FanHouse UCLA Football

Last year, the University of California at Los Angeles went through four starting quarterbacks in a season which failed to meet expectations. New head coach Rick Neuheisel and offensive coordinator Norm Chow had hoped to turn the tide and avoid any quarterback controversy, naming Pat Cowan the starter in Spring Practice.

But just days after fifth-stringer Osaar Rashaan declared that he would start again as UCLA quarterback, he moved up to number three on the depth chart when Cowan and Ben Olson were carted off the field with injuries. Cowan, the erstwhile starter, will miss the 2008 season; Olson must recover from yet another surgery.

Things have gotten so bad that UCLA's coaches are now asking recruit Kevin Prince to leave school early in order to provide depth at the position. But Prince is still recovering from reconstructive knee surgery himself, so don't expect this high schooler to be a lucky charm to avoid injuries at the position!

But if things look glum in Westwood, Bruin fans can take consolation that they did not lose seven first- and second-round players to the NFL Draft!

When they aren't tasering students, it seems that the UCLA campus police are not brushing up on their background check skills.

After claiming that background checks on suspended Wide Receivers coach Eric Scott that turned up clean had been conducted by an outside third party, UCLA Athletic Director Dan Guerrero was forced to backpedal Monday and admit that the faulty scan was done by campus police. According to the Los Angeles Daily News, "the background checks are done using LifeScan, a fingerprinting program tied into various law enforcement entities, but not done by an outside agency.

The background checks are done by the UCLA Police Department, which notifies the campus human resources department." An alleged "breakdown in the process" kept athletic department officials from knowing that the new coach was, shall we say, less than a role model.

Meanwhile, Scott's lawyer Milton Grimes claims to have conducted his own investigation which he says will provide sufficient evidence to allegedly exonerate his client. Hopefully he did not use the UCLA campus police to conduct it!

Previously on FanHouse: UCLA Assistant Coach Arrested for Burglary

Have they lost their mind?

Last year's 13-9 victory was exciting and finally ended USC's 7-year victory streak (average score 35-18) over the Bruins. I can understand UCLA feeling good about themselves - they have a ton of guys coming back, It's the offseason when hope springs eternal, they've scored a few recruiting victories ...

But this is just stupid. Take it away, Dennis Dodd.

This is an issue because the Bruins got, uh, well, somehow left out of my first 2007 Top 25 in January. Being the good [Sports Information Director] that he is, Mr. [Marc] Dellins quickly shipped me the galleys of the spring guide. He apologized in advance for the typos (the bound version is coming). I didn't notice any except the bold prediction on Page 3 about beating USC. Again. By 20. To win the Pac-10. Now that's a good [SID].

No, that's an insane SID.

USC didn't need any extra motivation after dropping their championship hopes on the Rose Bowl turf last December, but now they've got it. I can only imagine Pete Carroll hearing about this (and he will), sitting in his office telling anyone within earshot: "For Realz? They aren't this stupid, are they?" with that confused look ironically last seen in last year's game against UCLA.

Anyway, at least we now know in advance - if it wasn't already a given - UCLA's confirmed a woodshed beating heading its way ETA 12/1/07 at the Coliseum. Sadly, there is no novelty in USC maulings of UCLA. See: 66-19, 47-22, 52-21 and 27-0.

Pete Carroll's biggest loss to date was by 11 points against Notre Dame his first year at Troy. That was a rebuilding team. Since then nobody's gotten the Trojans by anything more than seven points. I really just don't see where UCLA comes off not only calling their shot, but by 20 points. Cal might have something to say about their Pac-10 championship talk as well. If UCLA were to have that kind of season it would have made more sense not to draw a huge target on their chest, no? Let everyone gun for USC and stealthily claim the crown.

At least this once again confirms that UCLA defines itself by how it does against USC instead of more contemporary measures like "wins" and "championships". Because really, who would want to be defined by those things?

Previously at the FanHouse:
Cross-Town Rivals Cross in Town
UCLA Wins Battle in Local Recruiting War
It's Time to Let USC and UCLA Party Like its 1969
Top CFB Moments of 2003 #3: Tip, Pick, Chaos
USC vs. UCLA to Rematch December 1, 2007
Video: Rey Maualuga Delivers THE Hit of 2006
UCLA Fans Are Eye-Popping, Violent Fools
Aaaaah! Last Eight Minutes of USC-UCLA Liveblog! Aaah!
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Back in the day when the NCAA wasn't so rule happy and quasi-repressive, competing teams were allowed to wear similar uniforms. Certain teams could wear their Saturday finest home uniforms, and their opponent could do the same. This was aesthetically pleasing and created something of a tradition between cross-town rivals USC and UCLA.

Those days are gone however, and we're left with NCAA Rule I, Article 3 (a):

Players of opposint teams shall wear jerseys of contrasting colors, and the visiting team shall wear white jerseys.

White jerseys per Rule I, Article 3 (b) are defined as follows:

A white jersey is one with only contrasting playing numbers, player's name, school name, NCAA Football logo, school insignia, conference insignia, mascot insignia, game insignia, memorial insignia or the American flag attached.

In other words if I'm home you're wearing the road uniforms or one of us is getting docked a timeout. To put it kindly, this is lame.

I guess the reasoning was that back in the day with people still owning black and white televisions it was difficult to distinguish the good guys from the bad guys. Times have changed and the dinosaurs who before owned black and white TV's are now the ones who have yet to hop on HD train. With technology and the great American wealth machine doing the sport a favor, it's time to put the kibosh on this rule and restore a particular tradition within one of the game's great rivalries.

There's a famous painting of the 1967 USC/UCLA game well known to fans of both schools. In it, Trojan tailback O.J. Simpson is seen near the goal line amid a pile of football bodies. His home cardinal and gold complements the powder keg blue and gold of UCLA's players attempting to prevent a touchdown run. It's a beautiful scene and for a while was representative of the rivalry until the rule came into use some years later.

There's been talk in recent years of reviving this tradition, but neither Trojan coach Pete Carroll nor UCLA coach Karl Dorrell has been willing to part with timeouts to make it happen. This is tragic - but hopefully the NCAA can get around to either giving these teams an exemption or modifying the rule somehow to add just a little more tradition and prestige to this great game.

I've added the YouTube video of Simpson's famous 64-yard touchdown run below. The 1967 game was actually one of the better college football games ever played, matching number one UCLA against number two USC. The stars were UCLA's eventual Heisman trophy winner quarterback Gary Beban and USC's Heisman runner-up and 1968 winner tailback O.J. Simpson. USC would win 21-20 thanks to Simpson's run, catapulting them to the national championship.
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