FRESNO, Calif. >> Where he once parked his Bulldog-red Hummer outside the Fresno State football offices, then-coach Pat Hill long ago carved the commandment “Play Hard!” in cement.

These days it might be more appropriate to punctuate it with a question mark instead.

For not only have the current Bulldogs squandered games, more and more it looks like they have lost their long-characteristic grit and swagger.

After contentious visits to a packed, raucous Bulldog Stadium over the past 30 years, come Saturday’s game, the University of Hawaii might not recognize the place — or an opponent careening toward the worst season in its proud history.

With two games left, the Bulldogs, who have never lost 10 games in an all-intercollegiate season or won fewer than two, are 1-9 (0-6 Mountain West). What’s more, among 128 Football Bowl Subdivision teams, the Bulldogs are one of just two (Kansas is the other) without a victory against an FBS opponent this season.

Fresno State has lost 11 games in a row against FBS teams since last November’s win at Aloha Stadium and become a mainstay in Bottom Ten polls. In the interim the only victory has come over lower-tiered Sacramento State.

The steady decline from 11-2 with Hill’s players, including quarterback Derek Carr, in 2013 to 6-8, 3-9 and 1-7 this year with his own material, cost head coach Tim DeRuyter his job last month.

So bad had things become on the field and so disinterested had fans become at the turnstiles, where a 37-year attendance low is trending, the Bulldogs will eat the $3.1 million remaining on DeRuyter’s contract in addition to shelling out more than $1.5 million for next season’s replacement, ex-Bulldogs quarterback and Cal coach Jeff Tedford.

It is a sign of just how far the Bulldogs have fallen and how little hope their usually fervent Red Wave followers hold for the remainder of this cursed season that Saturday’s crowd is expected to be by far the smallest the Rainbow Warriors will see in their 13 visits since 1985.

The Bulldogs have averaged 90 percent of the 41,031 capacity for games involving UH over the years, but will likely play in a two-thirds-empty facility Saturday despite a promotion that allows anyone buying a ticket to the defending Mountain West Conference champion men’s basketball game to attend the football game for free.

The announcement last week of Tedford, who will focus on recruiting after closing out consultant duties at the University of Washington, has made it easy to write off the final two games of this season and look to 2017.

All of which has cranked up the degree of difficulty for interim head coach Eric Kiesau. Choosing his words carefully at Monday’s press conference, Kiesau said, “There’s been a little bit of — I don’t want to say air out of the balloon — but we’re going to (have to) pump up the balloon.”

Kiesau said, “You have to kind of re-focus them on what’s important and that’s how we finish and how these seniors finish. If guys want to turn the page (now) and look to the future, in my opinion, that is the wrong statement to make for these seniors.”

Kiesau hasn’t taken away the sideline benches like UH’s Nick Rolovich — yet. But he has gone deep in the motivational guide to coaching looking for solutions. He has taken players’ names off their jerseys, put up “All In” signs and even put towels over the mirrors in an apparent attempt to get players to think “team” instead of individuals.

The result: In their last game the Bulldogs were shut out for the first time in six years, 27-0 by Colorado State.

Rolovich maintains the (4-7) Rainbow Warriors won’t take Fresno State lightly, but the ’Bows might not get that chance. The way things have been going, some suspect the Bulldogs may have already beaten them to it.

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@staradvertiser.com or 529-4820.