When John David Booty’s desperation heave downfield landed
on the ground, Matt Slater couldn’t stop running.
His adrenaline wouldn’t let him.
As the redshirt junior cornerback ran past his celebrating
teammates who stormed the field, Slater’s legs collapsed
beneath him. He lay in the corner of the end zone, facing a sea of
UCLA students with arms raised to the sky, crying so hard that his
entire upper body shook.
Junior Taylor jumped onto a platform in front of the UCLA bench,
stamping his cleats. His voice cracked in competition with the
90,622 in attendance at the Rose Bowl, but Taylor kept repeating
“I got me one.”
In his hands was a “Fuck ‘SC” shirt that had
“MC 15″ written over it to commemorate his former
teammate Marcus Cassel, who died Nov. 17 from wounds inflicted in a
one-car accident.
Chris Markey did laps up and down the sideline, hugging everyone
he saw.
Bruce Davis
was buried under cameras and microphones when he took a look behind
him at the thousands of people in blue.
“I don’t want to walk out of here,” Davis
said. “This is the best moment of my life.”
This was the scene following UCLA’s 13-9 upset victory
over No. 2 USC at the Rose Bowl on Saturday.
In many ways the final score reflected an end to an
unprecedented era.
The Trojans’ seven-game winning streak against their
crosstown rivals had ended. Their run at a fourth straight national
championship appearance had ended. The Bruins’ fourth-quarter
meltdowns against their rivals had ended. UCLA coach Karl
Dorrell’s futility against his rival had ended, as had USC
coach Pete Carroll’s unbeaten dominance over UCLA.
But players and coaches involved in the win claimed it was all
about a new beginning.
“I know how important this is to the Bruin family,”
Dorrell said. “It’s been a long time coming. It’s
special.”
The Bruins (7-5, 5-4 Pac-10) were able to knock the Trojans
(10-2, 7-2) out of the national title game.
For one evening, at least, the Los Angeles football conversation
started and ended not with what the Trojans did wrong, but what the
Bruins did right.
“The best part about this game is that we went out there
and outplayed them,” junior linebacker Christian Taylor said.
“They didn’t hand it to us, we just played
better.”
What the Bruins did right was put a defensive scheme together
that dominated the Trojan offense in a way that no team in the
country has been able to do in the last six years.
The nine points their offense managed is the lowest total since
the Trojans lost the 2001 Las Vegas Bowl in Carroll’s first
season. Taylor led a linebacker corps that held the Trojans to 55
net rushing yards on 29 carries, a 1.9 average.
“We were able to pressure them all day and it got to
them,” junior cornerback Rodney Van said. “We would go
to the line of scrimmage, look in (John David) Booty’s eyes
and see that he was rattled. That’s when we knew it was our
day.”
But it would take one jaw-dropping play from an unlikely hero
before Van’s words rang true.
The Bruins were nursing a four-point lead after Justin
Medlock’s 31-yard field goal with 8:49 left in the fourth
quarter when they were tested one last time to end a week full of
challenges.
Although the Trojans hadn’t shown the offensive firepower
that scored 44 points against Notre Dame the previous week, Booty
engineered a comeback drive in which he had the distinct look of a
championship-caliber quarterback.
Booty drove his team from the USC 28-yard line down to the UCLA
18-yard line with 1:15 left in the game.
For the first time all day, the Bruin defense seemed tired and
vulnerable. But on third-and-four, UCLA was able to make one last
stand.
Senior linebacker Eric McNeal blitzed off the right end, timed
his jump, deflected Booty’s pass up into the air, and dived
to intercept the ball just before it hit the ground.
What happened in the next several minutes was characterized by
most of the UCLA football team as a blur.
Sophomore quarterback Pat Cowan led the offense back out onto
the field while the Rose Bowl was bubbling with anticipation of
what the Bruins hadn’t done in eight years. The Bruins
drained the clock down to four seconds before giving it back to the
Trojans at their own 12-yard line.
The Rose Bowl had been overflowing with celebration in the
stands after McNeal’s interception, but Dorrell’s eyes
were following Booty’s last throw until it landed on the
ground and his players rushed onto the field.
“I didn’t believe it until the clock went to
zero,” Dorrell said. “We’ve been through a tough
situation before in Notre Dame, and I wasn’t going to
celebrate early.”
While it was the Bruin defense that made the stand in the
closing minutes of the game, it was an efficient, although perhaps
mild, offense that gave the Bruins their first lead in the
crosstown rivalry in Dorrell’s tenure.
Cowan, who was only named the starter three days before the
game, led his team on a 12-play, 91-yard drive to start the
scoring. On that drive, Cowan scrambled for 55 yards on four
carries, including a 1-yard touchdown.
Following a USC safety and a 1-yard touchdown run by C.J. Gable
at the end of the second quarter, Cowan led the Bruins on
second-half drives that resulted in Medlock field goals of 22 and
31 yards.
“He’s grown as a leader, and now when we look in his
eyes, everyone trusts him,” junior guard Shannon Tevaga
said.
The Bruins’ win surely cleansed the wounds of the 20-17
loss at Notre Dame earlier in the year, as well as last
years’ embarrassing 66-19 loss to the Trojans. Following the
chaotic celebration on the field, Dorrell and his players
reiterated that the win had less to do with the past and more to do
with the future. With high school recruits on official UCLA visits
glad-handing coaches and players in the postgame locker room,
several members of the team spoke about what this win means to the
football program moving forward.
“We know how much this means to the whole UCLA
community,” junior cornerback Trey Brown said. “This
win is for them and having to wait too long to see this. This is
only the start of making UCLA an elite program again.”