Down 52-7 in the fourth quarter of Saturday’s blowout loss
against Arizona, UCLA junior running back Maurice Drew was escorted
off the field, grabbing his right knee in pain.
Logic would suggest that a normal football player would sit out
the rest of the game with the score seemingly out of hand. But Drew
is not a normal football player.
Drew walked back onto the field and gained 15 yards on a screen
pass on the very next play.
“My leg is going to have to fall off for me to come off
the field,” Drew said. “When there are other guys
battling out there, I can’t just sit there on the sideline;
that would be being a coward.”
In fact, the way Drew approached that moment is the same way he
has approached his entire life.
According to Drew, there is no way that he, at a mere 5’6,
would be where he is today if it wasn’t that way.
“I’ve been doubted my entire life,” Drew said.
“Being smaller than everyone, you’ve got to have that
something extra.
“You have to have that extra drive that moves you farther
than others.”
Through that hard work, Drew is now on the list of numerous
national player of the year awards, and ranked in the top 10
nationally in many scoring categories.
But for a long time, he was not appreciated for his
abilities.
Coming out of high school, Drew was recruited by many schools as
a safety because they felt that he was too small to handle the
rigors of being a Division I running back.
“Those schools who told me that, just showed me they
didn’t believe in me,” Drew said. “The person who
believed in me from the very beginning was coach
Bieniemy.”
That coach is current UCLA running backs coach Eric Bieniemy,
who first recruited Drew when he was the coach at Colorado. When
Bieniemy, who is 5’7 himself, came over to UCLA in 2003, the
first person on his wish list was Drew.
“I had a really tight relationship with him when I was at
Colorado, and my goal was to get him here,” Bieniemy said.
“My philosophy is that you recruit the person, not the
player, and there is no better person than Drew.”
Drew’s character as a person had been tested as the Bruins
have suffered through mediocre seasons in his two years in the
program.
But none of that compared to the obstacle he was faced with
earlier this season when his grandfather, Maurice Jones, died
following UCLA’s second game of the season against Rice. He
suffered a heart attack in the stands while watching the game, and
Drew made it to the hospital right before his grandfather passed
away.
“It was kind of just a dream,” Drew said.
“When I woke up in the morning, I expected him to be there,
but then you when see him being put in the casket, you realize he
is gone.”
Since the game, Drew has changed the name on the back of his
jersey to “˜Jones-Drew’ in honor of his late
grandfather, and established himself as one of top play-makers in
the Pac-10, not to mention the nation.
A large part of that success, Drew says, has been the support of
the people he has had around him, and the people who mentored him
throughout high school.
“I have always been very close to my family and my
coaches,” Drew said. “They, especially my coaches at
(Concord) De La Salle, have helped me become the person that I am
today.”
Through his experiences as a child, Drew says, he grew into an
affable, fun-loving young man, which is given off by his dyed
dreadlocks, and his constant smile off the field.
Through experiences at Concord De La Salle High School, the
nation’s all-time winningest school, Drew learned the
ultimate self-discipline and a great work ethic for the game.
Today, Drew is a perfect combination of both.
“De La Salle really taught me to appreciate everything
about football,” Drew said. “They expected a lot out of
you, in terms of being dedicated, and that brought out the best in
us.”
“But don’t get me wrong, I also do like to have
fun.”
As coach Karl Dorrell says, Drew’s perfect mix has brought
a great presence into the Bruin locker room.
“His work ethic is amazing, and he is a great
teammate,” Dorrell said. “He is the guy you want on
your team, the one you want leading you to the promised
land.”
Now in his third year with the Bruins, Drew has embraced the
leadership role that was passed on to him by the running backs
before him, including current NFL running back Manuel White.
During the summer, Drew brought his teammates together, and
organized training sessions.
“I realized the role that I played on this team and I
embraced that,” Drew said. “I wanted the younger guys
to look up to me.”
Coach Bieniemy agrees with Drew.
“You see the younger guys out there, and they really
respect him,” Bieniemy said. “How could you not, he has
gone through so much, and look at where he is. I mean, no one of
this team has the work ethic that Maurice has.”
Because of those training sessions and that work ethic, Drew has
had the most healthy season of his career. Drew has appeared in all
nine of UCLA’s games and has averaged 171.11 all-purpose
yards per game, which ranks eighth in the nation.
The season has been a retribution for the inconsistency he
suffered through in his first two years. Last year, he set a UCLA
record with 322 rushing yards and five touchdowns in one game, and
then, in limited action, a net of 11 rushing yards over the last
three regular season games.
“I knew I was a better player than that,” Drew said.
“I didn’t want to be known as a guy who broke down
during the season. That’s not my personality. I’m
always going to fight.”
In last weekend’s game against Arizona, however, Drew
brought back those critics, failing to go over 100 all-purpose
yards for the first time all season and also failing to score a
touchdown for the first time.
For Drew, it’s something that he definitely doesn’t
want to go through again.
“It was definitely a wake-up call for us,” Drew
said. “It taught us that we have to play at the best of our
ability, or we have no chance to win.”
On Saturday, Drew finally has a chance to silence all the
critics as the Bruins enter their biggest game of the season
against Arizona State, with an opportunity for the Pac-10
conference title, and an undefeated home record on the line.
For Drew, it means a chance to show that he can respond when he
is injured and when the odds are against him and the Bruins.
“This is a championship game for us, we have everything to
lose,” Drew said. “We are not out of the Pac-10 race
yet. We have to come out victorious, there is no other
way.”