To borrow a phrase so tired it needs a porter to carry the bags under its eyes, it is what it is.
So there.
No matter the din of the outcry, regardless of perceived regression, Rocky Long's football team isn't getting older overnight. It isn't suddenly assuming the persona of a group teeming with power and proficiency, one of bluster and bravado whose roster is laden with seasoned skill.
Consider: Not once since Long took over SDSU's head coaching duties in 2011 have the Aztecs had fewer than 15 senior scholarship players. At the outset of the 2018 season, SDSU had nine, adding a pair of scholarships to walk-ons prior to fall camp.
Fact is, during Long's tenure, the team has had at least 16 senior scholarship players every year, including 19 in 2017, the highest total since SDSU honored 21 on Senior Night eight years ago.
This is less alibi than matter of fact. To be sure, narrow escapes — and losses — against teams far less talented have given pause. But to suggest bewilderment is to ignore the bottom line. Long had ample concerns entering the season, including the forward progress of a young offensive line and a secondary where one senior would be joined by two sophomores and a junior who had never started a game.
Add to the equation an onslaught of injuries that left the Aztecs barren of their entire starting backfield for six games, and the margin of error narrowed to a pencil point. Backups were baptized by fire, including a quarterback — Ryan Agnew — who had never made a collegiate start. The results were predictable, a teetering walk on a high wire that generated audible gasps and groans.
Still, grit overcame the complications of being green, of ripening before ready. Minus the leadership of quarterback Christian Chapman and the home-run threat of tailback Juwan Washington, SDSU strung together six straight wins, one of them coming at Boise State, where the Broncos are 109-8 at home since 2000.
With their starting backfield still absent two weeks later, the Aztecs held off San Jose State to become bowl eligible for a school-record ninth straight season.
But a pair of losses — to Nevada and UNLV — sandwiched around a win at New Mexico has unsettled a fanbase accustomed to swatting aside inferior foes like so many pesky flies. Somebody had some explaining to do.
Earlier this week, somebody did.
"You know, I've really thought about this a lot," said Long, whose team faces perhaps its most formidable task of the season this week at Fresno State. "We're a struggling football team; we have been all year long. So you start looking for reasons, and it's very, very simple.
"I've looked back over the numbers of years that I've been here. We had a year like this in 2014 and it was exactly for the same reason. Very few seniors and a whole lot of freshmen. Well, this week on (Fresno State's) two-deep, they have three times as many seniors as they do freshmen. On our two-deep, we have just as many freshmen playing as we do seniors.
"We can discuss the expectation level, the disappointment and all you want to talk about, but, in reality, there are reasons that we are an inconsistent football team, a struggling football team. But guess what? We're bowl eligible and we have a winning record. So if you take the emotion out of this and take the true facts, we're playing about like we should play. I try real hard to take the emotion out of it, because I'm kind of an emotional guy; I don't show it very much, but I have it inside.
"Our expectation level as a program has risen to the point that maybe it's unrealistic. You have to determine how many veteran players, how many good players you have and all those sorts of things, and, if you want the truth, this team has overachieved. By the number of freshmen that we're playing and by the number of injuries that we've had, this team, in reality, in the world of football, if you take all the emotion and the media out of it, has overachieved already.
"This late in the season, being bowl eligible and already having a winning record and still having a minute chance to win the (Mountain West) championship, I would bet there would be several teams who would be happy with that. You've heard me say this, but we are who we are. We have some talent, we're inconsistent, we're young, we're beat up and we play really, really hard, so that gives us a chance to win."
Or at least a chance to survive. SDSU has had 30 entire games missed by would-be starters this season (37 counting partial games). The Aztecs played a season-high 17 freshmen (true and redshirt last week) and just 12 seniors. Only four — Aztec Parker Baldwin, linebacker Ronley Lakalaka, defensive end Anthony Luke and right tackle Ryan Pope — have started every game this season, with Pope being the lone offensive player.
Rest assured that Long is not in the excuse business. He is far from smitten with the play of his offensive line, which was expected to be the team's backbone heading into the season. The Aztecs have been limited to 100 or fewer rushing yards in two of their last five games after failing to top the century mark just once in their previous 60 contests.
Now, as it preps for Fresno State, that same offensive line will be missing starting sophomore left tackle Tyler Roemer (violation of team rules) and sophomore starting right guard Keith Ismael (concussion protocol). Pope has been moved to left tackle to fill the vacancy left by Roemer, while sophomore Kyle Spalding is expected to take Pope's spot at right tackle. Junior Nick Gerhard will start in place of Ismael. Spalding is making his first collegiate start; Gerhard his fourth.
"I don't think we've played well on the offensive line, and that's disappointing," Long said. "Everybody is beat up at this time of year, but our offensive line has not met our expectation level...I don't have an exact reason why."
A rather sizable accumulation of youth might be a fair place to start.
"Experience is the main factor and this experience will do them well later on in their careers," Long said of a team that has played only 13 seniors all season. "The frustrating part is coaching them, because if you take one approach, it affects a few of them, but it doesn't affect all of them. You take another approach, and it affects maybe a different group of guys, but it doesn't affect all of them. They haven't been in our program long enough to know how they're supposed to react to certain things. They're still trying feel their way about those kinds of things."
Playing the hand your dealt isn't always agreeable, but Long isn't about to fold his cards and walk away from the table.
"You want the real surprise? The real surprise is that these are young guys who have tried to live up to everyone's expectation level and they've still won seven games," Long said. "That's the surprise. I'm looking at it purely by facts, not by emotion, not by expectation level, but purely by facts.
"We've got a bunch of really good young players that are going to be something special in probably two years. But guess what? They are not now; they're out of their league. But because they try so hard, they compete."
And often win. With two more victories this season, the Aztecs would have 41 victories spanning four seasons, equaling the winningest stretch in school history.
Hunting success in a thicket of thorns. It is what it is.
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