Bruins junior midfielder/forward Ryan Hollingshead scored the first goal of the night approximately 16 minutes into the first half.
It’s awards season in Los Angeles.
The signs are telltale: Grammy and Oscar are in town, and so are lavish parties, news helicopters and Meryl Streep.
There’s also lots of crying, lots of congestion on the streets and Weezy, so apparently award season is similar to allergy season.
Even though we might try to deny it, I think we all have some varying level of suppressed interest in awards. We make bets, we come up with drinking games, we critique the choices, we wonder why no one we know has seen “The Artist” and yet it won Best Picture at this year’s Academy Awards.
College sports have well-respected honors such as the Heisman Trophy and the Naismith Award, but nothing really as comprehensive as the Oscars or the Grammys. In honor of the season, I feel challenged to provide some type of award list recognizing the last calendar year (dating back to February 2011) in UCLA Athletics. I give you the Eshoffs!
BEST PICTURE: “The Goal.” The men’s soccer team had a rather epic run to the NCAA semifinals in the fall, coming up just shy of the national championship in a penalty-kick loss to North Carolina. But the lasting picture was junior Ryan Hollingshead’s left-footed blast from a distance to give the Bruins a 1-0 lead in the first half ““ a goal that energized the fan base and was the No. 1 play on that evening’s SportsCenter. Can’t argue with that.
BEST ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE: “The Ace.” The 2011 spring sports season was really all about one name: Trevor Bauer. The then-junior pitcher put together one of the greatest seasons ever seen in college baseball. He went 13-2 with a 1.25 ERA and led the country in strikeouts (203) and complete games (10). Those are video game numbers. The funky-motion South Campus-er was then taken third in the 2011 MLB Draft. Well-played.
BEST ACTRESS IN A LEADING ROLE: “The Gymnast.” Sophomore Samantha Peszek was a rather highly touted member of UCLA gymnastics’ class last spring, and she delivered on those expectations in a big way. Peszek won the balance beam title, the main course in the smorgasbord of women’s gymnastics events. She executed a trick called a full twisting tucked-back somersault, and she speaks Polish. Not sure which is harder on the tongue.
BEST SCREENPLAY: “The ‘Ship.” Nothing deserves more love than a national championship, which the women’s volleyball team delivered in December of 2011. The run fits in somewhere between the “Original” and “Adapted” screenplay categories ““ the program won titles in the early ’90s and is always among the nation’s upper tier, but coach Mike Sealy has been at the helm of the program for only two years!
The buzz around awards ceremonies tends to fluctuate from year to year, depending on the quality of the candidates. The stretch from February 2011 to February 2012 was by no means the most successful time frame of UCLA sports, but that doesn’t mean that awards aren’t merited.
It’s like one of those Oscar years where Martin Scorsese and Steven Spielberg are absent, when George Clooney and Streep don’t really have anything to offer up. The football team struggled and its coach was fired. The basketball programs are mired in rocky seasons, and the athletic director just made the biggest gamble of his career with the hire of the new football coach.
But why bemoan the absence of those more prestigious sports in the awards realm when you can take the opportunity to celebrate performers that aren’t always recognized?
If a silent film such as “The Artist” can be the Best Picture of the Year, then soccer, volleyball, baseball and gymnastics can certainly be the pillars of the UCLA athletics program. Pass the popcorn.
If you think his columns would make great silent film scripts, email Eshoff at reshoff@media.ucla.edu.