EUGENE, Ore. “”mdash; The UCLA football team wanted to shock the nation on Thursday night. When the cameras turned in their direction though, the Bruins were staring a bull in the face, armed with nothing but a toothpick.
Playing Oregon (7-0, 4-0 Pac-10), the nation’s top-ranked team, on its home turf and on a nationally televised broadcast, UCLA (3-4, 1-3) looked just a little more than dazed and confused in its 60-13 thrashing.
It was the second straight blowout in league play for coach Rick Neuheisel and his team.
“We have got some serious work to do in rebuilding our program, getting back to where we can be a good football team, one that can compete in this conference successfully,” he said.
UCLA knew what was waiting for them, as Oregon averaged 54.3 points per game coming into the contest, but statistics like that are nowhere as painful as the real thing.
“I don’t think anyone expected it to be like this,” junior wide receiver Taylor Embree said.
The Ducks scored on nine of their 12 possessions, marching down the field with ease on nearly every play. Oregon coach Chip Kelly’s offense, championed by the play of quarterback Darron Thomas and running back LaMichael James, who helped the team to a healthy portion of its 582 total yards, worked to perfection.
The UCLA defense, constantly asked to catch the blurs of yellow and black that flew around the Autzen Stadium turf, had no answer.
“I felt like we stopped them with one thing, and then they hit us with another and then so on and so forth,” junior linebacker Sean Westgate said. “It wasn’t one play, it wasn’t one person, it was everybody at some point.”
On the other side of the ball, the Bruins were without redshirt sophomore quarterback Kevin Prince, who once again sat out because of a knee injury. Instead, they were led by sophomore backup Richard Brehaut.
Brehaut completed a respectable 16 of his 23 passes for 159 yards, but his interception on the team’s first drive gave Oregon the ball, a fatal mistake, as UCLA would find out repeatedly over the course of the game.
“That’s on me,” Brehaut said. “I can’t turn the ball over like that and expect to quarterback us to a win.”
When the Bruins had the ball, which was often, considering the speed with which the Ducks worked their magic, the Bruins had flashes of cohesion. UCLA’s running backs put together some quality runs, but it was never enough to get the Bruins all the way down the field.
Redshirt senior kicker Kai Forbath was the only Bruin to score in the first 58 minutes of the game, nailing his two field goal attempts.
Brehaut finally got the Bruins a 6-yard rushing touchdown on their last drive of the game.
The sell-out crowd of 59,372 that gathered at the imposing Eugene venue remained true to its reputation as one of the more boisterous fan bases in the country. It obviously inspired by the recent coronation of its team to the top of the national rankings. The fans employed a “yellow-out” that painted the stands in the bright team colors, while the air was flush with the sound of their constant buzz.
After a loss like this, it’s a sound the Bruins and their fans won’t soon forget.
Prince To Have Surgery
Prince will have arthroscopic surgery on Saturday to determine the extent of the right knee injury that kept him from playing against Oregon.
UCLA’s replacement on Thursday, Brehaut, will continue to be the starter.
The surgery will almost certainly sideline Prince for the team’s next contest, on Oct. 30 against Arizona, and possibly for the following game, against Oregon State.