SOUTH BEND, Ind. “”mdash; The echoes of Notre Dame Stadium were
silenced for an inexplicable 59 minutes of regulation.
But within a matter of three plays, the UCLA football team felt
the sonic eruption of all the Notre Dame pride bursting through in
the fourth quarter.
After protecting a lead for most of the game and dictating the
style of play, UCLA blew a four-point lead in dramatic ““ if
not nearly impossible ““ fashion, when Brady Quinn threw a
45-yard touchdown pass to Jeff Samardzija with 27 seconds left to
hand the Bruins a soul-crushing 20-17 loss at the hands of the
Fighting Irish.
SLIDESHOW
See more photos and listen to players and coaches react to UCLA’s
20-17 loss to No. 18 Notre Dame.
UCLA (4-3, 2-2 Pac-10) saw its dream of a transcendent win
snatched away on a no-timeout, three-play, 80-yard drive by No. 11
Notre Dame (6-1). It was the way the final minutes of the game
concluded that left many in disbelief of UCLA’s demise and
others to wonder if UCLA had the killer instinct to go for Notre
Dame’s jugular.
Instead of strutting off the field before a stunned crowd, UCLA
was forced to watch the Notre Dame players bask in the glow of
their improbable win.
“I’ve never lost a game like this in this fashion
before,” UCLA coach Karl Dorrell said.
UCLA was fiercely protecting a 17-13 lead with four minutes left
to play. As the game time slipped away, so did UCLA’s ability
to get a first down or make an open-field tackle.
The loss was all the more excruciating for the Bruins because
they could have ended the game without relying on their stellar
defense for one more stand.
After forcing a turnover on downs with a critical
fourth-and-inches stop on its own 35, UCLA had a chance to run the
clock out and keep Quinn off the field for good. A first down would
have meant that Notre Dame’s three remaining timeouts would
be useless with 2:20 left in the game.
But the play-calling became very conservative on UCLA’s
final possession. Quarterback Pat Cowan, making only his second
career start in place of Ben Olson, handed off to tailback Chris
Markey on three straight plays.
But they were the type of running plays that raised eyebrows
““ modest bursts up the middle with little chance of getting
the first down that would have ended the game.
On each play, Markey was met by a group of defenders that
swallowed him up at the line of scrimmage.
The Bruins bled the clock down to 1:02 and forced the Irish to
use all three timeouts to stop the clock. In doing so, however,
they gave Quinn the chance to beat them.
On fourth down, Aaron Perez’s punt reached the end zone
and gave Notre Dame the ball at its own 20-yard line. After holding
its opponent to only 265 total yards through 59 minutes with a
blitz-happy defensive scheme with man-to-man coverage, UCLA
switched to a prevent zone.
Facing a toothless pass rush, Quinn swung out of the pocket to
his right and completed a 21-yard pass to Samardzija, who stopped
the clock by catching the ball along the sideline.
On the next play, Quinn again rolled out of the pocket and found
David Grimes for a 14-yard completion to UCLA’s 45-yard
line.
For the third play of the drive, Quinn rolled to his right, this
time only after the secondary had covered the receivers and the
play broke down. That’s when Samardzija glided into sight on
a crossing pattern, and received a perfect strike from Quinn before
breaking two tackles ““ including an open-field miss by safety
Dennis Keyes ““ and running into the end zone to give Notre
Dame the lead with 27 seconds left to play.
“Unfortunately for us, we had a chance to win it,”
Dorrell said. “We were there all the way to the final minute
and didn’t find a way to finish, that’s what it comes
down to.”
An upset victory that could have brought UCLA to national
relevance suddenly became another disheartening loss that leaves
Dorrell’s program in obscurity.
In the locker room following the game, most UCLA players sat in
their uniforms, staring out into space, as if replaying the last
few minutes of the game in their heads. Some players didn’t
even take their helmets off; they just sat at their locker without
speaking and barely even moving.
The depression spread across the visitors’ locker room,
suggesting all the players realized the opportunity they had
squandered. The game was a chance to put UCLA back into the college
football consciousness, but it ended up being another highlight
reel for the “luck of the Irish.”
“I don’t know what happened,” said Cowan, who
completed 16 of 32 passes for 217 yards with two touchdowns and an
interception. “I really don’t.”
After the game, players kept coming back to the fact that they
felt the game was there for the taking, but they just
couldn’t get a firm grip on it.
“I made some good plays; a lot of people made some good
plays,” said wide receiver Marcus Everett, who had six
catches for 102 yards and a touchdown. “We had opportunities
to put them away, and we didn’t and they came out with a
“˜W.'”
Cowan tied the game at seven with a 54-yard touchdown pass to
Everett in the second quarter, and gave UCLA a 14-7 lead later in
the half with a 36-yard touchdown pass to William Snead, who was
playing in only his third game at tight end after switching from
defensive end.
But Cowan didn’t take solace in the fact that he came
close to outdueling Quinn, a Heisman Trophy candidate.
“The game is 60 minutes, so it doesn’t matter how we
played before we lost,” Cowan said.
The UCLA defense, led by defensive coordinator DeWayne
Walker’s aggressive scheme, had stifled Quinn all game and
made a joke out of the Notre Dame rushing attack. Defensive ends
Justin Hickman and Bruce Davis sacked Quinn a combined five times,
some of which were a product of excellent coverage in the secondary
that forced Quinn to remain in the pocket searching for receivers.
UCLA’s front seven also held Notre Dame tailback Darius
Walker to 53 yards on 21 carries ““ a 2.5 clip.
Although Quinn’s two-yard touchdown pass to Samardzija
started the scoring in the first quarter, it came on a
field-shortened drive after UCLA failed to convert a
fourth-and-inches.
A pair of Carl Gioia field goals brought Notre Dame to within a
point before Justin Medlock’s 29-yard field goal gave UCLA a
17-13 lead with 7:19 to play.
While the UCLA defense and the progress of Cowan’s play
seemed to be a silver lining, nothing could overcome the gloomy
outcome for the team.
Perhaps the program’s biggest upset in over a decade
became yet another could-have-been for a football team still
looking for respect.
“(Notre Dame) played hard all day today and fought through
their problems, and give them credit for that,” cornerback
Rodney Van said. “We have to learn to do the same because we
had a chance to put the nail in the coffin, but we just
didn’t do it.”
For UCLA, the challenge is accepting what transpired in South
Bend before spiraling into a long losing streak. Before that
happens, the players will have Samardzija’s game-winning
touchdown burned into the back of their minds.
“When I saw it happen, my heart stopped,” defensive
tackle Brigham Harwell said. “It hurts, no doubt. But we
can’t do anything now, except move on to the next game
(against Washington State).”
Moving on to next week is a cliche that might not sit well with
the UCLA football team. But it’s the only thing that this
team can do when trying to answer this question: How did the Bruins
manage to lose that game?
“Stuff like that happens in football,” Markey said.
“But I don’t know why it always happens to us. It gets
old.”