way that the administration is mismanaging public funds, redistributing them to administrators and president, and not putting the money that the state is giving to the institution to teaching, to the student and paying their employees.”

Jasper Rubenstein, Spartan Daily

Graffiti adorns the walls surrounding the wheelchair ramp leading to the lower level of Joe West Hall.

According to an article from Protectsanjose.com, 278 SJPD police officers were laid off. The same article also stated that with a reduced number of officers on the force due to financial cuts, the San Jose Police Department has fewer officers on duty than it did four years ago. In the month of October, there were seven reports of graffiti and tagging on and near campus.

“I have seen graffiti on newspaper boxes and white delivery trucks parked near campus,” junior kinesiology major Daniel Mosqueda said. “It just surprises me that taggers would do it here on campus.”

According to University Police Department’s police blotter, graffiti was reportedly found etched onto the exterior doors at the Industrial Studies building. Dudley Moorhead Hall was also defaced at the beginning of last October, according to UPD’s October police blotter.

Vandalism and graffiti were also reported at the North Garage between Ninth and 10th streets, according to a UPD police report. In addition, graffiti was seen near South 10th Street as well as the Seventh Street plaza on campus.

According to SJPD’s crime blotter, officers located a suspect on Oct. 30 based on an anonymous tip, arresting two suspects who did approximately $2,000 in damages at the Calco gas station and Almaden Lake Park in San Jose.

Even with the city of San Jose’s Anti-Graffiti Program, there have been a number of reports of tagging near SJSU as well as the surrounding neighborhoods.

In a September 2011 report from San Jose city council, the city’s goal is to remove gang graffiti within 24 hours as well as other tags within 48 hours.

According to an SJPD media relations representative, gang activity is the leading cause of the rising crime rate in San Jose.

Seventeen of the 39 homicides that have occurred in San Jose this year are gang related, according to an SJPD media relations representative.

Sophomore nursing major Myla Llorico has been staying in her dormitory room due to the rise in crime in San Jose.

“With all that has been going on lately in San Jose, I’ve been keeping it in lately,” Llorico said. “As far as tagging goes, I’ve seen a few near the ATM’s but other than that not really.”

However, SJPD recently released Tip Submit, an iPhone and Android app that allow people to send anonymous crime tips to SJPD.

According to SJPD’s website, Tip Submit allows smartphone users to remain anonymous by encrypting the messages, assigning them a unique alias and ID and routing them through secure servers, protecting the personal details of the information provider.

Photos can be submitted through the app as well, providing SJPD officers with a clearer understanding of the content being submitted.

“This app is a great idea that people can feel confident about and not worry about putting their identity into jeopardy,” junior engineering major Syed Abidi said. “With this app in place, maybe people will become more proactive in reporting tagging not just on campus but also the surrounding areas, since students are on their phones basically all the time.”

Idaho senior safety Quin Ashley (No. 12), junior cornerback Aaron Grymes (No. 6) and senior cornerback Matthew Harvey chase sophomore wide receiver Chandler Jones (No. 89) of SJSU along the Spartan sideline during Idaho’s 32-29 upset over SJSU last Saturday at Spartan Stadium. Photo by Vernon McKnight / File Photo

If there was any game SJSU could have circled as a guaranteed win, it was last weekend at home against Idaho, and the Spartans didn’t get it done.

As the Spartans’ hopes and chances of reaching a bowl for first time since it won the 2006 New Mexico Bowl have dwindled over the past two weekends, the team now finds itself with its back against the wall.

This weekend, SJSU will travel to Logan, Utah to face the Utah State Aggies, the first of the Spartans’ final three games of its season — meaning it will need to win its remaining games of the season in order to become eligible for a bowl.

The Spartans and the Aggies are coming off polar-opposite games from this past Saturday.

SJSU fell victim to Idaho, in part from a 22-point fourth quarter from the Vandals, erasing a 20-7 halftime Spartan lead.

Meanwhile Utah State came back from a 21-point deficit to defeat Hawaii in Honolulu, a win capped by a 1-yard run by junior running back Robert Turbin to put the Aggies ahead with 14 seconds left in the game.

“Utah State beat Hawaii like Idaho beat us,” head coach Mike MacIntyre said. “Emotions play a big role in football. I feel like our guys will be able to bounce back and be ready to play, and hopefully it will fuel them to finish out the game strong.”

MacIntyre said he could tell the team had emotionally recovered from the loss from its demeanor at Sunday night’s practice.

“They were attentive, but got down about some plays they knew they could have made but didn’t,” he said. “Now our guys have to get back off the mat and go back the next day ready to fight again — and that’s what our guys will do.”

The running game is a huge issue for the Spartans, both offensively and defensively, going into this weekend’s must-win game in regards to postseason play.

On the defensive side of the ball, SJSU will be looking at the Western Athletic Conference leading and sixth nationally ranked rushing attack in terms of yardage.

The Aggies running game is led by Turbin, who currently ranks second in the WAC in yards-per-game and first in rushing touchdowns.

MacIntyre had nothing but rave comments about Turbin.

“He’s the best running back in our conference,” MacIntyre said. “He’s strong, athletic, fast — an excellent player.”

Utah State will showcase a new quarterback, junior Adam Kennedy, who threw two touchdowns in the Aggies’ comeback win over Hawaii.

MacIntyre said Kennedy is a better passer than freshman Chuckie Keeton, whom Kennedy replaced, and SJSU will need to prepare for a spread-out Aggie passing game in addition to its dominant run game.

“We have to be ready for a vertical passing game they’ll stretch with which they hit some big plays against Hawaii,” MacIntyre said.

The Spartan rush defense looked slightly sluggish in the Idaho loss, in which it allowed 183 rushing yards, and will be greatly challenged by the Turbin and the Utah State run attack.

SJSU’s run game on the offensive side of the ball also looks nothing like its dynamic self, which it displayed in the first three games of the season.

In the loss two weeks ago to Louisiana Tech, the Spartans recorded just 12 yards on 17 carries, and against Idaho it gained 68 yards on 25 attempts.

MacIntyre said if he could put his finger on one certain aspect of the struggling run game he would.

“It is something we have been working on,” he said. “We should have run it better and we will try this Saturday. I think it will start clicking soon, I really do.”

Going up against this underperforming SJSU running game is a prolific Utah State defense, which ranks first in total defense in the WAC.

“It will be a very tough test for us,” MacIntyre said. “We are excited about going there to play.”

This Utah State defense will more than likely also test the Spartan passing game, which completed more than 70 percent of its passes against Idaho — albeit many of them were short screen type passes.

MacIntyre said his intention with this methodical passing plays was to open up the defense to loosen the running backs, and added that he was surprised it did not do so.

Whether SJSU will continue the same play calling, MacIntyre said it will depend on how the Utah State defense sets up play after play.

“We can’t throw it long every snap, and we can’t throw it short every snap,” he said. “We are going to mix it up and have a game plan going in there. We will see what the defense gives us and we will take advantage to create plays.”

MacIntyre said the fourth-quarter loss to Idaho on Saturday was shocking for SJSU because it has been playing very well in the fourth quarter for the most part this season.

This stellar fourth quarter play includes two last-minute go-ahead touchdowns — the first at Colorado State on Oct. 1 and the other a thrilling home win over Hawaii on homecoming night Oct. 14.

“I didn’t see it coming and neither did (the team),” MacIntyre said of the stunning loss last weekend.

Utah State and SJSU will kick off at 1 p.m. on Saturday.