This season, Kevin Craft has been knocked down.
He has been knocked down by opposing players time and time again.
He has been knocked down by the media due to his season-long habit of committing untimely and costly turnovers.
He has been knocked down by a season which has been one of the most trying of any in recent memory for the Bruins, and will end without a bowl game for the first time since 2001.
Yet through it all, Craft has picked himself up off the ground, refusing to stay down, quit or lash out at other teammates for the cause of his struggles.
“I admire his courage,” coach Rick Neuheisel said. “I admire his toughness, both physical and mental, because he takes a lot of hits. If you’ve watched our games carefully, there’s a lot of shots he takes.”
It is no secret that Craft has had a difficult and inconsistent year in his first season as the Bruin signal-caller and that the offense has struggled along with him.
In 11 games as the Bruin starting quarterback, he has completed just 56.8 percent of his passes (221 of 389) for 2,252 yards and thrown for seven touchdowns. More disconcerting though is the 19 interceptions, six of which have been returned by the other team for touchdowns.
As a former quarterback himself, Neuheisel said he knows the anguish that comes with throwing multiple interceptions in a game, something Craft has done in five of the team’s 11 games. Neuheisel added that the human reaction to adversity is to blame others for one’s mistakes, yet Craft has yet to do that. Despite the resiliency Craft has shown, Neuheisel admitted that courage alone does not make up for the mistakes on the field that prove detrimental to the team.
“As a football coach, it’s not good enough,” Neuheisel said. “We can’t play quarterback that way and be successful and be the team that we want to be.”
It has been a tough role for Craft to fill in his short time at UCLA. After transferring from Mount San Antonio College last spring, Craft was not supposed to be the starting quarterback.
Yet due to a moment of sheer bad luck, seniors Pat Cowan and Ben Olson were injured on consecutive plays in spring camp, thrusting Craft into a quarterback competition he eventually won.
On Monday, reflecting on what has transpired over the course of the season, Neuheisel admitted that it may have been a lot to place on Craft’s shoulders at one time.
Yet according to offensive coordinator Norm Chow, that responsibility is why players choose to play quarterback.
“That’s what you do when you’re quarterback,” Chow said. “That’s why you play quarterback. That’s what I keep telling him. If you didn’t want to take that load on, then you shouldn’t be a quarterback. You should be a left tackle or a left guard or whatever. You can’t worry about that.”
Craft said that his mentality has been steady and has not changed from the time he first stepped foot on Bruin practice field buried on the depth chart.
It was last Friday’s loss to Arizona State on national television that seemed to encapsulate the tremendous struggles Craft has experienced this season in one game.
In the 34-9 loss, Craft threw three interceptions that were returned for touchdowns, and lost a fumble that resulted in another defensive touchdown for the Sun Devils.
On a night when the Bruin defense held the Arizona State offense to just six points and 122 total yards, it was Craft and the offense that proved to be the Bruins undoing.
“It’s hard when you go in the locker room after a game like that and you feel like that,” Craft said. “Everybody wants to achieve what we know we can.”
With the struggles on offense contrasted by the exceptional play of the defense, it would seem plausible that a faction could develop between the two units on the team. Yet according to defensive tackle Brigham Harwell, that scenario is far from the truth.
“They want to be the best, and they want to do good things, it’s just that some things just don’t go their way,” Harwell said. “But we believe in them. We do. It’s frustrating at times, but we tell them that we believe in you guys and got your back and we’re going to keep doing that until the end of the season. We came into this season together and we’re going to finish together. It’s not about offense, defense, special teams; it’s a unit.”
One source of struggles for both the offense and Craft has been the play of the offensive line. In the Bruins’ 11 games, there have been nine different starting lineups on the line, resulting in 35 sacks allowed and giving the Bruin running backs limited room to run. Heading into the game against USC, the Bruins are averaging just 2.6 yards per rush and 86.0 yards rushing per game, both last in the Pac-10.
With a constant shuffling of personnel along the line, Craft has been pressured and hit, forcing some quick and ill-advised decisions.
“Well you saw the beating he takes,” Chow said. “He gets up. He’s a tough-minded young guy. Obviously (he’s) had his ups and downs, and you know, he just hangs in there, so you got to admire him for that.”
Craft has faced an incredible amount of adversity this season, yet has maintained a positive attitude through it all.
“I really play for these guys out here,” Craft said. “No matter what happens out there, I’m trying to just put our team in the best situation to win and be successful. I’m going to be harder on myself than anybody is. If I come off the side and I’m getting yelled at, I’m harder on myself than anybody because I want it as bad for us, for me, as they do.”
At this moment in time, Neuheisel said he is not sure what Craft’s role will be next season, with quarterbacks Chris Forcier, Osaar Rasshan, Kevin Prince and Nick Crissman returning, and true freshman Richard Brehaut stepping foot on campus next year.
“I’m sure he’ll compete his tail off,” Neuheisel said. “We’ll play the best player and we’ll see who that is as soon as we get going in our offseason program.”
But for the moment, Craft is the Bruins’ quarterback for at least one more game, with the entire team standing on his shoulders.
“Kevin Craft is a solider,” running back Kahlil Bell said. “I have nothing but love and respect for that kid. He takes a whooping every single week and he keeps getting up. I got respect for that. All I can tell you is Craft’s a solider, and he’s our quarterback.”