The 1945 Fresno State Bulldogs football team represented Fresno State Normal School—now known as

California State University, Fresno California State University, Fresno (Fresno State) is a public university in Fresno, California. It is one of 23 campuses in the California State University system. The university had a fall 2020 enrollment of 25,341 students. It offers bache ...

—during the

1945 college football season The 1945 college football season was the 77th season of intercollegiate football in the United States. Competition included schools from the Big Ten Conference, the Pacific Coast Conference (PCC), the Southeastern Conference (SEC), the Big Six ...

. Fresno State competed in the

California Collegiate Athletic Association The California Collegiate Athletic Association (CCAA) is a college athletic conference affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) at the Division II level. All of its current members are public universities, and upon U ...

(CCAA). However, due to the impact of World War II, the Bulldogs only played one conference game in 1945. There was no conference champion crowned in 1945. Since some colleges were still not playing football in 1945, the Bulldogs played the College of Pacific twice and Cal Poly twice. The team was led by first-year head coach

Alvin Pierson Alvin Peter "Pix" Pierson (1898 – 1974) was an American college football player and coach. He served as the head football coach at Fresno State College—now known as California State University, Fresno—in 1945 and again in 1949, compiling a ...

and played home games at

Ratcliffe Stadium Ratcliffe Stadium is a collegiate athletic venue in the western United States, located on the campus of Fresno City College in Fresno, California. Opened in 1926, it was renamed in 1941 after their first football coach, Emory Ratcliffe. The st ...

on the campus of

Fresno City College Fresno City College (FCC or "Fresno City") is a public community college in Fresno, California. It is part of the State Center Community College District within the California Community Colleges system. Fresno City College operates on a semester ...

Fresno, California Fresno () is a major city in the San Joaquin Valley of California, United States. It is the county seat of Fresno County and the largest city in the greater Central Valley region. It covers about and had a population of 542,107 in 2020, maki ...

. They finished the season with a record of four wins, six losses and two ties (4–6–2, 0–1 CCAA). The Bulldogs outscored their opponents 113–92 for the season, including shutting out their opponents five times and being shut out three times. At the end of the season, Fresno State was invited to the

Raisin Bowl The Raisin Bowl was an annual post-season American college football bowl game played at Ratcliffe Stadium in Fresno, California, from 1946 to 1949. The first four games were played on January 1, the last on December 31. The games pitted a Cali ...

, where they were defeated by the , 12–13.

Schedule

Notes

References

Fresno State California State University, Fresno (Fresno State) is a public university in Fresno, California. It is one of 23 campuses in the California State University system. The university had a fall 2020 enrollment of 25,341 students. It offers bachelo ...

Fresno State Bulldogs football seasons Fresno State Bulldogs football {{Collegefootball-1940s-season-stub