The Bruin landslide was in motion.
It was just one loss, but the fashion in which it happened last
week got people thinking of a potential collapse that has plagued
Bruin teams of years past. Skeptics were expecting the 2005 UCLA
football team to have another late season letdown, but that was far
from the minds of the players and coaches.
Coming off last week’s numbing loss to Arizona, it was a
mystery which team would appear: The one that reeled off eight
straight wins to start the year, or the one that lost by 38 points
to a Wildcat team with a losing record.
Enter UCLA senior quarterback Drew Olson, who dispelled any
doubts.
It was on the biggest stage in front of a television audience.
It was his final home game at the Rose Bowl. It was the
Bruins’ shot at keeping a glimmer of hope for a BCS bowl
game, and Olson delivered, throwing for five touchdowns on 22 of 27
passes and for 510 yards in the 45-35 victory over Arizona State on
Saturday.
“You can’t ask for anything better than this,”
Olson said. “To play my best game at UCLA in front of a crowd
like this with everything we had on the line, it’s
satisfying.
“Probably the best I’ve felt ever.”
Fourteen other seniors joined in the celebration Saturday with
nearly 85,000 fans on hand. Senior players, such as safety Jarrad
Page and tight end Marcedes Lewis, took pictures with teammates at
the place they called home for four years.
“We all said we’d come out here and play a great
game after the embarrassment we had to play through last Saturday
that we brought on ourselves,” Page said. “We said
it’ll never happen again.”
But it was a particularly fitting night for Olson, who has
endured numerous quarterback controversies and was hampered by a
season-ending injury last year. On his senior night, he snapped
Cade McNown’s single-season school record of 25 touchdown
passes and now sits atop the UCLA annals with 30. Olson also
finished just three yards shy of McNown’s 1998 school record
of 513 passing yards against Miami.
UCLA coach Karl Dorrell was pleased with all fronts of
UCLA’s game.
“We had to make a statement this week given the misfortune
of how we played last week,” Dorrell said. “I’m
just proud of how this team responded given the setback, the hiccup
or road block or whatever happened last week. They responded
admirably. Tremendous character, a lot of heart.”
But the lasting image the seniors and the rest of the No. 12
Bruins (9-1, 6-1 Pac-10) want lies three weeks away against a team
no current Bruin has been on the winning side of. The hype began
Saturday as a chorus of “Beat ‘SC” chants erupted
with less than a minute to go in the game.
UCLA’s final regular-season game will be for a share of
the Pac-10 title if it can knock off top-ranked USC (10-0, 7-0).
The last time that happened was in 1998 under former coach Bob
Toledo. Title aside, senior cornerback Marcus Cassel sees it as a
rivalry game above all else.
“They can be 0-10, we can be 0-10, but that’s not
what’s it’s about. We’re two teams in L.A.
““ there’s bragging rights,” Cassel said.
“They don’t want us to win. We don’t want them to
win. We don’t like them, they don’t like us. It’s
not about the championship. We just want to beat them.”
But the topic of Saturday’s game would not have been USC
if it weren’t for Olson. In a team meeting last Sunday, Olson
told his players not to lose sight of the season after one loss. He
told them what the season meant so far and that there was no reason
to just fold. A fast start was the Bruins needed.
UCLA got that on the opening play when Olson dumped off a 5-yard
slant pass that was turned into a 91-yard trip to the end zone by
junior wide receiver Joe Cowan.
“That’s the first thing that Coach Dorrell said in
the locker room, that we needed to start fast. Somebody make a big
play,” said Lewis, who finished with 108 receiving yards and
two touchdowns.
“Don’t let the play come to you. Go get the play.
The slant to Joe gave us a jump-start and we never looked
back.”
UCLA’s defense appeared to have recovered from last week,
when it gave up 52 points and 519 yards of total offense. On the
Sun Devils’ first possession, redshirt senior linebacker
Spencer Havner recovered a fumble caused by a bad snap. Five plays
later, sophomore running back Chris Markey broke loose on the right
sideline and scampered in for a 56-yard touchdown as UCLA lead 14-0
with 9:54 remaining in the first quarter.
Arizona State would crawl back into the game behind a steady run
game. Freshman running back Keegan Herring, who racked up 129 yards
rushing in the game, scored the Sun Devils’ first
touchdown.
UCLA and Arizona State exchanged blows, but a key miscue shifted
the momentum to the Sun Devils’ side. In the middle of the
second quarter, Arizona State punted but regained possession after
the ball struck the back of UCLA’s Michael Norris. The Sun
Devils’ Jamar Williams recovered the ball on the 6-yard line,
which eventually led to a touchdown. On the next possession, the
Bruins failed to convert on a fourth and two and Arizona
State’s Terry Richardson scored his second touchdown, tying
the game at 28-28.
Though not a defensive team, the Bruins have shown they can get
a defensive stop when they need it. UCLA came out in the third
quarter and shut the Sun Devils down.
Cassel came up big for UCLA, causing two fumbles on Arizona
State senior wide receiver Derek Hagan, who is only the third
player in Pac-10 history with 240 catches and 3,500 yards, that
eventually led to touchdowns by Lewis and Bruin sophomore wide
receiver Brandon Breazell.
“We knew as a defense and as a team that we can play
better football,” Cassel said. “We just had to come out
here and show it. We had to show our desire.”
After Justin Medlock converted a 27-yard field goal for the
Bruins, Arizona State trailed by 10 with 2:06 remaining.
UCLA’s defensive line penetrated and sacked Carpenter twice
on the Sun Devil’s final drive. Carpenter was sacked five
times.
The Bruins can celebrate and enjoy the win, but three weeks from
now, the game against USC is going to be like climbing Mount
Everest, Olson said. He understands UCLA is going to be written
off, just like it has been all season.
Asked if anyone will think the Bruins have a chance, Olson was
as poised as he was in the pocket on Saturday.
“No one will. We’ll be all right though,” he
said with a smirk.