The following is a special guest post from Copyboy, a good friend of ours who is has been a diehard UCLA football fan for decades. He also happens to be a partner in a digital production firm in Portland, Oregon that specializes in website & application development, content production, and branding. - BN Eds.

Regardless of what you think of Jim Mora as a football coach, it cannot be denied that UCLA made a significant break from its past when it hired him. Mora, unlike his predecessors, is not a company man, and notoriously cheap UCLA ("Wooden worked for peanuts!") is finally putting together a nationally-competitive financial package for its football staff. Does this mean that UCLA football has turned the corner? Will wins follow the money? Maybe. Hopefully.

But recent events, including the amateurish in-house marketing campaign announcing Mora's hiring, are a reminder that UCLA still has a lot of work to do, beginning by recognizing that its football program is a brand, and that right now, that brand needs a complete overhaul.

UCLA football players ditch practices by going "over the wall," without repercussions.

The athletic department withholds bowl stipend payments, meant to cover players' meal expenses while school is on break, to those who skip voluntary practices.

Shortly after Rick Neuheisel is hired in 2007, inheriting a team devoid of talent at the precise moment USC was competing for national titles, UCLA marketing produces an ad with his image and the headline, "The football monopoly in Los Angeles is officially over."

UCLA is blown out on national television at Arizona, and several players are suspended following an ugly, shameful brawl. Regardless, Neuheisel, widely seen as a lame duck even before the game, is allowed to keep his job. Etc., etc.

UCLA football fans rightly wonder why decisions like these get made. They should be even more curious about how they get made.

For example, just how did someone arrive at the decision to withhold those stipend payments? Put aside for a second your opinion on the decision and ask yourself, On what basis was it made? In the Morgan Center, is there a set of guidelines someone can turn to when such matters arise? Is there some widely-adopted language, a mission statement, say, to help ensure that issues like this are dealt with consistently?

From my point of view - as someone who has helped leading brands develop such language, and also as a longtime observer and fan of UCLA football and basketball - it certainly appears as if people in the Morgan Center, given all the inconsistencies we've witnessed, are making day-to-day decisions absent guidelines and brand strategy.

Continue reading this post »

A special guest post from BruinBlue with poignant thoughts on yet another bungled football coaching search by the clueless UCLA regime. - BN Eds.

First, and most important, they don't know what they're doing in the athletic department at UCLA. None of them. That does not mean that Mora is guaranteed to be a bad coach, or fail, though the latter is pretty likely. But it means that the people who run coaching searches at UCLA absolutely do not know how to do it. Obviously, they don't have the capacity to close the deal with a top-tier candidate like Petersen. But most importantly, they don't know how to identify the right kind of coach to potentially turn this program around in a big way, which so desperately needed to be done.

Now, after years and years of this, after all this hope and ultimate letdown, it certainly has occurred to me that maybe "turning this program around in a big way " is not that important to them. And when I say "them," I of course mean the AD, his helpers in the search, the Chancellor who signs off on the hires. I think that there is this incredibly foolish propensity to want to stay in a comfort zone, even to hire people who had some connection to UCLA or to Terry Donahue. Yes, I go on about Donahue; but seriously, why do you think that Mora, who was not on any other lists, was on this one? Because his father was an assistant coach with Donahue in the '70's, here, and because Mora himself was an assistant for five or so years when Donahue was GM in San Francisco. Weren't you originally surprised to see Mora on the list at all? Well, that's why he was on it, and that's why ultimately Guerrero fell back on him, when he had no other idea of what to do. To me, that means that Donahue had a hand of some sort in the four football head coach hires after he retired in 1995. That is not a good thing at all, but UCLA simply cannot get beyond it.

Now, the other thing is that it is obvious, as we have discussed before, that Guerrero has no clue as to the names and careers of national college football coaches. I actually think that he has not heard of most of them. This is more than appalling. Why was there at least no approach to Dan Mullen, or to, say, Gary Anderson, or maybe Paul Johnson? Because Guerrero doesn't know any coaches, outside of those his teams have played (Sumlin), those who coached in this conference (Bellotti), those who the search firm came up with last time, and who knew Chancellor Block (Golden), and those who Donahue knows (Mora). That's it. That's basically the Guerrero list of coaches. So we are almost playing with two hands tied behind our back, because we don't know any good coaches to look at. That is why for three straight searches, we have not gone after any of these second-tier names which many of us who closely follow college football carefully watch, and actually make lists of, to try to help in some way. They don't know, and they don't care, at UCLA.

Continue reading this post »

The following post is from BruinBlue. It is being published here with his permission. - BN Editors.

By any reasonable measure of the term, UCLA does not currently have an elite basketball program. That actually hurts to write, but it is true. If we define "elite" as a program which is usually in the top ten, usually earns a top two seed in the NCAA tournament, we are not elite. North Carolina, Kansas, Duke, are elite. Kentucky is essentially there, too, irrespective of whether we condemn the way they do it. Connecticut may not be quite there, but  is obviously very close.  Those programs certainly don't win a title every year, but they are usually strongly in the running; and by tourney time have earned a seed which strongly positions them to make a big run.

In the Steve Lavin era, UCLA was a top two seed one time, his first year. In the Ben Howland era, UCLA has been a top two seed three times out of eight years. In the other five years, UCLA was no higher than a six seed, or did not make the tournament. Certainly better, but not elite. And of course UCLA has not won a title in any of those seasons. In fact, we have won one national title in the 37 years since the greatest coach of all time in any sport, John Wooden, retired. In that period, Duke has won four titles. Carolina has won four, and more are soon to come. Connecticut has won three, as has Indiana, though nothing at all lately from that program. Kentucky has three as well. Schools with two include Louisville, Kansas, Michigan State, Florida. You will note that five schools have won 17 of those titles; nine schools have won a total of 25 of them. For all the talk of parity, the elite schools ultimately win almost all of the titles. And we have one title in 37 years.

Obviously, we were elite for three years in a row under Ben Howland. I don't think that being elite is something that goes on and off, so certainly you can have a down year and still be elite. But not three years in a row in which you go #6 seed, losing season, #7 seed. And now, with Malcolm Lee almost certainly going pro, we are looking at an upcoming season where we will be at best on the outskirts of the top 25. Four years in a row. And after that? Well, if we have the homerun recruiting season we are desperately hoping for, we will still be too young and inexperienced to be much more than at the low end of the top 20. If we have a good but not great recruiting season, then it's worse than that. It is certainly possible that the year after that one, 2013/2014, UCLA could have a big year. But how long does anyone expect any new big-time recruit to stay here? One year? Two at most?

Squarely facing facts, we are losing players too fast, and not sufficiently replacing them. We all know that every school loses players early, but we lose ours more regularly and more quickly. At least some of the Carolina and Duke players stay. This year, we will lose the only two players who have any legitimate chance to be drafted. We almost always do. Not all schools will, and that is the difference. And then of course, we have been struggling to recruit consistently well. We are not recruiting as well as the elite schools, though we do get at least one really good recruit in most years. Carolina wins titles because they have kept some players longer than expected, and because they recruit like demons. Kentucky recruits a top class every year, and Kansas usually does as well. Arizona is starting to do that. We have not been able to recruit even one top point guard for three years, even though that position was available to any talented freshman who could come in and simply outplay Jerime Anderson. We are now dipping into the ranks of JCs and transfers, clearly a sign that we are having major problems in recruiting.

So there are real problems and concerns. They will not go away by ignoring them or pretending that we are in much better shape than we are, or by saying "We are UCLA! Look at all those championship banners! No one has a better program than we do!" This willful delusion on the part of the athletic department and too many fans, has contributed to our many terrible coaching hires; the belief that was held by too many for about 30 years, that virtually anybody could run this program. The result of course was that we have won but the one national title in 37 years.

So what about Ben Howland? Howland was one of the only two solid hires made in that period, the other being Larry Brown. Howland is one of the better coaches in the college game, in terms of fundamentals. He is also a good person, always supportive of his players when talking to the media, unlike some coaches. And he is very appreciative of UCLA, and of course of John Wooden. However, that is not the whole story. As stated, we have not been elite for three years, now going on four and probably at least five. One can look for excuses and explanations for this or that defection or missed or overrated recruit. But ultimately the bottom line becomes the program's status. And our current status points to there being some significant problems, most clearly our inability to keep any player even one year longer than the first year he has any chance to be drafted; and our inability to recruit at a consistently high level.

Continue reading this post »

A guest post from "Bruin Blue" which raises a good question. There is not necessarily any correct answer to this question. We are looking for reflective and well thought out responses to this post. If you have an extensive response with data and citations, we recommend sharing that as a fanpost. - BN

This is not being written as a reaction to the loss at Washington. Or the fact that we have lost in Seattle seven times in a row. Or that we have lost three out of five to Arizona since Sean Miller got there. Or that we now virtually never win as an underdog, or against any nonconference team with athletic offensive firepower. But all of these things seem to tend toward the conclusion that the style of play which we might call "Ben Ball" has already achieved its best results for us, and that we are now potentially locked into a situation which is not at all the most conducive for reattaining elite status.

The style of play Ben Howland favors is what he learned at Weber State, from the coaching tree of Dick Motta, and at UCSB under Jerry Pimm. It relies on tough man-to-man defense, and an offense which is setting picks and screens, continually trying to work for a matchup advantage, or a close-in shot. It is an old-fashioned style. Not that old-fashioned styles can't work, but there is a reason that they are out of fashion. I suppose that Bo Ryan and Tom Izzo play comparable styles, but that is in the Big 10, with blue-collar athletes; and against other conference teams which play similarly. Most top coaches either play uptempo out of nature, or (like Coach K) have adapted a new style to fit the demands of the current game, with the three-point shot, and quicker athletes.

When Howland came here, he revitalized UCLA basketball. He taught defense, such as we hadn't played for a long time. His offenses were always unexciting and unexplosive. But he caught the Pac-10 in a down cycle where with Lute's downward trend, there really were no other good coaches, certainly none which could match Howland's defenses. So we thrived. And we pulled those two great upsets against Memphis and Kansas (though in the latter case we were only a one-point underdog). And we made those three straight final fours, though we were beaten by double digits each trip there, where our offense simply couldn't manufacture enough points to match the firepower of those opponents.

Now, three years later, we are at a stage where the offensive shortcomings of this system are easily apparent. We always struggle to score points. Sometimes it is absolutely excruciating. We start almost every game the same way; dribbling around, looking for an opening, taking the ball back out. We average about ten points in the first ten minutes of a game. Eventually, against teams we are better than, we find the seams in their defense, and slowly pull away. But against teams with firepower, we usually don't win, because we are too offensively challenged. They have more ways to score than we do. Eventually they hit some shots, and we fall behind and lose. Last night, Washington, which is not a particularly good team right now, was 7 for 33 in the first half. We should have been up by ten or fifteen points, but because of our slow-paced and ineffective offense, we were up by one. And eventually they hit some shots, and we didn't hit enough, and we lost.

Continue reading this post »

The following post is from a friend of ours who shared this on BruinReportOnline. He gave us permission to feature it in this community. Calabruin is a UCLA alum, who bleeds blue and gold, and also has been a season ticket holder for 18 years.

I have been a season ticket holder for 18 years, and have watched the slow disintegration of season ticket holder support. Last night finally got to me. I won't discuss student support/attendance etc. I will leave that to others, but to my fellow season ticket holders, we need to talk.

You demand excellence from our coaches, our team, our program, and yet we seem to act like we are attending a free seminar being given by the dude discussing actuary tables!  Yeah I'll show up as time allows, oh this is boring? Check please, I'm outta here early.

For starters, I have gone to 10 games this year and have made sure my tickets were used by other Bruins for all but one other.  Given them away if necessary to make sure they were used. Why waste them. So some of y'll had stuff happening over the holidays, couldn't make it, couldn't find someone to foist the tix on. Got it.

But game time attendance for Pac Ten games, specially the Thursday games HAS BEEN DISGRACEFUL. You are paying some damn good money for these seats and they aren't being used, and the seats between the baskets, the prime seats are at best 2/3 full? If we the fans act like we don't give a damn, why should the players?

Continue reading this post »

Took the liberty to turn Insomniac's comment into a blogpost. There is also more on official site's What's Bruin Blog. GO BRUINS. -N

Yesterday was yet another incredible day for Tyler. As soon as he arrived to the practice field, Coach Neuheisel called him over, gave him the coach’s whistle and had him lead the team out to their drills. He was also given a tour of the locker room, coach’s offices, film room, weight room, and given free reign over the entire field at practice.

At the end of practice, he was invited into the middle of the team huddle and given an official jersey (as well as a ton of other gear) and made an honorary team member. He then helped the team breakdown the end of practice and go over some administrative stuff before meeting with the media. I recorded a bit of that encounter on my iPhone. Unfortunately, with the wind, it’s a little tough to hear, but as a proud papa, I’d be remiss not to share the video.

Among Coach's many aphorisms, perhaps my favorite is, "Make each day your masterpiece." As Bruins, we were fortunate enough to have been led by a coach who lived that maxim out on a daily basis for almost 100 years. I’ve personally been fortunate enough to have a child who’s exemplified that philosophy for eight years. And our family is incredibly blessed to be surrounded by so many people who have helped make living that ideal a reality. Thank you for that.

-insomniacslounge

A promise (somewhat) is still a promise! So here is this week's Rabbit on the front page. GO BRUINS. -N

We need to help our Bruins Football Team to continue to win by: upping our chatter, more blogging, daily dawning of The Blue and Gold and the biggest Enchilada of them all, "COLOR the stadium in BLUE". I know it IS Washington State but we did lose to Kansas State! So let not count on anything but us Bruins! I’ll be located this Saturday in Section 22-L, Row 43 and Seats 3 & 4 stop by and say hello and bring your own peanuts.

Jackrabbit4 says: "UCLA 27 vs WS 3".

Go Bruins

-Jackrabbit4

By BruinBlue

A good deal deeper than Nikola Dragovic, who is a terrible player, but who will mercifully be gone soon. Deeper than James Keefe, who tries, but who inexplicably got worse in four years.  Deeper than Malcolm Lee, who has flashes of talent, but who spends every day thinking of how to get out of here.  Deeper than Bobo Morgan, who is a cheerful mediocrity; or Jerime Anderson, who is actually painful to watch; or even Drew Gordon, who took off seven games into the season.

Our problems come down to two indisputable facts: We have unaccountably recruited several inadequate players in the last few years. And those few players we have recruited who have great potential, almost always vacate the program after one or two years. And it doesn't take a mathematician to figure out that you absolutely cannot have an elite program with this formula. It is like the algebra problems where the reservoir is being filled with water from one hose, while it is being drained by another hose which is more powerful and faster. We recruit some players; some of them are no good; the ones who are good take off; and we have to immediately recruit some more of them. And if we should start to become unable to recruit many top players--and I think that this is going to become a real possibility--well, you can pretty easily predict the ultimate outcome.

We haven't gotten to that stage yet, but I am not at all optimistic that we are going to be able to recruit well in the next class. We've got a few players for next year. Smith is definitely a strong recruit, and Lamb is probably pretty good. And then we have a JC player who won't be here long, but who might help. Other than that, we are apparently going after Europeans (shudder), more JCs (hard to imagine it has come to that), and undersized sleeper players (smacks of desperation). Why should anyone just blithely imagine that this is going to get better next year or the year after that?

Continue reading this post »

The following are excerpts from Wooden On Leadership, a present I picked up for X-mas.  I was reading it yesterday while flying home from snow covered DC. For some reason the following grafs from Coach about his team from 50 years ago (pp. 11-13) really struck me and wanted to share it with rest of you. I highlighted the parts, I also marked up in the hard copy while I was reading it. Oh if you don’t have a copy of Coach's book, you can pick it up by going here. Anyway, here is Coach talking about his 1959-60 UCLA basketball team. GO BRUINS. -N

In 1959-60, UCLA struggled to stay above .500, and, in fact, we had to win our last game of the season to finish with a record of 14-12. From a win-loss point of view, it was the worst year I’d ever had as head coach at UCLA.  Some fans began to grumble about our "poor" results": "The program is mired down," some said, "Wooden can’t win in the postseason"; "UCLA doesn’t have a post-season." And there were other things said along that line. I had a different opinion.

The 1959-1960 season had been a success and pleased me a great deal, especially when I recalled a prediction made by Sam Balter, a well-known broadcaster and sports writer. In assessing UCLA’s chances at the start of the year, he said, "I’ll push a peanut with my nose down The Miracle Mile in Beverly Hills if UCLA isn’t below .500 this year." I received no calls from anyone who disagree with Sam’s prediction – and for good reason.

The preceding year – 1958-1959 – UCLA had been third in our conference. Four of our five starters on that squad wouldn’t be returning, including future Olympic gold medalist Rafer Johnson, Denny Crum (later to coach Louisville to two NCAA national championships), and Walt Torrance, perhaps the best player on the team.

I’ve often said that as a leader I’d rather have a lot of talent and little experience than a lot of experience and little talent. In 1959-1960 we didn’t have much of either. And there was an additional handicap beyond our control.

Continue reading this post »

Continue reading this post »

Rebumped. I was going to write a post which would start with recounting the nightmare from Donahue years. Instead of reinventing the wheel, rebumping this post from November 7, 2007. While I am supporting of Rick Neuheisel, I hope he understands that if he wants to break away from the the culture of mediocrity that has engulfed UCLA football for more than a decade, he needs to break away from the legancy and mindset left behind by Typhoid Terry. GO BRUINS. - N

Bruin Blue with a must read post on Typhoid Terry who is working OT to play the violin for CTS. GO BRUINS. -N

A number of UCLA alumni and fans have at least some positive things to say about Terry Donahue.  I do not.  I have nothing against Donahue as a person; but I hated him as a football coach.  And I mean hated.  From the first season, when he was totally outcoached by John Robinson in the conference decider, and then embarrassed the university by not even showing up against Alabama in the Liberty Bowl, I knew that he was a mediocre-at-best coach who was going to hide behind UCLA's talent and natural advantages over most of the teams in this conference, and probably last a long time.  I didn't know how long, of course.  I still regret the loss of that 20 years of my football fan life.  Following UCLA football has never been the same for me after that experience.  Year after year of essentially nothing; losing to almost all the good teams, trudging to victory over the bad ones; never competing for a national title, despite a host of Pro-Bowl-type players.  And on and on and on it went.

I know that some will argue; and point to the Rose Bowls (four in twenty years), and the other Bowl wins, and the victories over USC at the end.  I used to be more vehement about such arguments, but it's so dreary to relive that now, that I seem to lack the energy.  Otherwise, I could tell you stories about some of the most pathetic, cowardly, stupid decisions ever made on a football field.  Well, just to make my point, and for the sake of amusement, I'll give you three.:  In 1978, UCLA was loaded, with Theotis Brown, James Owens and Freeman MacNeil as offensive threats; Jerry Robinson and Kenny Easley on defense.  Donahue managed to lose to a Kansas team which ended up 1-9  Later, he played an Oregon State team which finished 3-7.  OSU had no offense at all; only a really good field goal kicker and a good punter.  In typical Donahue fashion, the Bruins had slogged to something like a 12-10 lead, entering the fourth quarter. There was a strong wind which was against UCLA in the last quarter; but even knowing that, Donahue had played as conservatively as possible in the third.  So in the fourth, what does Donahue do but continue to run the ball into the line on every play, apparently fearing something awful will happen if he throws it.  What happens is that on each change of possession, UCLA gets pushed back further and further;  as their punter, with the wind, keeps outkicking ours.  Finally, with about eight minutes to go, UCLA is stuck back on its four yard line.  Donahue, acting like a bad poker player who keeps betting the same amount on the same bad hand, has the team run three more conservative plays, leading to a punt.  The punt goes about thirty yards, and OSU gets the ball on our 38.   They run three plays for a couple of yards, and their FG kicker then kicks the winning field goal.

The second is a game against Oregon in 1980, I believe.  (Rich Brooks, of all things, coaching Uof O).  UCLA is on probation that year, so even for  Donahue, who loved to play for ties, there was no reason not to go all-out..And remember, there was no overtime back then.  Anyway, Oregon is leading 20-14 with about six minutes to go.  UCLA drives down to the Oregon 27, where it's 4th and 3.  With what thought in his head, we will never know, Donahue has the team kick a field goal, to make it 20-17.  Oregon gets the kickoff and is able to run out the clock. I can only imagine that Donahue was thinking, "Well, a field goal is three points, and if we kick it we are only down three.  Then if we get the ball back with a couple of minutes to go, we can perhaps kick another field goal and end up with a tie."  Here is one more.  In 1989, UCLA is having a dreadful season.  They are playing Washington, who the week before had lost to USC, thus knocking themselves out of the Rose Bowl.  In that game, Don James could have played for the tie late, but needing the win, went for it and lost.  Well, in this game which now meant nothing but pride to either team, UCLA surprisingly got ahead early, 21-0  Washington rallied to cut it to 24-21.  Late in the fourth quarter, UCLA went on a potential game-clinching drive.  First and goal on the UW 6, Donahue did what he always did--run three plays into the line.  Now there were less than 3 minutes to go.  Donahue had the team kick a FG to make it 27-21.  Now, what did this accomplish?  In Donahue's limited mind, it meant three more points.  In the mind of anyone else, it meant nothing, because Washington wasn't going to go down and kick a FG to play for a tie (again, no OT then).  So what happened was that UCLA kicked off, Washington ran it back to about the 45, and went down to score the winning TD, 28-27.

I hope those stories were interesting.  There are more.  

Continue reading this post »

RSM Bruin fan recently had a very interesting email exchange with Bill Dwyre , who was sports editor of the Times for 25 years until he stepped down in May 2006 to write as a columnist. In this exchange Dwyre seem to essentially hints at a Pro-Trojan bias (cover up?) by his colleagues in the sports section. GO BRUINS. -N

I've had some back & forth dialog with Bill Dwyre, the former editor of the Los Angeles Times in recent weeks, since the Mayo story broke on ESPN, and I thought I'd share some of the recent comments on the LA Times coverage of 'SC player transgressions that Bill has provided. Take them for what they are worth.

First, I sent a scathing email to just about everyone in the LA Times Sports department, along with most of upper/senior management basically lambasting them for their pathetic and embarrassing lack of journalistic integrity relating to the activities taking place within & around the 'SC athletic department.

From this email I received a lone response, which was from Bill Dwyre.

"I don't know if anybody else will answer you here, but, for what it is worth, I can tell you I'm damned embarrassed and I don't even run the section anymore."

My reply to Bill was that I appreciated his response and that it was truly a shame what has become of the LA Times. It's lost all its journalist integrity and professionalism and that the likes of Jim Murray must be rolling over in their graves.

Then a few days later after Menelaus on BruinsNation had updated the list of mischievous 'SC player activities, I sent it off to the same email distribution list as my original email. (Sarcasm alert) I let them know that since they seemed to be asleep at the wheel, I would try to help them restore some of their pride by providing them with the list in order to help jump start their pending renewal of investigative journalism. I said that I felt the tide was turning and that they would begin to actually do some of their own work rather than continue to only report on the work other true journalist performed (i.e. Yahoo, ESPN, AP, etc.)

The lone response from this email, again, was from Bill Dwyre.

"Pretty damning when you put it all together like this…."

My response back to Bill was that the most embarrassing part of it for the LA Times should be that not a single bit of all that was listed was uncovered, investigated nor pursued by the LA Times. Nearly all the information was made public by news sources outside the city. The LA Times only reported on most of it, after another news source broke the story.

To this Bill responded with what I consider to be a very enlightening comment, which prompted this post.

"Well, you are right on most counts except for one, the Mark Sanchez case. I investigated, pursued, wrote twice, at great length, and never got a word in the paper. I'd love to send you copies, but I'm not allowed to. But I sure have them.

Plus, although I no longer run the sports section, I hear that we are taking a good run at the O.J. Mayo case, although we've already been hammered by ESPN pretty good on that one.

We had the news of all these stories you mentioned, but not all that much in-depth follow-up."

To me his last email showed a clear and methodical strategy by the LA Times editors to keep things as quite as possible when it comes to negative publicity regarding 'SC athletics. Bill essentially says that the writers are doing the work, but the editors are vetoing it and not allowing it to be published.

- RSM Bruin

Huge thanks to Jack Rosenfeld for emailing us this report and some great pictures from yesterday's dual meet at Drake. GO  BRUINS. -N

The UCLA men's Track and Field team won the annual dual meet on Saturday by a score of 89 - 74 Southern Cal at Drake Stadium (all time record vs Southern Cal is 34-41).  After losing last year, the Bruins won their 28th victory over Southern Cal in the past 30 scoring meets.  The men took advantage of the distance races, the field events, and the 110 m Hurdles to build a comfortable lead such that the meet was clinched before the triple jump and the 1600 meter Relay were completed.  UCLA swept the 5000m, 3000m Steeplechase, High Jump, Pole Vault, Shot Put and Discus.  

Kevin Craddock ran a very impressive 13.46 seconds, winning the 110m Hurdles.



More pictures and wrapup after the jump ...

Continue reading this post »

"Riles" have been around the UCLA online message boards for a long time. He was one of the original critics of Steve Lavin. He also was one of the first posters who called out Karl Dorrell. Oh he loves Ben Howland like the rest of BN. And just like BN he was one of the first to get on the hire Rick Neuheisel bandwagon last December. In other words, he is one of those UCLA fans who have always followed/supported our programs based on reality based facts and who has a knack of getting things right. Well the kid posted this magical story on BRO yesterday and he was kind of enough to share it with rest of us here in the Nation. Amazing stuff and congrats to Riles. GO BRUINS. -N

When I was 7, my aunt Patty, a UCLA alum, took me to my first UCLA Football and Basketball games. My belief is that I was the fill-in for her son, who was a UCLA student at the time, but was attending games with his friends. She needed someone to go to the games with...I liked sports (hell, she started me on hockey, too). This became a regular thing. The '86 Freedom Bowl. Arizona road trips. SC @ the Sports Arena. Learning about John Wooden. Hearing about how bad Hazzard was as a Head Coach. Listening to game broadcasts on the radio. Basically, I was hanging around someone on a pretty regular basis that was a big UCLA supporter.

This is what led to me taking on UCLA Basketball and Football as something I was interested in - more than passively. I grew up playing traveling (ice) hockey, and didn't have the time to dedicate to competitive basketball or football. I stuck to watching UCLA in my downtime. I can remember watching 4.8 in an ice rink in Harbor City. I can remember the year after (or maybe it was 97), Charles O'Bannon hitting a game-winner against SC at the buzzer. Karim Abdul Jabbar (Sharmon Shah) go from side to side, and reverse his direction a few times before getting in the endzone. I remember finding UCLA Basketball Forums on AOL when I was 13/14, and reading posts with some good info from MrGladstne...early internet. Thank Science for Bruin message boards and blogs and what they have become.

So all of that said, I've always had a conflict about being a UCLA "fan" - in the sense that that is all I can be. I've never been a student there. I can't debate really on issues like admissions, budgets, etc. I'd sit back and think, "How and why do I support this institution in which my real connection is that of my aunt who introduced me too it (rather matter-of-factly, I might add. USC was never an option.)?" I don't know. I've never been able to reconcile it, to be honest. As it came time to apply to schools to transfer to, I had to think about life as a guy who used to be a UCLA fan. It's weird. I guess I could root for the Ducks. Or the Bears. Or the Gauchos. Longhorns? Maybe. It wouldn't be as fun, though.

In 2001, Patty passed away after a second bout with cancer. I wish she was here to read this note I received yesterday:



GO BRUINS

-Riles

Brittany Page, a Bruin senior (from San Diego) majoring in English sent us the following preview helping all of us zero in on the Hilltoppers. Brittany is graduating next quarter in June. Enjoy. GO BRUINS. -N

Top-seeded UCLA takes on No. 12 seeded Western Kentucky in the Western Regional semifinal in Phoenix, Arizona on Thursday.

The Bruins rallied behind Kevin Love and Darren Collison's combined 40 points, to defeat a dangerous Texas A&M team, 51-49, on Saturday to advance to the next round of the NCAA basketball tournament.

Western Kentucky, making its first NCAA appearance in five years, has been one of the surprises of this year's tournament. They upset No. 5 seeded Drake, 101-99, in the first round when senior guard Ty Rogers hit a deep three pointer at the buzzer.  In the second round, the Hiltoppers beat No. 13 seeded University of San Diego, 72-63, to advance to the Sweet Sixteen for the first time in 15 years.

The Hiltoppers (29-6) press teams in hopes of forcing an up-tempo game and are known for their ability to expose and defeat opponents by shooting plenty of three pointers.

As a team, Western Kentucky is 18th in the nation in three point percentage shooting 39.4 percent, with four players shooting over 40 percent from beyond the arc. UCLA Assistant Coach Scott Garson told me this morning in a phone interview:

Western Kentucky is led by an experienced backcourt consisting of senior guards Courtney Lee, Ty Rogers and Tyrone Brazelton.  NBA scouts have been watching Courtney Lee much of this season as he led Western Kentucky in scoring.  More from Coach Garson on Lee: Lee is shooting 40.4 percent from 3-point range and averaging 20.3 points per game. He scored 29 points in the NCAA tournament's second round when Western Kentucky defeated USD.

This will be the first time UCLA plays against Courtney Lee, but his game is similar to a player they faced in the PAC-10, James Harden of Arizona State per Garson: It is safe to say that while UCLA has not directly faced Lee in conference and non-conference play they will try to defend and contain him much like they did with Harden. Although it will be a team effort, Russell Westbrook, the PAC-10 defensive player of the year, will be in charge of defending Lee since he usually takes on the best perimeter player while on defense.

While the Hilltoppers will attempt to speed up the pace of the game UCLA will try and maintain their control of the tempo. Here is Garson on tempo: UCLA Coach Ben Howland will seemingly counter Western Kentucky's presses by controlling the tempo with a disciplined halfcourt set led by point guard Darren Collison.

While the Hiltoppers have scored an average of 85.5 points a game, their defense has not been as successful, allowing opponents to average 81 points per game.

The main advantage the Bruins have over the Hiltoppers is in the low post with 6-foot-11 freshman sensation and PAC-10 player of the year, Kevin Love playing underneath.

The Hilltoppers will use 6-foot-9, 190-pound sophomore Jeremy Evans and 6-9, 260-pound D.J. Magley to guard Love. Once again from Garson on their inside game: The Bruins will no doubt try to get the ball inside to their bigs as often as possible to expose this lack of low post presence and the size advantage they have over the Hiltoppers. They will attempt to get the ball into Love at the low post as much as possible for the high percentage shots and to exploit the offensive threat he poses.

Both teams have proven themselves thus far in the tournament and this matchup will be nothing short of a great game.  Here is Garson one last time on the key for tomorrow night: UCLA has the obvious size and tournament experience advantage over Western Kentucky; however the key to the game for the Bruins will be defense and tempo. If UCLA establishes the tempo and defensive presence early in the game and stick to their game plan, they should come out with a victory.  But, this will be no easy feat for UCLA, as Western Kentucky has proven they are capable of pulling off upsets.

- Brittany Page

Many thanks to Jack Rosenfeld for sharing this story on our women's gymnastics team. Regular readers of BN should know Jack. He is the uber talented photographer who is always kind of enough to send us his wonderful pictures from Pauley. Thanks Jack and good luck to our Bruins for rest of the season. GO BRUINS. -N

Tough day at Pauley.  The women were in the lead after the first two rotations.  They had a tough beam rotation, including two of the women falling off the beam.  One of them was Brittani McCullough, who had very strong vault and uneven bars.  After her beam performance, she had her ankle worked on and re-wrapped before her floor routine.  On her first tumbling pass, she hurt her ankle on the takeoff, but was able to finish the first pass before being unable to continue.



She is out for the season with a ruptured Achilles tendon.  UCLA finished third, as McCollough could not complete her floor routine and UCLA used senior Natalie Padilla's 9.1 score.  Although it would have been tough to win the overall meet without McCullough's floor routine, UCLA might have been able to take second place with a stronger beam performance. Tasha won the all-around and Jordan took third.   UCLA finished third behind Arkansas and Alabama, but finished ahead of Cal State Fullerton.

Great way for the Schwikert sisters to end their Pauley Pavillion careers.



You can find more photos of the meet on the Bruin Report Online's other sports forum.

- Jack Rosenfeld

We reached out to 'lvucla' after a reader of ours emailed us this story. Again a huge thank you to lvucla for being kind enough to share this beautiful story with rest of the Bruin Nation. If any of you who are reading this know how to get in touch with MJD please make sure he sees this post. GO BRUINS. - BN Ed.

A couple months ago my son and I sent an 8 x 10 picture of Maurice Jones-Drew to his PR firm in hopes it would get personally signed.  Weeks went by, and I even asked Jack, my son if he thought Maurice would sign it and send it back.  Jack told me Maurice is very far away, and he probably gets "millions" of letters and it probably wouldn't happen.  I honestly had no clue if it would really get personally signed.

Well, low and behold, it came!   It even said "To Jack" which was great.  I was going to frame it and hang it in his room so he could wake up and see it.  However my best friend had the best suggestion ever.  He said that it would be way more exciting for Jack if he was actually able to get it from the  mail box himself.  It has been really cold here, so I had to wait until it "warmed" up to take him to the mailbox without wearing gloves.

Well, thanks to my best friend's suggestion, I put the picture back in the envelope and put it in the mailbox.  It was truly an incredible moment for me as a dad.



What you will also notice is we are covered in snow (30 degrees) and my son is wearing a sweatshirt and was totally fine. (I don't want any child abuse allegations!)

The quality of the video is not as good as I hoped for on you tube, but you get the picture. It was an incredible father/son experience.

-lvucla

lvucla graduated from UCLA in 1992. lvucla and Mrs. lvucla run a small legal practice in the very small town of West Branch, Michigan which is in Northern Michigan. Jack is 5 years old and loves the Bruins. To no surprise, Kevin Love is his favorite Ben Ball warrior. GO BRUINS. -BN Ed.

Our friend Bruin Blue is back with a little commentary on UCLA hoops following Saturday's game. Please note that the following post represents BB's commentary and not the view of Bruins Nation. I noted to BB that I disagreed with this take slightly because I think, even with the new rules, Howland's coaching style works as good as anyone else including Roy Williams, and I am not worried about mass defections to NBA as are some of the alarmists on message boards. Nevertheless, this is an excellent read which gives us a lot to think about. Also note that BB told me that this is not meant to be a negative essay at all. In fact, if anything, the main point from this essay is to appreciate Coach Howland's coaching abilities in today's college basketball world of coaching with mostly talented underclassmen while also dealing with injuries GO BRUINS. -N

Two years ago, before the Final Fours, and after a loss to Washington, which ignited a lot of debate about Howland's coaching, I expressed my opinions about Howland.  My belief, then as now, is that he is one of the very best coaches in college basketball, probably the best defensive coach out there.  However, like any coach (outside of the nonpareil John Wooden, who even so had a couple of critics), Howland is not impeccable or infallible.  His offense is not a thing of beauty, and we seem to need at least half the game to figure out an opponent's zone.  He substitutes rather more than I would like; and while the early timeouts are a legitimate approach, they can be a problem near the end.  Put it all together, and there is no coach whom I would rather have at UCLA than Howland, as his abilities far outweigh these slight negatives.

However, what we are seeing now at UCLA is the burden of high expectations.  It was one thing two years ago to be overjoyed to beat Gonzaga and then make our first Final Four in a decade.  Last year, we expected more, but still many of us (including me) were not very confident that we could beat Kansas and do it again.  Now, this year, we expect a Final Four, or at least will be quite disappointed if it is not forthcoming.  And of course a National Title is something that we consider a very legitimate goal.  In fact, if we don't win it this year, we may not for several years; and that would be disappointing to all.  So it seems as if the excitement of beating Washington State or Arizona or Stanford has mostly dissipated; and most of us are anxious for the tournament to start.  That is great in some ways--that we have gotten so far--but it also causes us to take things for granted, and in some sense spoils much of the season.

I will admit that I am trying very hard to keep my love for college basketball and UCLA basketball at the level of the past.  To me, the NBA, and all those players leaving so early, has made this very difficult.  There have been a lot of discussions on Bruin message boards about which players will leave this year, and who would do what in the pros.  We watch Kevin Love, and for all his abilities, realize that his UCLA career is almost over.  Worse than that, all the natural improvement he will make in the future will not benefit our program.  He is a freshman, and as polished as he is for that level, there are obviously things he needs to improve.  He will, but we won't see it, unless we care to watch the NBA, which I do not.  Whatever he can do this year is what we will benefit from, and that's it.  We are obviously still struggling to adjust from our guard-oriented approach of the last two years to one which emphasizes feeding the post.  Sometimes in games one can see the two approaches conflicting with one another . Again, if Love were here three or four years, it would all fit in; but as it is, we have only the one season to master this, which seems terribly unfair.  And as good as Love is, he is not a physical marvel like Greg Oden, who was more likely to dominate in his one year of NCAA play.  How good was Christian Laettner in his first year?  No one remembers, because he got to play four.  It's really painful for me to see Love, as good as he is, and realize that if he would just stay and learn from our coaches, he would be a dominant player in a couple of years.  But he won't; and that is what Howland must deal with.

Which leads to a key point--that I think Howland is hurt more than the other top coaches by this current state of affairs.  Howland is a teacher; his players improve from year to year more than most coaches' players.  If things were as they were thirty years ago, with no NBA defections, we would be the best program around.  But in this era of the top players going one- or two-and-out, it's the programs like North Carolina which can bring in great offensive talent every year, which get the advantage.  Roy Williams' style of coaching (and he is a fine coach, but not as fundamentally sound as Howland in my view) is perfect for this era, because his offenses are readymade for players with great offensive skills who can come in for a year or two.  Howland's style is made for players to learn and grow into.  Howland's juniors and seniors would be better than Williams', except that we aren't going to be having any juniors and seniors, except for "project" types like Mata and Roll.

So it's the battles of the underclassmen; and UCLA's academic and fit requirements make it difficult for us to match Carolina and Florida and Kansas in yearly recruiting.  We get our share; but we couldn't match Florida's talent in the last two years, and may not be able to prevail with our underclassmen-laden class this season.  Realize that we are starting a freshman (Love), a backcourt of a still-injured junior (Collison) and a junior (Shipp) who is really playing out of position, and a frontcourt of a very raw junior (Aboya) and an often-injured junior (Luc).  Our backups are a sophomore Westbrook, a sophomore in Keefe who is just rounding into form, and our one senior, the hard-trying but obviously limited Mata.  And that's our team.  Yes, other teams are no more experienced, but some have better athletes.  And so we go 16-2 to date, and are obviously one of the top seven or so teams, but we may well not make it all the way once again.

Next year, if we lose all those players whom people are speculating about, we will probably be a little short again.  Again, if Howland could ever get a team of all juniors and seniors, we would be awesome; but we apparently never will.  So our underclassmen compete with those of the other big-time schools; and in the end, talent with good coaching may trump our slightly lesser talent with better coaching.  It did the last two years.  Howland has probably taken us as far as we are likely to go in this era of short-time players and constant turnover of talent.  We are a perennnial Top Ten team, but so are others; and there is no real reason to expect our freshmen and sophomores to consistently outplay the underclassmen of Carolina, Kansas, Memphis and Duke, among others.  I wish that the NBA would go away, but it won't.  Every year will see a mostly new UCLA team; and Howland will do everything he can to teach as many fundamentals as possible.  Maybe that is why we are apparently going after Renardo Sidney--because he realizes that if he is going to rigidly adhere to "fit," he is going to likely fall short at the very end every season.  Howland's coaching is as good as anyone's--but coaching can only take one so far, the way that college basketball exists these days.

- Bruin Blue

Ladies and gentleman: Bruin Blue. GO BRUINS. -N

I'm not talking about me, of course.  I'm talking about UCLA football; and how nice it feels to finally see UCLA hire a good football coach.  This is the first time I've been excited about a hire in football since Dick Vermeil; and that's thirty long years.

I know that Rick Neuheisel is not the perfect coach; but very few are.  And I tend to think that whatever success he has had--and he certainly has had it--he is going to have more success here.  He is older, and more experienced, both in life and in coaching.  And no one can say that Neuheisel is not a bright guy.  He has coached at two major programs; seeing what worked and what did not.  He will now have access to perhaps the best talent base in the nation right here in Los Angeles.  And of course he knows what is needed and expected here, at his dream job.  His first comments on Saturday, about how he has great respect for Pete Carroll; and that he knows it is up to him to make the UCLA-USC game the biggest rivalry game in the nation, evince his awareness of what will be necessary to take on that behemoth across town, and make them respect us, if not fear us.  This is not someone who is going to come into UCLA and try to deflate expectations.  Just that alone should make us very happy, after so many years of being mostly told that we should be satisfied with our current nondescript status.

After the anxiety and ups and downs of the last four weeks, I am just very glad and relieved that it came out so positively.  There were of course our "dream candidates," but there were plenty of "disaster candidates," and of course some in between.  As I have recently written; of the remaining credible candidates, I believe that Neuheisel was the best.  How often do you get to hire someone with a .688 winning percentage, achieved at two major programs?  We are already getting good national press about this.  People are not seeing UCLA make another hire of an unproven assistant, or a little known head coach; they see that we are getting someone who has been a successful head coach at the highest levels.  That infusion of new interest in, and respect for, our program has to help us.  It's just nice to see UCLA being taken seriously once again, even in the first two days of the Neuheisel era.

Of course, the initial excitement inevitably wears off, and there is much to do.  But at least it will for once be fun to follow it.  I so vividly remember how utterly dispirited I was when Karl Darrell was hired.  I was certain that he would not be successful (I don't think even I could imagine how bad he would actually be), and I really wanted to just get away from the whole thing.  And for five years I have not cared about recruiting, have not cared what assistants we hired; to me it really didn't matter much.  But now I think we can all enjoy the football off-season (while we are avidly following our basketball team, of course), and actually have fun following the recruiting and the Spring practices.  And for once we will not have to be embarrassed about the football coach we have; for we now have Ben Howland in basketball and Rick Neuheisel in football.  That sounds pretty good to say, doesn't it?

It's not going to be all happy times, of course.  Our talent level is severely depleted.  We have a murderous schedule next year.  And we currently have some people who are hoping for Neuheisel to fail.  Hopefully, these numbers will lessen as time goes on.  But it's going to be a new position for me, at least; defending the football coach against those who are angry that Dorrell was fired; those who desperately wanted Walker; those who simply don't like Neuheisel; and those who just hate UCLA on general principles.  I'm not too worried about it; but in some sense this is a major new step for UCLA; and those both inside and outside the university who were happy with the way things were running before, are going to be unhappy about the new state of affairs, and we'll undoubtedly hear from them.  But it's sure fun to be on the side in the ascension, for once.

Not to lessen the happy mood, but I always want to say what's on my mind; and I am concerned about the Walker situation.  I know that Neuheisel indicated that "Walker is my first recruit," and so if he is happy to keep Walker and his other defensive staff, it's fine with me.  I do hope that Walker will thoroughly dedicate himself to helping the team win, no matter what it takes.  I hope that he will not feel that he is anything but an assistant to Neuheisel, who is the head coach.  I do not want to see him relying upon any of his media supporters to advance his personal career, wherever it might ultimately take him.  After the first game or games, I do not want to see or hear about "Walker's defense vs. Neuheisel's offense," or anything implying that there are two coaches here.  Frankly, I have mixed feelings about Walker staying, if only because of the all-out campaign which has been waged on his behalf, and the inevitable aftermath of that.  This kind of situation doesn't usually work; but maybe it will here, for everyone's benefit.  All we care about is for UCLA to have the kind of football program we are proud of; and that can only happen with everyone on staff on the same page.  As for certain of the beat writers--well, all we can do is either ignore them, or unmask them for what they are.  Let's hope that if others are expected to learn from their mistakes, they can, too.  We will just see.

It's been a lot of fun writing these essays and sharing my thoughts.  And I am so impressed with the level of intelligence and literacy, which I see from the many contributors to Bruins Nation.  Depth of insight and football knowledge, almost always expressed by people who actually know how to write well--it always makes it rewarding to read the various comments and essays.  And it will be nice now to be able to visit without my nerves being on edge, afraid to read that some awful hiring scenario was unfolding.  Time for us to all to just indulge ourselves for awhile, secure in the confidence that we now have two major seasons to look forward to each year, not just one.  And come to think of it, baseball is looking pretty good too, isn't it?  Well, it's never good to get too gushy; because my natural tendency is to have high expectations and to be disappointed if they aren't borne out.  But I'm pretty pleased right now, anyway.  And thanks again to everyone here who added to the intelligent and thoughtful atmosphere; and of course to everyone who was kind enough to let me know that they enjoyed reading my essays.

I'll be back, no doubt; but I might take a rest for just a bit,  But I'm sure that there will be plenty to discuss in the upcoming weeks and months, and I look forward to adding my thoughts as well.

-Bruin Blue

A Bruin Alum (BruinBlue) Makes A Pitch For Another Bruin Alum (Coach Neuheisel). BB makes a fairly convincing argument for the return of our prodigal son. GO BRUINS. -N

Perhaps the tension of this coaching search is getting to me; but I tell you, the more I think about the relative merits of the various coaches, both those whom we thought about in the early stages, and those more currently viable, the more I am thinking that Rick Neuheisel is not only the best candidate available now, but one of the top two or three overall.  I guess it was that I never really thought of him as a candidate at the outset, since we didn't look at him five years ago; and I sort of went along with the conventional wisdom that he was being effectively blackballed by the NCAA.  But now that he is in the spotlight, I have thought a lot more about it, and also looked up some of his past records; and a very compelling case is made.

It's not that I get my ideas about coaches from stats and even scores.  Like many of you, I have watched a great deal of college football over the years; and I do pride myself on my ability to separate the really good coaches from the pretenders.  It's not an exact science, of course; and a lot of it is just the "feel" of how they handle playcalls; how they perform in big games, etc.  And of course some of it has to be the actual scoreboard results.  Anyway, I do well remember watching Neuheisel closely at the outset of his career; because, like many, I was very upset that Terry Donahue had apparently pushed him out as his heir apparent, in favor of making Bob Toledo the offensive coordinator.  Then he went to Colorado, and rather lucked into the head job there after only one year.  Well, the first two years, he did a commendable job.  Then he struggled in the next two.  I don't think he was really ready for the pressure of such a high-profile position. Then he left and went off to Washington, where he looked like a better coach to me.  6-2 in league in his first year, taking over for Lambright.  Then 7-1 in league, 11-1 overall, and a fine performance in the Rose Bowl win.  Actually, Washington wasn't far off from deserving a bid to the national title game. Then the next year,  he was 6-2 in league, 8-2 overall, going into the last game, where he went to Miami (he had beaten a fine Hurricane team the year before) and was humbled by an overpowering club which went undefeated and romped in the national title game.  Then he lost a bitter but thrilling Holiday Bowl game to Texas, to finish 8-4.  The next year was the down year at 7-6, and 4-4 in league.  But it appeared that he had the pieces in place for a fine team the next year, when he was unfairly fired. At least that's what I've read from some apparently knowledgeable posters who were up there then and appear to have no essential bias about it.  I believe that his last two recruiting classes were both in the Top 25, belying what some have said about him not being able to recruit.

Putting this all together, we see that Neuheisel has a record of 66-30 (.688).  This puts him higher than all sorts of coaches, just based on winning percentage.  His teams have finished in the Top Ten three times in his eight years.  He has played in three BCS games, winning them all.  He has a Pac-10 winning record of 23-9,.  He won all four Apple Cup games against rival Washington State.  Now, how many coaches which we have considered or are considering, have records to compare with that?  This is not to say that there aren't some fine coaches at other programs where the talent is lesser, who might be extrapolated to do as well; but the fact is that it's still extrapolation, not certainty.  I cannot believe that with the recruiting advantages inherent in UCLA, Neuheisel won't do better here than he did anywhere else.  I also believe that with some NFL experience to give him some more depth of knowledge; and with the last eight years having chastened him, he will really do a fine job at his alma mater, the school where he has always wanted to coach.  Legitimate concerns have been raised about the fact that he had his best years at both Colorado and Washington in the first two at each school; but that is awfully scant data to extrapolate from, since he only had four at each place; and he did go 6-2 in the conference in his third year at Washington. I cannot say with absolute certainty that Neuheisel will do better here than he has done, but I do sense that he would.  And that would be pretty darn good.

It's so ironic that I have argued for years about UCLA's propensity to hire the alumnus; to go with the guy that the insiders like.  And we have missed so often in that way--with Farmer, Hazzard, Dorrell, even Donahue, at least in my view.  And I have always demanded that we go outside the "Bruin Family" and get someone who will bring a whole new perspective.  But Neuheisel may actually be the one alumnus with the credentials and the acumen to break that losing streak.  And note that he has been away from UCLA for a long time; working at different schools, with different heritages.  So he is far from an insular candidate.  And I like that he is so smart.  Smart coaches usually do better than...not-so-smart ones.  Sometimes his cleverness has been his downfall; his thinking that he can get away with things that others cannot.  But I have to believe that he is intelligent enough to learn from that, too.  And as others have said very effectively on Bruins Nation, most of his transgressions were really pretty minor stuff.

I'm writing all of this because I am actually thinking that ironically enough, we might have the right coach right there in front of us, and are going to bypass him.  It's becoming pretty obvious to me that Dan Guerrero either does not want to hire Neuheisel, or is trying very hard to find someone else who would placate the alumni and boosters.  It may just be that he is afraid to take a side in the growing internecine warfare between the Walker faction and the Neuheisel faction.  He may fear upsetting the NCAA; though my understanding was that Neuheisel was recently vetted by that body.  I am not sure what he is doing.  But he longer he keeps looking at outside coaches, the more it appears that he may just try to grab one of them, and thus extricate UCLA from this increasingly contentious struggle.  I hope that Neuheisel hangs around long enough to see how this plays out, but he really might not; and then where will we be?  Well, we might possibly get Leach;  we might possibly get Jones.  I personally prefer Neuheisel to either of them; but certainly respect the opinions of those astute contributors here who might disagree. We might also get someone like Herman Edwards, who is a great guy, but not all that much of a football coach, and completely untested in college.  Believe me, if I thought that we had a real chance at someone like Mark Richt or Urban Meyer, I'd be all for it; but this isn't going to happen. And I see a real danger of us ending up with some "neutral" hire, whose reputation (particularly if it's NFL-based) is more than his actual ability.

Another thing to really like about Neuheisel:  Can you think of many other coaches who would have the confidence, even the arrogance, and the dynamism to stand toe-to-toe with Pete Carroll, not only for recruits, but in the big game?  Neuheisel has all of Carroll's cockiness, without its overbearing side. Leach and Jones certainly seem to have this, too.  But again, with Neuheisel you are not really doing much extrapolating from a record at a smaller school; you are looking at someone who has played in BCS games more than once.  I know that all of us are aching to be able to take it to Carroll, not just once every seven years, but  to give him as good as he gets.  That's really a tall order, and one that most Bruin fans have essentially given up on, no matter how they talk.  But though it won't happen overnight (the talent level next year will be lacking), I can actually see Neuheisel making UCLA a force to be reckoned with on the national scene; and along with that would go a pretty fair chance of playing even with the monster across town.  We used to do that, as we all remember.

Well, we'll ultimately get the person that Dan Guerrero chooses.  I could certainly live with anyone who has been a successful college coach.  But it's just my sense right now that Neuheisel is a lot more than a "fallback" or "second-tier" candidate; but is actually one of the very few people who might actually make a difference in our long-suffering football fortunes.

- Bruin Blue

DG finds himself in between a rock and a hard place and as Bruin Blue notes this was his own doing. Once again to echo Menelaus below a very Merry Bruin X-Mas and Happy Holidays to everyone in this blue and gold bleeding Bruins Nation. GO BRUINS. -N

We are all still hoping that Dan Guerrero ends this extensive coaching search with a winning hire . And that might well still happen.  But I think it would be pollyannish to believe that the ultimate choice is going to be someone who is met with consensus approval, or whose name immediately gains us much-sought national respect for both the process and the hire.  It is tempting to simply hope that the man who brought in Ben Howland will do it again; but it is equally easy to believe that this search has been mishandled and compromised to such an extent that however it ends up, there are going to be some very unhappy people, and some immediate problems to deal with.

As I said the other day, no one is certain as to whether there are any "big name" candidates left with whom we would have a reasonable chance. At this point, I think it's doubtful, though not impossible.  There is a good chance that the three candidates who will shortly all have been interviewed twice--Rick Neuheisel, Al Golden and DeWayne Walker--are really the final list, barring some real deus ex machina in the next week or so.  And if those are indeed the three finalists, we can look at the problems we will face, some of which were actually created or at least accentuated by Guerrero.

By letting Walker coach the Bowl game, Guerrero gave him a chance to "audition," in an almost "can't-lose" situation, since the fact that we were using our backup QBs would be a pretty good excuse for a loss.  And a win, or the close loss which we got, would inevitably be used as major ammunition by the corps of Walker supporters who have been pushing for his hire since midseason.  Letting Walker handle the gathering of recruits a couple of weeks ago gave the media a chance to collect quotes from some of them about how much they hoped to play for Walker.  Now we are seeing various current players push for Walker.  This is very common, as players and recruits always want to play for the person they know best.  But it is part of the media narrative which drives the Walker campaign.  And now, if Guerrero chooses Neuheisel, there are going to be some unhappy people, a lot more than there would have been had these situations not been allowed to occur.  And even worse, if Neuheisel coaches and Walker remains as defensive coordinator, is there not a very real possibility that sides are taken by some of the players who would have preferred Walker?  And if the offense initially struggles while the defense is the stronger side, could this not cause real internal discord and dissension?

If Guerrero chooses Walker, he will anger the group of boosters which supports Neuheisel.  Guerrero will have chosen a man who has coached one game (0-1) over someone who has coached 96 (66-30), and has actually won a Rose Bowl.  If the team gets has a bad season next year, how ridiculous will Guerrero look, particularly given that he will have once again done the opposite of what he said he would do--bring in someone with head coaching experience?  At that point, Guerrero would be in the UCLA hall of shame along with the incompetent Peter Dalis.  And after Guerrero waxed rhapsodic about how UCLA's increased revenue under his tenure has allowed them to be very competitive in the football hiring marketplace, how could he credibly sell Walker as the best choice for UCLA?  And would anyone mind that a school as academically prestigious as UCLA would pay its second highest salary--far more than that of any professor--to someone who "graduated" from an online "university" known as Excelsior College?

If Guerrero goes with Golden, he will anger both the Neuheisel and the Walker factions, all in support of someone who may have fine potential, but who currently has a lifetime record of 5-19.  Some programs--really bad or really good--might be able to get away with this kind of hire; but can UCLA, at this point?  If the team struggles next season, the outcries will grow louder.  Walker would likely not stay if Golden is hired, since Golden's specialty is defense.  Golden would be stepping into a minefield here.

So any of these choices now come with significant risks--not just on-field risks, but internal risks.  And here is where Guerrero has painted himself into a corner.  Had he gone with Neuheisel last week, there of course would have been some criticism, but it would have looked like Neuheisel was his clear choice; and of course Neuheisel's on-field record, while hardly spotless, is pretty solid.  But then came the Bellotti bombshell, making it look like Neuheisel was certainly not the main choice.  It may have been bad timing there--that Guerrero had wanted to speak to Bellotti, but that Bellotti had only granted access late last week.  Whatever was intended, this episode managed both to hurt Neuheisel's image and to make UCLA look rather futile in its search.  Then, of course, by not hiring Neuheisel before the Bowl game, he allowed Walker to try to enhance his case.  He has now granted Walker a second interview, this with the Chancellor included.

I have always said that an athletic director should never be afraid to be turned down by a coaching prospect, or even two or three.  Too often in the past, we have seemed unduly afraid of being turned down, so we have gone for the safe choice.  I do not at all blame Guerrero for seeking out Bellotti, even though the latter would not have been one of my top choices.  But with the various leaks and rumors (some undoubtedly false but some very possibly valid), it looks to all the world that UCLA is casting about frantically to find a coach.  We hear that Steve Kragthorpe was contacted but declined interest; similarly for Chris Petersen.  We have heard various things about Steve Mariucci; he's interested, he wants too much money; we're still talking to him; negotiations have broken down, etc. We have heard that there was an interest in June Jones, but that he is either not interested or that he wants to take his entire staff with him, and we have insisted on Walker being retained.  Most of the reasonably fair part of the national media, such as CoachesHotSeat Blog, are seeing UCLA looking like a program which can't attract anyone of prominence, so will have to settle for another assistant, an alumnus who desperately wants the job, or a very young coach whose current claim to fame is winning four games this year.  Now, that may not be at all fair, since I happen to think that both Neuheisel and Golden have good credentials, but that's how it looks to most.  We are not in the business of placating the rest of the country, but I am also tired of being looked at as a national joke.

Well, the proof is always in the pudding.  Whomever Guerrero hires will have a chance to vindicate it by doing a really good job.  As always, he will be given a chance to do so; though I think that the patience of Bruin faithful has now worn very thin indeed.  Right now, it looks to me as if Guerrero was either not prepared for the rigors of this hire, or that he severely misjudged the landscape.  It appeared that he was not certain that he was going to fire Dorrell until after the USC game.  The search firm seemed to be hired late.  The amount of money that we originally came to the table with (by all accounts about $1.5 million a year) would have been impressive five years ago, but is at least 30% under market value today.  The apparent insistence on having the new coach keep Walker as defensive coordinator may well have turned off those few current coaches who didn't balk at the salary.  There are legitimate questions as to whether Guerrero had the knack for "selling" the job, as a good AD must have.  Going after some big names is commendable, but not so much if nothing was broached to them that would make them really consider the job.  If the final list does indeed come down to Walker, Neuheisel and Golden, can anyone say that the list is appreciably better than that in 2002?  And if not, does it not enhance what the critics and carpers always love to say: that UCLA is not an appealing place for a coach, and that our program is destined to always have to settle, while the other schools go after and often land the big fish?

I personally think that Neuheisel is still a very credible choice.  But the longer we extend this, the more it looks as if Guerrero wants to go in another direction.  And the more it appears that he might be looking for the excuse to take the easiest way out and hire Walker.  If he does that, I can comfortably predict that UCLA will lose a good 25% of its booster and alumni support base.  It's not a good position for an athletic director to be in; and we will soon see what the final decision will be.

- Bruin Blue

Bruin Blue tries to catch his breath. GO BRUINS. -N

It's been an exhausting three weeks for me; and I'm sure it has been for most of you, too.  Checking the forums for news virtually every ten minutes; tossing and turning in bed;  waking up early with mixed trepidation and hope.  One day it seems like Chow is the choice, and I'm despondent.  Then it seems like Neuheisel, and I feel pretty good about that.  Then suddenly it's Bellotti,and I go to bed pretty sure that the deal is going to be done, only to wake up the next day and see that it isn't.  And still we're waiting, and we really don't know for sure.  Is this a football search that is finally going to end well for us?

I have no inside information; as very, very few do.  I'm not even sure if Dan Guerrero is certain what he wants to do.  We hear that the three finalists are Neuheisel, Walker and Golden; but who's to say if some coach who is still waiting for his Bowl game or even just done with it, might not be considered?  Then I've heard strange rumors about current but lesser-tier coaches.  I think that what seems to be going on is that while Neuheisel is the first choice of many alumni and boosters, there is significant objection to him from some boosters; and Guerrero has not been willing to just go ahead and make the offer.  The longer it goes, the less likely Neuheisel seems to be; so I hope that if they cannot find a big-name to be really interested, they just go ahead and offer Rick the job.

Neuheisel was never my first choice, or even second or third.  But he's not a bad choice at all, particularly when one thinks about it.  I don't know if everyone realizes that at Washington, he had a Pac-10 record of 23-9.  He was 19-5 in his first three years, which is almost Pete Carroll territory.  And it's not like he took over a program loaded with talent.  He has his flaws; it is noted that at both Colorado and Washington his teams tailed off in his last two years.  I actually think that he wasn't ready when he got the Colorado job after only one year as an offensive coordinator, when Bill McCartney suddenly retired.  He still finished in the Top Ten in his first two seasons there.  And at Washington he of course went to and won a Rose Bowl, the only one the Huskies have been in one since Don James retired.  Also note that he always beat his rival WSU for the Apple Cup; which is not like beating USC, but shows that he is good in rivalry games.  Anyway, I know that some are uncertain about him, particularly with regard to his well-reported off-field issues.  All I will say is that most of these violations were very minor, and seemed to me like the actions of a smart guy who is too clever for his own good, and is always looking for loopholes in the rules.  I am not here to convince anyone to be for Neuheisel, but I do fear the alternatives at this point.

DeWayne Walker is still to be worried about.  I do not see how one game as interim coach should count for much in any case, particularly as teams usually play well in one game for interim coaches.  See Ed Kezerian and Bobby Williams, among others, for proof of that.  But I also know that a lot of media people wanted any excuse to push Walker for the head job, and that only a terrible performance would stop them.  As Nestor and others have taken pains to note, BYU is a team we had already beaten this year.  Okay; we had Olson then; but it's not as if he is some great quarterback.  BYU is a well-coached team without great athletes.  Ours are better, which is why we almost always beat them.  They are methodical and slow, and try to out-execute you.  The oddsmakers well knew that Olsen and Cowan were out. and still made us only 6-point favorites, which should be noted.  And of course Bronco Mendenhall, a fine coach who has gone 22-4 in the last two years, did not have one of his better nights.  He absolutely gifted UCLA with a touchdown right before the end of the half. Without that, it's 17-6 going in, and UCLA has no momentum.  The game then probably ends about 24-9, since BYU can open it up more, and we cannot just sit back and hang in.  Give UCLA and Walker some credit, of course; but we didn't end up with the victory, and even if we had, it shouldn't have mattered to his chances.

Before the game, we learned that Walker is going to have a second interview, this with Chancellor Block.  I have no idea why we need to do that.  It just takes more time (I seriously doubt that it would be before Christmas), and makes Neuheisel hang.  What if Neuheisel gets tired of this, or miffed, and drops out?  Unlikely, probably, since this is his dream job; but I've seen stranger things.  What then?  Al Golden?  Golden actually has a pretty good resume and might well turn out to be a fine coach, but there are problems.  First, he has no reputation out West at all.  Therefore when we have the inevitable down year next year, how much patience are people going to have?  Then of course there is the fact that he doesn't know coaches or schools in this area.  He apparently is doing a great job recruiting for Temple, but that is in his neck of the woods.  If Golden won big, he might be a great recruiter for us, but that's putting the cart before the horse.

Who else, then?  I would still love for us to make a big bid for a really good coach like Petersen or Mendenhall, but I don't think either of these two is going to come.  Mike Leach is a favorite of many, though personally I think that Neuheisel is better.  But we do not seem to be going after Leach.  June Jones remains,  but he has also expressed no interest.  These things can change, but I am starting to think that this is wishful thinking on our part.  Steve Mariucci remains, but apparently he is asking on the high side of $2 million, which is not going to happen; and which frankly he doesn't deserve at this point.  And any other possible big name coach is really a fantasy--you know, Urban Meyer, Mark Richt, Bob Stoops, et al.

So what I am afraid of is that if Guerrero really doesn't want to offend certain boosters by picking Neuheisel, he will start looking at lesser head coaches.  He already had apparently tried to interest Louisville's Steve Kragthorpe, but was rebuffed. Kragthorpe is a good, hardly great, head coach.  After that... Mike Price?  Todd Graham?  Dan Hawkins?  Rocky Long?  Rich Brooks?  You can see the problem.  Guerrero might just take a stab at someone to avoid having to pick Neuheisel over Walker, or Walker over Neuheisel.  And I don't really fancy our chances of making an acute stab at this point.  That is why I'd be pretty happy if we just selected Neuheisel now.  Of course we are going to have Walker as our defensive coordinator if he wants to stay; there's no getting around that.  But at least I am confident that Walker will have no chance to "play" Neuheisel, who is very smart and connected.  If Walker wants to stay and do a good job as DC (please learn to stop the spread, okay?), that's fine.  Then he can take one of the head coaching offers he is sure to have, and show what he can do.

Now, I know that there are risks in going with Neuheisel.  One is that he is apparently being pushed by Terry Donahue and his corps of ex-players.  I would have loved to have had a fresh start in Westwood, without being influenced by this faction.  But either because we do not offer enough money; or because we didn't go about it the right way; or because we insisted that a new coach keep Walker; or for a combination of these, it hasn't happened.  And the chances grow slimmer each day.  So we may have to accept the best choice possible, which is really not that bad.  Neuheisel may last here a long time, which cpuld be another concern; but at least he won't be a hire paving the way for Walker to step in a couple of years later.  And if he doesn't do the job, at least we will have had higher expectations with him, and can probably change directions if he does not meet them.  It's not at all impossible that he grows and matures and makes UCLA a real national power.

As I write this, I realize that by the time it is posted, things may have changed again.  If they do, I certainly hope it is for the better.  Like the rest of you, I have been so disappointed and dispirited by the end results of the past searches, that I can scarcely hope for a positive result now, until it actually happens.

- Bruin Blue

Bruin Blue brings the heat. For your part if you haven’t done it, please email Dan Guerrero at dguerrero@athletics.ucla.edu and Chancellor Gene Block at chancellor@conet.ucla.edu, and let them know respectfully and politely that neither CHOKER (Chow + Walker) nor Walker will be acceptable at UCLA. If you are an alum or student, please make sure to indicate your graduating class in your emails. GO BRUINS. -N

That's what it's going to be for me and many other UCLA alumni and fans if Norm Chow ends up being the UCLA head coach. It is not looking good for the good guys, which is all of us who have hoped for and expected that UCLA would finally secure the services of a proven, top-rung head coach, after all the misery and disappointment of the last decade. It is looking good for the usual suspects, which are the Morgan Center bureaucrats who want to save every nickel, and who are afraid of any powerful football coach being able to dictate to them instead of kowtow. It is also looking good for that part of the UCLA fan base which much prefers wishful thinking projection hires to people with a track record, because the former can be imagined as anything you want, where the latter always have a few flaws or losses on the slate. And it is looking good for those national media pundits who love to talk about how UCLA is a basketball school, and how we are too cheap and too unappealing to ever be able to obtain a proven coach.

It's never over until it's over, they say. But too many of us have seen this process before, and do not hold out much hope, given the past. In 2002, Dan Guerrero said that he was looking for someone with head coaching experience to get us into BCS Bowls and win conference championships. His short list then consisted of two mediocre assistant coaches and one guy who had done okay at Oregon State, though never had a winning record there. This time, after five more lousy years, he said that he was definitely looking for a coach with experience, to make us a national power. So far, his short list appears to consist of his own assistant coach, some unknown NFL assistant whose brother is a head coach, another career assistant who may or may not have been offered one head job in 35 years and who has not even interviewed for one in the last three, and a current NFL assistant who was a head coach a few years ago.

I have seen people searching for ants at picnics who have shown more imagination. We can always hope that there is something going on under the radar; but there wasn't last time, and there well may not be this time. If so, then UCLA has "searched" for their own defensive coordinator who desperately covets this job; the aforementioned career assistant who everyone knew months ago wanted this job; an alumnus who has always wanted this job; and some other guy who I think is only in there to make the first three look better in comparison. Now, that's some search. It must have taken all the acumen of Guerrero, the redoubtable Bob Field,, and that high-priced search firm to have unearthed these nuggets.

And what of all the big names that we lovingly rolled around on our tongues for the last few months, when we were hoping against hope that we would get rid of our dreadful head coach and make a fresh and exciting start? Mendenhall, Petersen, Grobe, Leach, Johnson and more? Too expensive for our self-imposed restrictive budget? Just not interested, or was it because our athletic director was not persuasive enough; or was it the demand that the coach accept the mandate of DeWayne Walker being his defensive coordinator, or else no offer? Not someone we were familiar with, because he coaches east of the Mississippi? Not the "right fit" here? Too demanding about how a successful program should be run?

I am pulling my punches somewhat because maybe somehow it will turn out all right. But if it doesn't, believe me, I'm not waiting around for the aftermath. All the excitement from the same people who were ecstatic over Dorrell, thrilled over Lavin. All the idiocy about how because Chow is mad at Pete Carroll, he'll exact some terrible revenge. (Actually, the reverse is likely the case; that Carroll would love for the opportunity to conclusively show that he, not Chow, is the person who won those national titles; and would try to humiliate us on the field at every opportunity. It appears that our inferiority complex in terms of USC may now lead us to trying to use disaffected Trojans to beat them; sort of like USC hiring Henry Bibby was supposed to really stick it to us). All the nonsense about here we go toward national titles, behind our inspiring team of Chow and Walker. And, oh, yes; the inevitable Guerrero press conference.

"Dan, when you said a few weeks ago that you were looking for a proven head coach, did you then change your mind?" "No, I did mean that, but I always said that if the right assistant came along, we would look at him, too; and in Norm Chow...(blah, blah, blah)"

"Dan, did you have any contact with any current head coaches?" "Well, as I said in my opening statement, I will not discuss any contacts I may have had. What is important is that I am sure that we have hired the right coach for UCLA....(blah, blah, blah)"

"Dan, was the keeping of DeWayne Walker made a non-negotiable demand to the coaching candidates?" "I did not make any demands, but of course I am thrilled that DeWayne is going to stay with us, because he is a great young defensive coordinator, and...(blah, blah, blah)"

"Dan, when you look around and see Michigan hiring Rich Rodriguez, Arkansas getting Bobby Petrino, and Georgia Tech securing Paul Johnson, do you think that your hire matches up to those standards?" "Yes, I do. As I have said, it is not about getting the best coach, it is about getting the best coach for UCLA....(blah, blah, blah, blah, blah)."

No, I will skip all of that, because I have heard it all too many times before. Chow would be the fifth straight head football coach hired at UCLA without one day of head coaching experience. DeWayne Walker, who would clearly then be in line to be Chow's successor in four or five years, would be the sixth. And thus, whether it hurts to hear it or not, those people who laugh at UCLA for its inability and unwillingness to hire a big-name, proven coach, and say that it will always be the same in Westwood, will be proven right once again. I have two friends who are big USC fans, and when I told them that it was lkely that we would hire Chow, they both laughed and said that we had done it again. Both of these were actually hoping that we would hire someone credible, because they do not fear us anyway, and wanted the rivalry to at least be more interesting. No one really cares what USC fans think, but it just reflects the general view of good old sanctimonious and cheap UCLA, and the way we always go about things in the end.

Could Chow work out? Well, it depends what one means by that. He could have a winning year or two. Bob Toledo had two 10-2 seasons. Karl Dorrell had one, and averaged seven wins a year. SInce Dorrell was the worst coach imaginable, it is easy to see Chow or an even average coach like Toledo was doing better. But getting us to the level we have all dreamed about? No way. And even at the very best, Chow would only be coaching here for four or five years, anyway. What is the point of that? Then we get Walker, and he would have to be a great coach, or we are where, or worse than where, we started, ten years or so from now. What an absolutely disastrous and inane way to do things. Words are not sufficient to express it, really.

My greatest fear all along was that what is wrong with UCLA is endemic and deeply ingrained, and can't be fixed anytime soon. This same process and these same attitudes have gone on for so long that it becomes hard to imagine us ever proceeding in a different way--the way that Michigan or even Georgia Tech have. If Chow becomes our coach, I will absolutely believe that UCLA is the worst program in the country when it comes to selecting and hiring head coaches. Can you think of any worse? Any that follow a Toledo with a Dorrell, and then a Dorrell with a Chow, and a Chow with an already pre-selected Walker? I certainly can't. So that gives us some perverse mark of distinction, anyway. Well, as I said, it's not completely over. But I cannot sit around and let it happen without expressing my feelings in advance. Is anyone in Westwood willing to listen?

- Bruin Blue

Bruin Blue's thoughts on someone, who some are looking at as the Rasputin of UCLA football. GO BRUINS. -N

Who is this man, and why is he apparently wielding such incomprehensible influence in our athletic department?  He has been here two years as the defensive coordinator, and we know his results.  Solid improvement in the defense last year, little if any improvement this year, even with ten starters returning.  Overall results mixed; some fine efforts, particularly against conventional, pro-style offenses.  Some very poor efforts, mostly against spread offenses.  End result of his tenure--a 13-12 record.  Not all his responsibility, of course, since he wasn't the head coach, and the offense was mostly worse than the defense.  But since football is a team game, a great coordinator is usually able to make some kind of difference in the overall record.  How many esteemed coordinators do you know who were part of a program with a .500 record?

Well, one can argue the relative merits of Mr. Walker as a defensive coordinator.  But how has he managed to parlay this brief record into a position where he is not only a significant candidate for head coach even though he was part of the failed regime, brought in by the head coach who just was fired?  How has he managed to somehow apparently convince the athletic director that his retention at least as defensive coordinator is not only essential, but mandated?  How has he managed to attract supporters so visible that they have been pushing for his promotion since the beginning of the season, and have now started a web site dedicated solely to enhancing his image?  And how has he obtained such a friend in the media as Brian Dohn, who not only is openly supporting his hire, but is seemingly slanting his every comment to help Walker?

Some might say that he has managed this because he is such a great coach, and such an inspiring leader. Others might think that there are other reasons; that much of this has been carefully orchestrated by Walker himself, and that at least some of those who are providing this promotional support for him are hoping to cash in on the access to Walker if he becomes the Bruin coach.  Motives probably are varied, but the whole thing is very unsettling, at least to me.

Here we have a coaching search which  Dan Guerrero is attempting to conduct under the tightest cloak of secrecy.  And yet now we are starting to read all sorts of things about how Walker is or is not approving of a certain coach.  That he would be happy to work with Chow, but not with Brian Kelly.  We are reading that Walker is a candidate for jobs where he never ultimately interviewed.  Every time there is an opening or potential opening on the West Coast, we hear that Walker is a prime candidate.  And now we suddenly read in Dohn's blog that June Jones is very interested in the UCLA job, but that he wants to bring all his assistants, and Guerrero is committed to keeping Walker.  Now, where did Dohn get such information?  Did he make it up?  That's hard to believe.  Certainly Guerrero didn't tell him, nor did Jones or anyone else in his camp.  Can you imagine Jones, on the cusp of the most important game in the history of Hawaii football, with tens of thousands of Islanders caught up in the excitement, not only negotiating with UCLA, but letting this information leak out?  And I seriously doubt that any of Geerrero's very small group assisting him with this search is leaking it, either.  What possible good could it do anyone?

Except--that writing something like this can only hurt the chances of Jones and UCLA ever striking a deal.  As I am writing this, Jones may be forced to utter a public denial, which could very much hurt the entire process, much as Peter Dalis foolishly admitting that he had talked to Rick Pitino essentially killed any chance of Pitino coming here.  So did someone who very much wanted to enhance Walker's image and also his chances, leak it?  Or was it Dohn himself who decided to print something which would do that?  My first reaction when seeing it was incredulity that UCLA could possibly make Walker's retention more important than hiring a top-level coach for this position.  My second was, as the attorneys like to say, cui bono? Who  benefits?  And clearly it is Walker, once again.  If it becomes general knowledge that no head coach candidate can possibly keep or bring in his own defensive coordinator, then that may well eliminate any credible candidate, and leave only Walker, and his personal favorite, Norm Chow, who would presumably stay only a few years, allowing Walker to take over.

Is Walker that clever and that able to manipulate the athletic director and selected media, into allowing him to accomplish his ends?  Is this all my imagination?  Is Dan Guerrero going to finally stand up and hire one of the several proven head coaches who it is now obvious are very interested in this job?  Or has he already promised Walker that he will be retained; and therefore ths search, while perhaps conducted in ostensible good faith, is already predestined to come to an inevitable conclusion--the hiring of Walker, or Chow, with Walker the virtual co-coach?  Rest assured that if the retention of Walker is absolutely a requisite for the new coach, we are very unlikely to be able to hire anyone with a pedigree.  No one would come here when the clear writing on the wall was that Walker was more important that he was; that no matter how poorly Walker might do, or how much he might disagree with Walker. he had no power to fire him; and that Walker would surely keep his own power base here, which might well be used to undermine the head coach's authority.  Whether Walker would do that or not is not the issue (you're welcome to your own opinion on that).  The issue is that this is what any intelligent and successful head coach would think; and that this situation could almost assure that none would come here, leaving (once again) Chow and Walker.

I would like to think that all of this is just my fancy, born out of the uncertainty and anxiety of this search process.  But I would still like someone to explain all of the "leaks" which always favor Walker; the endless articles about how UCLA is a very unappealing job; the comments about how this prospect or that one has been eliminated because of money or personality.  I am now pretty well convinced that if Walker's retention were not a mandate for the new coach, that we could get one of three or four very strong candidates to be our head coach.  If we do not, it is either because the Athletic Director has with absolutely incredible foolishness (I'll use a nice word at this stage), put DeWayne Walker above the relative merits of his coaching prospects; or that a disinformation campaign coming from somewhere has systematically eliminated and discouraged all the good candidates.  It might well be the fodder for some serious investigation--except that this isn't politics, it isn't world affairs; and all we want is for UCLA to hire a really good coach, not suffer through another miserable five to fifteen years with nothing but our anger and our theories.

- Bruin Blue

BB writes an open letter. GO BRUINS. -N

Dear Mr. Guerrero,

I hope you don't mind if I call you Dan, because this isn't a real letter, and it just seems more direct that way.  Anyway, let me get right to the point, which is the search for a new football coach which you are undertaking, and which has tens of thousands of UCLA alumni and fans, both here in L.A. and across the country, on edge.  In fact, I would daresay that there are plenty of them who can't even sleep, and keep waking up and checking the blogs and the message boards to see if there is any news.  In that, they are not unlike their counterparts at Arkansas, Michigan, Georgia Tech and the other big programs which have been searching for coaches.  The only difference might be...well, that at UCLA we are not too confident, based on past history, so we tend to be more anxious.  In fact, some of us cannot help being downright pessimistic.

We were all thrilled with your hiring of Ben Howland, a homerun hire if there ever was one.  Of course, Howland did help a good deal with his great interest in UCLA and his apparent willingness to accept less money than his old school, Pittsburgh, was offering.  And although I don't follow college baseball much, it seems that John Savage is doing a fine job.  In football, however, you hired Karl Dorrell, and that was a disaster.  Maybe you are more sanguine about it, but by any reasonable balance sheet, it has been a terrible five years for our football program.  Of course it did follow a terrible four years by the previous coach whom you fired, which gives us at least nine years of absolutely nothing, except a fluke 10-2 season when we won a bunch of miracle games, and then got humiliated by our cross-town nemesis, before beating Northwestern in a Bowl game.  Since you have once again affirmed your goal for this program as being BCS Bowls and even bidding for national titles, I'm sure you will agree that we have not been in that ballpark for at least 20 years.  So we're desperately hoping for you to make the hire that will get us there.

Just recently, you said that when you hired Dorrell, you "went with your gut."  Well, we all have done that, and know the feeling when it doesn't work.  We raise the pot when we should have folded.  We bet on red instead of black.  We order the lamb when the salmon was the better choice.  But with most of those decisions, the cost is not too great, and we just try to be smarter and better next time. When you hire a football coach, though, especially at UCLA, the wrong decision costs us at least five years.  You weren't here for all the Lavin years, but you know that he lasted seven seasons, ultimately making a mockery of this program and putting us in a crater that only a genius like Howland could dig us out of so fast.  Toledo lasted seven as well.  Even Dorrell, with the worst UCLA coaching record in 60 years, got five.  So if you make a mistake now, it's at least another five years of futility.  I know it's a lot of pressure, but it's pressure you wanted; and I know you're not asking us for our opinion.  In fact, you're keeping all of this so secretive that few have any idea exactly where you stand right now.  The news that we have managed to get hasn't seemed so good, but maybe it's ready to change for the better.  We're still hoping.

Because it's so important, I am going to make some suggestions, which you obviously are free to either take or completely ignore.  But as you well know, it's our program; too; and I cannot personally bear the thought of going through another five or ten years of football misery.  So here is what I suggest:

First, completely put out of your mind any thoughts of hiring either Norm Chow or DeWayne Walker as our head coach.  Why?  First, because neither of them has the slightest degree of experience in being a head coach.  Yes, sometimes assistants become great head coaches, but even more often they do not; and many times they are total busts.  If you went back and researched the   before-hire"buzz" on various assistants who became head coaches and flamed out, you would see all sorts of positive endorsements, various respected people and coaches lauding their potential.  It's sort of like a blind date; the friends who set you up are always positive before the fact.  Tom Holmoe, Mike Stoops, Jim Lambright, Paul Wiggin, Ted Tollner, just some of the many highly touted assistants in this conference who became head coaches and were disasters.  Oh, yes, and the aforementioned Karl Dorrell.  Can UCLA afford to take such a chance again?  I and many others say absolutely not.

Now, I know that you like Walker, and want to keep him on, at least as defensive coordinator.  I have no strong opinions either way, EXCEPT that keeping Walker should in no way be made a condition for the next head coach.  Head football coaches are strong-willed people, and they usually do not want to be told who must be on their staff.  You cannot afford to lose out on a potential candidate who has his own personal choice for DC, and would balk at keeping Walker.  Never, ever make a coordinator more important than your head coach.  Good head coaches find their own good coordinators, believe me.  As to making Walker the head coach, this would  almost be worse than the hire of Dorrell, since Walker's credentials are no better.  He has been a DC for two years.  Yes, he has improved your defense; but this year's unit had ten starters back and finished fourth best in this league, despite getting to play Cal and Oregon with their ace QB s either seriously hampered or not playing at all.  And even if you think that Walker was a great DC, there are plenty of those around who have been or would be terrible as head coaches.  Remember Woody Widenhofer?  George Perles?  Holmoe and Lambright?  Mike Stoops?  Greg Robinson?  Yes, I know you want to keep your recruiting momentum, but I guarantee you that any credible coach you hire will recruit very well here.  Don't let Walker sell you the story that only he can do that.  And if you hire Walker and he is mediocre, you will have virtually buried this program, because by then no coach will want to come here, our reputation across the country will be so low.

As far as Chow, much the same arguments apply.  Yes, Chow has been a great OC at some places.  So were Norv Turner, Cam Cameron, Paul Hackett, Tollner, Chuck Long--how many do I need to mention?  Being a brilliant OC is not close to being a good head coach--it is really almost like apples and oranges, because the demands and responsibilities of a head coach are to both sides of the ball, and to the complex personal and team chemistry of the squad.  And thinking that you can put a really good OC as head coach and a good DC to help with the defense, and then you will have two halves of the circle, would be very naive . A head coach must run every aspect of the program and must have the will and the capacity to tell his coordinators what he wants, even to fire them if they do not.  Chow would be such a disappointing hire, for a school which keeps promising to hire a proven head coach and then always finds reasons why it couldn't.

Now, on to "proven" coaches.  Apparently you went after Chris Petersen and he's just not interested.  That's okay, it happens--as long as it didn't happen because you insisted that he keep Walker and he was too loyal to his own staff.  Petersen was a great first choice.  But you've still got others.  Bronco Mendenhall is starting to be mentioned.  I like almost everything I've seen about him, and I watch a whole lot of college football.  His teams are crisp, organized and well-functioning.  He's won two Mountain West titles in a row.  If you end up with Mendenhall, it will be a coup, really on the order of Georgia Tech getting Paul Johnson, whom I also really liked.  And please don't somehow think that the upcoming Vegas Bowl game is somehow an audition of Walker vs. Mendenhall.  UCLA has the better talent (Dorrell beat BYU 27-17), and of course our team will play lights out for an interim coach whom the players like; just as, for example, the Michigan State players scored a big Bowl upset under interim coach Bobby Williams, who was given the job, and then was a dreadful coach.  And don't let the public-relations campaign which Walker is subtly or unsubtly waging in the media either influence you or concern you.  You are making a legacy hire here, for everyone in the Bruin Nation, not just Walker and his coterie of friends or would-be press agents who are seeking long-term access through him.

Now, let's say Mendenhall doesn't want the job, either.  Well, is Steve Mariucci still in the ballgame?  He's got a national reputation, he has the charisma and the contacts.  He's not my first choice, but he's a good one.  Money is a problem, but I hope you are quickly learning that if you are not willing to pay around market value, not only are we not going to get a good head coach, we are going to be the laughingstock of the nation for our cheapness.  If Mariucci is simply impossible to hire, how about June Jones, who is a great offensive mind, and has a lot of national cachet right now for his undefeated season at Hawaii?  Jim Grobe at Wake Forest is highly respected, and was actually Arkansas' choice before Petrino.  Is Jim Mora absolutely out of the running?   Jim Fassel was a pretty good head coach for the Giants, taking them to the Super Bowl.  He is very respected as an offensive mind.  Mike Leach, not my personal favorite, perhaps, but another creative offensive mind.

There are even others.  Todd Graham of Tulsa, you remember him.  Came in here with Rice last year and gave your defensive coordinator all sorts of trouble.  Took a previously horrible Rice team to a Bowl game.  Now he's at Tulsa where he went 9-3.  He's got an OC named Malzahn who is very innovative.  You could probably bring both of them in.  Randy Edsall at Connecticut has done pretty well considering that UConn was a Division II football school for years.  There's Gary Patterson at TCU, certainly not anyone's favorite, but pretty respectable given that program's recent history.  And yes, there's Rick Neuheisel, who has that personal baggage, but who, if everyone else fell through, would certainly covet this job, and who has pretty good credentials, certainly as compared to anyone who has not been a head coach before.

Well, maybe you're already aware of all these people, and didn't need me to suggest any of them.  Okay, then, I'm sure you can get at least one of them, preferably one higher up on the list.  We desperately need someone whom the vast bulk of the alumni and fan base can get behind for once.  Someone who has proven what he can do as a head coach, so very few will be that upset if the first year is a struggle.  Someone who the national pundits will admire as a hire, and say, "Well, UCLA is finally in the big-time with this hire." Someone who, unlike the last few football coaches we have hired, is not a short-time or career assistant, but a mostly proven head coach commodity.  Someone who can change the entire mind-set and character of UCLA football, to one where we legitimately expect to compete for national titles, and will brook no excuses if we do not.  Someone whose head coaching track record can legitimately be extrapolated upward to predict such results, not someone who may tell you big things but has nothing in this resume to prove it.

Okay, Dan, thanks for listening.  I know that this was long, but my letters are always long.  If it weren't so important to me, I wouldn't feel the need to write them.  And I know that you aren't really listening, but I like to hope that you might be, just a tiny bit.  I remember how awful I felt when it became clear that Karl Dorrell was to become our head coach.  I realize that you didn't feel that way, but I did.  I don't want to feel that way again in a week or so; and I know that no one else does, either.  I know that you can't please everyone no matter what you do, but you have the best chance of pleasing the most people by hiring someone with proven, big-league credentials, like Arkansas did when they hired Petrino, and Georgia Tech did with Johnson.  I continue to wish you good luck, and am still hoping for a happy result.

Sincerely,

Bruin Blue (pen name, but I'm sure you understand)

Bruin Blue continues to speak up before its too late. GO BRUINS. -N

I have wagered on some football games in my time; had some great wins and some tough losses.  I have also had games where I felt pretty good going in, but before too long, I could see that things were not going well at all, and that I would probably lose.  As the minutes inevitably dwindle down, you start resigning yourself to the result, even though your mind cannot help but spin fantasies of some kind of miracle by which you can pull it out.  Finally, you either turn off the TV and find something else to do, or (more likely) you keep turning it back on just for a few seconds to see if something extraordinary may have happened.  It never does, though.

And that of course is a metaphor for how I am feeling about this coaching search.  It is not at all looking good.  Yes, nothing has been finalized; but once it is, it is then too late for all but recriminations.  And I might as well write about it now, because I just do not see myself having the energy to spend five or ten or twenty more years pointing out what we did wrong and how foolish we have been.  When Donahue was our coach, I was young, so I just figured I'd outlast his tenure.  Which I did, but then I got Toledo; at least he had a couple of enjoyable years.  Then with Dorrell, I had really vowed to give it up, because I thought that he, like Donahue, would be mediocre enough to last for more than a decade.  However, he turned out to be so awful that I could see some glimmers of hope, even though it took five years to get rid of him.  But one more stupid hire and I can personally see no percentage in hanging on some more.  Others will feel differently, of course; and I am glad of that, because I will at least enjoy reading their criticisms.  But for me, this feels like all-or-nothing.  I do not expect us to end up with an incredible hire, but at least need someone whom I can get behind, and feel hopeful about.

At this point, the only two reasons to hope are, 1) that the choice has apparently not been finalized yet; and, 2) that Dan Guerrero has said that he wants a program that will actually compete for a national championship.  But of course he said something similar the last time.  I actually do believe that he (and even the hopeless Peter Dalis) have wanted UCLA to win championships; it's just that they never have shown the acumen or the will to make it happen.  I'm sure that the Pittsburgh Pirate ownership would like to get into the World Series, too; but wishing for it or earnestly desiring it is far from making it a reality.  How anyone could possibly have dreamed that Karl Dorrell could "win the conference, and get us into BCS Bowls" (essentially what Guerrero said when he was hired), is unfathomable.  It's not just difficult to understand, it's far beyond that, into the realm of thinking that your plate of beans is going to turn into a full course dinner at the Ivy.  So it should not surprise anyone if Guerrero convinces himself that Chow or Walker or Chow plus Walker will give us that great shot at a national title which he says is our goal.

There usually aren't miracles in coaching hires--certainly there aren't any at UCLA.  Remember five years ago, when many of us could not believe that the three finalists were Dorrell, Greg Robinson and Mike Riley, and kept searching for someone below the radar?  Then we read that Dorrell was going to get the job, and it seemed like a terrible dream.  How could UCLA possibly fire Toledo and then end up with Dorrell?  Well, they did; and sure enough, most of the Bruin faithful got themselves all excited about it.  In fact, I spent at least four years foolishly bothering to argue with other UCLA alumni about Dorrell's capabilities.  Now, these are mostly fairly intelligent people; attorneys, doctors, professionals; who are capable in many areas of their life.  But they always astound me in their absolute inability to be able to discern who is a good coach and who is not.  I had to argue with them about Lavin up until the very end, which should have been enough evidence.  But here they were again, all sorts of them, telling me to give Dorrell some time; that he was on the right track.  One of them, a guy who donates a good deal of money, and goes to all the games, only half-kiddingly told me in Dorrell's third year that he ultimately would be a Hall of Fame coach.  So it should be clear that this kind of thinking gives our administration a lot of cover when it hires, because virtually any choice is met with enthusiasm and continued donations.  At many schools, of course, a hire like Dorrell would get the A.D. fired pretty quickly; but not here.  No one ever fired Peter Dalis, who gave us Hazzard, Harrick, Toledo and Lavin.

So let's go through the names again.  Remember, UCLA does not make startling hires, finding someone whom no one had really thought of.  Yes the coaching search is usually very secretive, but that's really so the A.D. can eventually say to the media, "We looked at many candidates; and I'm not going to divulge the various discussions or whom we talked to, but I am confident that our new coach (Chow, Walker, Chow/Walker) is absolutely the right choice for UCLA").  Petersen is almost surely out, having evinced no interest.  I'll at least give Guerrero some credit for going after him, but it might have helped if UCLA had come up with a big-time financial offer.  Mariucci seems almost certainly out, from every report; either not being that interested, or (more likely) simply wanting more money than UCLA would pay.  Leach has apparently not been contacted, according to the Texas Tech A.D. (whom I would believe).  Johnson was never even pursued.  Mendenhall is apparently not being pursued (I have a tiny hope that this is because we're playing him in two weeks, but that is akin to my hoping that my team would recover a fumble and run it back for 98 yards in the last minute).  Grobe is apparently not considered, and said he would stay at Wake Forest for next year.  Neueheisel, for better or worse, is not going to be approached.  That basically leaves us with June Jones as about the only big-name hope.  Can anyone think of any others?  Brian Kelly?  Maybe, but I don't think he'd be vetted.  Jim Fassel?  I doubt they will even talk to him. Jim Mora? He's not taking our $1.5 million or so; which when you think about it, is almost a before-the-fact assurance that we will whiff on the bigger name targets, despite our misguided hopes that we can get one of them.

That seems to inevitably leave us with either a small-school coach or an assistant. And we never hire small-school coaches, so I think we can eliminate that hope.  Again, you cannot completely do this in the dark; if UCLA had an interest in someone like that, it would come out, from the other school, if not from here.  There were no surprises in 2002.  And as to assistants, if we were interested in one from another school, we would have to ask permission to inquire, and we probably would hear about it.  The names we have heard about are Chow, who unquestionably is interested, and Walker.  As Sherlock Holmes famously said, "If you list all the possibilities, and eliminate them one by one, the one that is remaining must be the truth." The only thing we have against the numbing realization that Chow is likely to get this job is that Guerrero must originally have wanted to shoot higher.  But with the infuriating (to us) reality of very limited funds; a bunch of soulless bureaucrats in the Morgan Center, and an alumni and fan base which not only puts up with this stuff but actually enables it, it may be necessary to accept the inevitable.  One can only bang one's head against this wall for so many decades.

If it needs to be said again, the hiring of Norm Chow, personally vetted by DeWayne Walker, is not only appalling to me, but is so counter to how this should be done, as to make me despair that anything will ever change here in the reasonably near future.  This duo may well win some games; may even have a good year or two, but it will hardly be anything to get excited about.  All our coaches have at least one or two good years, don't they?  It's UCLA, after all.  But I think about this ridiculous hope on the part of our administration that if you pair a 62-year old offensive guru who has personality issues but who desperately wants his first head coaching job ever, with a 47-year old guy who has been a defensive coordinator for all of two years and who wants to work with the former mostly because he knows that it is the quickest road to himself becoming the head coach here, you will make some kind of magic, and I don't know whether to laugh or cry.  But if the fan base buys it, the seats will mostly be filled, the donations will be made, and the beat will go on.

At this point, I feel as if we are down 10-0 with five minutes to go.  We have the ball, but have shown no real signs of being able to advance it.  Of such situations heroic finishes can sometimes be made, but those are the sort that sometimes happen for other teams, but all so rarely for us.  Time to turn off the TV, or watch it play out to the bitter end?

-Bruin Blue

BB offers up a rapid response to the UCLA/Chow rumors. We are in total agreement wrt to his concerns about a Chow/Walker scenario. That will not work for BN. GO BRUINS. -N

Well, I had written what I had thought was my essay for the week, and thank you for the always thoughtful responses I have seen thus far.  But I am compelled to write another one right on its heels. because I think we are at crisis point.

As I had already indicated, no one knows for sure what is going on.  But there are now enough credible sources to be able to say with reasonable certainty that we face a really serious danger of what I see is a nightmare scenario occurring.  That is the hiring of Norm Chow as head coach, with the explicit approval of DeWayne Walker, and then the guarantee to Walker that after a few years, he will be the successor.  I would not have believed that Guerrero and UCLA could have been so foolish, but I now think that it is definitely possible.  And though some may of course differ, I do see this as an absolute disaster-in-waiting.

First, we well know that Norm Chow has never held a head coaching position.  He has been a very well respected offensive coordinator for around 30 years.  He is known as a technician, whose favorite spot is the press box, where he can look down and scheme against the opponents's defense.  He is well known as not being a "people person," not being that comfortable with those kind of interactions.  That is surely the reason why in all these years, Chow has never been offered one single head coaching position.  Not at BYU, where he had coached for years, not at woebegone Stanford, which was desperate to find a coach.  Not in the NFL, where there might be a spot for a tactician only.  Nowhere.  And now UCLA strongly considers hiring him as its head coach?  Why?  Because they know about him, since he was OC at USC?  Because in some kind of misplaced idea taken from a fantasy movie, the fact that it is well known that he and Pete Carroll had a falling out means that he will be "out for revenge!" against Carroll and the Trojans?  (If only it were as easy as that).  Because--and don't take this lightly--he is one of the few coaches whom the omnipresent DeWayne Walker has "vetted" for the head coach job?

It has been bruited about that Walker is taking an active hand in these proceedings, at least to the extent of telling Dan Guerrero which coaches he would be willing to work with.  How absolutely inappropriate is that?  Why in heaven's name would UCLA be so amazingly obtuse as to listen to an obviously self-interested Walker as to whom they should hire?  How in two years did Walker get to a position where his retention is seen to be a sine qua non of the whole process?  What kind of road is UCLA committed to traveling for the next twenty years?  Because after Chow, we will certainly be forced to hire Walker.  That is four or five years of Chow and ten or so of Walker.  That will make six straight football coaches we have hired without one iota of head coaching experience.  I absolutely shudder to think of it.  Could it all work out?  Sure, there is always a chance of anything working out.  But the odds are very greatly against it, as I'm sure most of you will agree.  How and why does UCLA always take this wishful thinking road, even to the extent of committing itself for over a decade to seeing what happens?  We are always told to be patient and see what happens.  We have had twenty years or more of seeing what happens.  What happens is damn near nothing; but we are taken down the same road again and again.

As I write this, I am now hearing rumors that Norm Chow has already been offered the job.  If that is true, I am through with all of this.  I am sure that UCLA and UCLA football will go on well without me.  I will still watch the basketball of course, at least until Howland leaves.  But I cannot support a program which has not the slightest clue as to how to conduct a coaching search and how to hire a football coach.  All those names we had heard and speculated over:  Petersen, Mariucci, Leach, Johnson, Mendenhall, Jones, Grobe, Kelly, Mora.  And this is what we are going to get?  Please, tell me that the rumor is wrong; that Dan Guerrero is smarter and more patient than that; that we are going to end up with a highly respected proven coach; that we are not going to be committed to five years of the Norm Chow experiment followed by ten years of the DeWayne Walker experiment, followed no doubt by ten more years of some other awful experiment, all in the name of "Bruin continuity," and "keeping the guys we know around," and, "he's a great guy."  Please tell me.  Because I feel sick.

- Bruin Blue

Bruin Blue serves up another great post. However please note though we are all anxious about how Dan Guerrero’s search process will turn out, we are not going to reach any conclusion on his performance until we see his pick. Moreover, also note despite BB’s reservations we happen to think Mike Leach is an intriguing candidate for UCLA. However, that said great stuff again from BB. And as usual we agree with most of his thoughts. Despite our honest disagreement our heart collectively is with BB, which is hoping for a new head coach who will represent a clear change from the past and an exciting move towards a new direction in UCLA football. GO BRUINS. – N

Where are we now? Nobody really knows, apparently except for Dan Guerrero. I suppose we should have expected this obscurity and uncertainty. There are two reasons for it, one legitimate and one not . The legitimate one is that with so many potential prospects involved in Bowl games, a certain amount of below-the-radar activity is probably necessary. The other reason is that Guerrero and UCLA want "plausible deniability," so that when this is all said and done, it can be said that whomever was hired was really the guy we wanted all along. UCLA has a preternatural aversion to being turned down by a coaching prospect. I don't know why; plenty of other schools are, and come out just fine; look across town for the most obvious examples. The other programs doing coaching searches along with us are not nearly so opaque about it. Michigan wanted Miles, got turned down, and then tried for Schiano . They have to regroup, but will come out okay. Arkansas made a firm offer to Grobe which he rejected, so it's on to Plan B. But in Westwood, we really have no clear idea as to who the favorite is, who is second on the list, or much of anything.

But I think there are some things we can deduce, for better or for worse. It is clear to me that Guerrero is wedded to the idea of keeping the ubiquitous DeWayne Walker on as defensive coordinator, and probably making his retention a requisite for the new coach. A very bad way to do it, in my view, since I think that a new coach should be given free rein with assistants. I'm not even sure that this approach might not cost us a potential coach who doesn't like to be dictated to in that way and wants to bring in his own staff. Nevertheless, it is pretty obvious that Guerrero is happy with the defensive side of the ball, and is looking for an offensive-minded coach to complement it. Every single coach we hear mentioned comes from the offensive side. In Guerrero's formula, offensively capable coach+Walker=successful program. I'm not nearly so sure about that, but that is what we are very likely to get.

At this point, I'm afraid I am getting ready to be disappointed again. It's somewhat my fault; I probably am too expectant and demanding. Against my better judgment, I really hoped that we would come up with a knockout hire, someone who could catapult us to national championship contending levels. That has long been a dream of mine, and I'm sure I'm not the only one who has had it. But there is apparently too much for us to overcome, including UCLA's infuriating unwillingness to spend market price--never mind top dollar--for the right coach; an athletic administration which does not show the acumen or the will to make the true homerun hire; an alumni and fan base of which too many really don't follow college football outside of the Pac 10 very closely, and thus do not have the ability to assess and weigh the potentials and the liabilities of the various coaching possibilities.

And, no; this does not mean that I expect everyone to share my specific perspectives, or that I will be unhappy unless UCLA chooses exactly whom I want. But it does mean that I am not willing to settle for just a coach who is better than Dorrell, or one who will get us to the top part of the conference. Almost any reasonable coach can do that. But to be able to legitimately compete with what, like it or not, is a powerhouse program at USC; to have at least some reasonable shot at a national title in many of the years; to be an actual player on the national stage--this is much harder to obtain. I remember '72 and '73, when Pepper Rodgers had some great offensive teams which ran all over weak foes, but which were outclassed and out coached when we played USC. That is very much where I am afraid we are going to end up. Maybe there's not much we can do about it. There are only so many Meyers and Tressels and Richts and Bob Stoops, and we are not getting any of those. We can and probably will get a good coach, but there are a lot more of them, even in this very league. So while the future seems brighter, I very much wonder if it will be as bright as we would want it to be.

We all know that there is not a Ben Howland-type hire for us in this group. I wanted Chris Petersen because while realizing the shortness of his record, I thought that of all the prospects, he had the most potential to turn into the next Meyer or Richt. But apparently either he or his wife or both do not want to live in Los Angeles. I do wonder what would happen if we actually offered him $2 million or so, but we are apparently not going to do that. I was naive enough to think that we were really going to increase our offers this time. Apparently we are, but only as compared to 2002. We are still about 30%-40% below market value, it seems. After Petersen, I thought that Steve Mariucci might be someone who could recruit so well here, that combined with his obvious ability to coach quarterbacks and develop an offense, he might really put a serious scare into Carroll. Apparently we either offered too little, or he is not that interested in coaching college ball, depending upon what story you hear. Bronco Mendenhall was another coach who I think has excellent potential, but we are not even looking at him. Paul Johnson is a proven rebuilder of programs, but we didn't look at him, either; and he's gone to Georgia Tech.

So now it seems as if we are down to our seond-tier candidates. Mike Leach, June Jones, most likely. Of the two, I'd prefer Jones, who I think is a better guy, and who has actually done more. It is essential that we have someone who has won a conference championship, done something really significant. Even so, I have a hard time extrapolating his Hawaii results into an ability to beat USC more than occasionally. As to Leach, he has never won a conference title, never really come close--not as close as Kansas and Missouri did this year. Yes, his talent level is less than Oklahoma and Texas--but guess what? His talent level here is going to be less than USC's, so how does one somehow imagine he will beat them to win a title? Anyway, that is just my view, and I know that others are very high on one or the other. And neither would be a bad coach here; it's just that I really wonder about the upper limit of their tenure. There's Jim Grobe, who actually got Wake Forest to a BCS game, no small feat. But he said he was coming back to Wake, so I would be very surprised if we got him. And then there's Brian Kelly, who had two mediocre years and one good one at Central Michigan, and parlayed that into the job at Cincinnati. MIchigan apparently has no interest in him, which is rather interesting, given his locale. I'd take Jones over him and Leach.

Other than that, what have we got? Jim Fassel has apparently put out feelers. I sort of like Fassel, who I think did a pretty good job in the cauldron which is New York; but I know that many see him as a weak choice. George O'Leary is a good coach, but we are never going to hire him after his resume scandal. Mike Price is a possibility, but age and reputation are factors. Todd Graham of Tulsa, formerly Rice for one year, is somewhat interesting. Then we have the third-tier candidates such as Chow and the omnipresent DeWayne Walker. Walker means Walker, and Chow means four years and then Walker, so both possibilities seem awful to me. Of course there are all those Bruin fans beating the drums incessantly for the Chow-Walker combo or the Walker solo act. It's as if the last five, actually twelve, actually 32, years did not take place. By all means, let's hire another assistant or set of assistants, and away we go. There is actually some fellow on BRO who strongly urges a Donahue for "temporary" (two years) head coach, Neuheisel for OC, and Walker for DC, arrangement. I've seen Dali paintings which were less surreal than that idea; but it shows you the mindset of many Bruin fans.

I do believe that Guerrero wants to hire a coach with experience, and is more than likely to do so. But for me at least, that is not good enough. Simply being better than Dorrell, or even than Dorrell and Toledo. is just not sufficient. Guerrero talks optimistically enough about being a national contender, "however you want to interpret that." But I am not at all sure that he knows enough about college football to realize that this doesn't just happen by wanting it to, or by relying on UCLA's potential talent advantages over some other schools in our conference. If only there were three or four great head coach prospects out there, so that we would have a decent chance of falling into one of them. At this point, I would be stunned and exultant if we somehow landed Petersen; quite satisfied if we got Mendenhall or Mariucci; pleasantly surprised if it were Grobe; not overjoyed but at least reasonably hopeful if it turned out to be Jones. Other than that, I will not be very happy. Thus, rightly or wrongly, for better or for worse, I now once again find myself in the position of just hoping that we can get out of this football search alive.

Postscript: If I were forced to bet on who the next coach will be, and I were given three guesses at it, I'd say--despite all the misdirection--Jones, Mariucci or Leach. If only two guesses, I'd say Mariucci or Leach. If just one guess, Leach (unfortunately for me). I'll get to see how accurate I am within a pretty short time.

- Bruin Blue

Bruin Blue lays out the issue that everyone in BN agrees on: Walker is not a credible candidate for the permanent position of UCLA head football coach. GO BRUINS. -N

Rumors, suggestions and more rumors. Who knows what is really happening? Petersen may well have removed himself from consideration. It is said that Mariucci's monetary demands are too high for UCLA to meet. Are we ready down to Plan C? Some say that Leach is the clear front runner; others mention Florida's OC Mullen. We still hear about Chow and Neuheisel. I certainly have my ideas about all of these; and I'm sure you do, too. We may disagree on some of them. But there is one thing that I would like to think that all of us at Bruins Nation can agree upon.

NO DEWAYNE WALKER

Walker for head coach is almost a worse idea than Karl Dorrell. Walker may (or may not) have more coaching ability than Dorrell; but coming after the misery of the Dorrell experiment, the very fact that he is even seriously mentioned is absurd. The man has been an assistant coach for over a decade and no one ever made him a coordinator until Dorrell decided to. And we all know how much acumen Dorrell has shown in his coaching hires. Now he has been a coordinator for two years. UCLA's record in that period is 13-12. Is that to be attributed to Walker? No, but coaching is always a team effort. Somehow UCLA scored less points than their opponents in 12 of 25 games. And it wasn't as if there weren't plenty of offensive explosions by the other teams. Cal's 45 last year. Oregon's 21 points in the first quarter last season. An offensively impaired Florida State's 44 in the Emerald Bowl. This year, injury-riddled Utah got 44. Washington 31. Washington State 27, with 541 yards and 31 first downs. Arizona 34 (27 in the first half). You know, I don't even think that Walker is a good defensive coordinator. Some will point with pride to the Cal game. We held a severely immobile Longshore to 21. In the other games after Longshore was hurt, Cal got 20, 20, 17, 23 and 13. We held Arizona State to 24, with Carpenter having all sorts of problems with his injured thumb. ASU also fumbled on our five-yard line. We held USC to 24, exactly what they got against Oregon State and Cal in two of their last four games. Oregon was playing with fourth- and fifth-string quarterbacks against us.

This work is not disgraceful by any means. It is better than the defensive work of Larry Kerr. But of course Walker had a veteran defensive unit this year and was expected to have a nationally ranked defense, and he had nothing of the sort. And as often mentioned, he has still never stopped one spread attack. The spread is becoming very much the mode in the Pac-10, and unless he can stop it, we are going to have one bad defensive effort after another. So I am far from confident that Walker is even one of the top thirty defensive coaches in the country. But even if one wants to make the case that he is, this is hardly enough to recommend him as a head coaching prospect. And so far no other school, no matter how woebegone its program, has ever actually interviewed him for a position. So why in heaven's name is he even being mentioned for the UCLA job? The answers are: because he is here, and UCLA can often not think beyond its own doorstep; because he has a cult of followers with their own agendas who continue to push him at every opportunity; because it makes some people feel better about firing a minority coach to want another minority to replace him; because in all the detritus of the Dorrell era, the defense at times was the only thing people could see as a positive, so they somehow want to latch on to that to start a new regime. And because far too many UCLA fans simply don't understand winning football very well.

If you think it's bad now, wait until and if Walker wins the Bowl game. It's far from impossible, since we beat BYU earlier this season with Dorrell coaching. leading 20-3 at half. I would never have made Walker the interim coach for that reason; but apparently there is a big effort afoot to keep Walker as DC. I am not in favor of that idea; and we may see why as early as next season. But I could live with it, if he attended to his job only, and did not attempt to gain his own sphere of power. The bottom line is that Walker should absolutely not be even considered for the head coaching position. Another problem with Walker's constant angling for this job is that it will make it almost impossible for UCLA to even consider another assistant coach for the position, no matter how dynamic or well-recommended. You would have the outcries from the Walker cult, and of course accusations that UCLA had bypassed an African-American assistant for a Caucasian one from another school. That means to me that UCLA is limited to current or former head coaches only. Far better if UCLA had simply let all the assistants fend for themselves (their salaries are guaranteed through next June), and assumed that the new coach would choose his own staff.

Before closing, I will add a few sentences about more credible coaching prospects. I realize that everyone has their own preferences, which is as it should be. But I would suggest that the favorable article about Mike Leach, while fun to read, could have been written in its own favorable context about any one of dozens of fairly successful head coaches. I am no big fan of Mike Riley, but his records at talent-challenged Oregon State favorably compare with Leach's at Texas Tech. Similarly, Mike Price is not a high choice of mine, yet he took WSU to two Rose Bowl games. I wonder exactly what Leach has accomplished down in Lubbock, with a 5-20 record against ranked teams. He has scored a lot of points with an offense which murders bad teams but often struggles against good ones; and he has given up a lot of points to almost all effective offenses, of which of course there are plenty in the Pac-10. I think that there is a very good chance that Leach ends up as our coach, so I do hope that everyone will go back and look at the past game-by-game results of him and some of the other coaches we might be considering. It's an effort, but we have made many efforts over the last five years, and this is the time for one last great push.

A few coaches not being mentioned at all, but certainly worth considering: Paul Johnson, with almost impeccable credentials. George O'Leary, tarred by lying on his resume, perhaps; but a very successful coach at Georgia Tech and now at CUSA winner Central Florida. Jim Grobe, who took Wake Forest to a BCS Bowl. David Cutcliffe, who actually went 44-29 at Mississippi, taking them to five Bowl games. Todd Graham, who had a winning season at woeful Rice, and just finished a 9-4 year in his first at Tulsa. Just some other suggestions during this rather unsettling time. The quicker we can get past this Walker nonsense, the quicker we can focus on the proven records of much more credible prospects.

- Bruin Blue

Bruin Blue serves up another delicious post to set up what could be a memorable week in Bruin football. GO BRUINS. -N

So much has happened in the last 48 hours that I feel worn out, but hopeful. I am disappointed that we lost the Texas game, because I actually thought we had a small chance to go undefeated; but the earlier injuries have made our rotation unsettled, and we are not in top physical form yet. Even so, we probably should have won. I have no worries that we will be extremely good come conference and of course March. Our basketball program is truly the least of my worries!

Now, as to football. We are truly at the climax of this five year struggle. It has been miserable, and very frustrating at times; but it finally happened, and we all had some part in it. It's not that anyone takes a gleeful pleasure in it, but the removal of Karl Dorrell from our football program was absolutely necessary. If the administration had listened to some of us, this hire never would have been made, because it had almost no chance of succeeding, despite what some of Dorrell's apologists and other pollyannas might say. Dorrell was completely unqualified for the job, was extremely stubborn as well as self-interested, and set UCLA football back even further than it was when he got the job. I do not feel the slightest iota of sympathy for a man who will end up with about $7 million of the university's money, for doing next to nothing, and subjecting all the loyal UCLA alumni and fans to such pathetically unsuccessful football. He has made more money in five years than many people will earn in their lifetimes. I will look back on the Dorrell regime as the worst football interlude in UCLA's modern history. And before we bid him goodbye, we should note all the people who were responsible for it; including Terry Donahue, his corps of acolytes in the program, most of the Los Angeles print and broadcast media, and an all-too-unknowledgeable segment of the Bruin fan base, which is always there to support mediocrity in the name of "the Bruin family" and their own comfort zone.

For now we are at the crucial stage, the hiring of the new coach. And all our work will essentially be in vain if we make a similar mistake. And do not doubt that the same forces which have made it so difficult for us to locate and hire a top football coach are still at work. You can see them every day in other forums, and hear them on talk radio. Yes, everyone is entitled to his or her opinion, but these people resemble addicts in their inability to imagine a new way of proceeding, and in their almost pathological compulsion to repeat the same errors which they can note as having happened in the past, but cannot recognize in the new configuration they are presented with now.

I'm of course talking about the never-ending efforts some people are making to push for the hiring of DeWayne Walker as head coach. Now, I think such people fall into two categories. Some of them are sincerely fans of Walker; and actually think that UCLA should do the same thing they did with Farmer, Lavin, Toledo and Dorrell--hire an assistant coach because he is already here at UCLA (or in Dorrell's case an alumnus), and because some of the players and recruits are fond of him. They see the failures of all the others, but somehow think that this is different. They live in dreamland, preferring someone who has no head coaching record, because then they can project all sorts of greatness onto him; while anyone who has actually coached somewhere of course has some losses or question marks, which they then use to eliminate that candidate. There is something in the UCLA psyche which has always been in love with wishful thinking; "just around the corner" success, as opposed to intelligent logic applied to the hiring and retaining of coaches. I thought that the work of Ben Howland had taught them something, but apparently not.

The other group is more murky. I absolutely now believe that there is a group of people who are pushing for Walker because they either have some personal connection with him, or hope to gain something concrete from his hiring. There are people on forums who have been pushing for Walker from the beginning of the season. They float rumors about him: that he was and will be considered for other jobs; when the truth is that there is no evidence whatsoever that he has ever had a face-to-face interview for any head job. They say that they "know" that Walker has a certain offensive coordinator in mind; or that they "know" that all our recruits will defect if he is not kept. No matter what other names are broached for the head job, the only one they want is Walker. That should be awfully suspicious in itself. I have no concrete idea as to what part Walker himself is playing in this, but I would have to think that he has been angling for this job all year. You don't have to be Sherlock Holmes to deduce that it was Walker himself who leaked the story about Dan Guerrero having a personal meeting with him, to Tom Deinhart of The Sporting News. It is undoubtedly Walker who went to the media with a story about him being a prime candidate for the Washington State job. And I have to believe that it is Walker who is starting these stories about all "his" recruits leaving if he is not kept. Finally, various posters on other forums insist that Walker has already been promised that he will be retained as DC if he is not given the head job. How would they "know" this, if it is not Walker who is telling them, for his own gain?

Frankly, while I have never met Walker, I do not like him. I am actually rather concerned that Dan Guerreo might be swayed into making Walker's retention as a mandate for any new coach. That would be a horrible idea. First, we might actually lose a great coaching prospect, who does not want to have dictated to him who his coordinators should be. Really good coaches have their own system and their own ideas, and they do not want to be stuck with holdovers from a different regime who might have their own agenda. Anyone who reads literature about the military or business knows the syndrome of the holdover on the new staff who really wants the top position, and who tries to obtain loyalty from the soldiers or employees beneath him to cement his power base. Now, I can't be sure that Walker is that sort; but I am thinking that he is. Second, by forcing Walker on a new coach, the administration would be saying that Walker is in some sense as important as the head coach. What if the new coach doesn't like Walker; or keeps him for a year and finds out that, yes, he cannot stop the spread defense, and wants to get rid of him? That would not be easy if Walker felt protected by the administration and bulwarked by his corps of supporters on the internet. At this point, it would be my fondest wish if Walker somehow got another job and left this program. I do not otherwise see a positive end to Walker's saga in Westwood. Do you realize that there are several people who write things like, "It is more important for us to keep Walker than to hire any one particular coach"? That kind of thinking is akin to that of a cult. And if we are forced to keep Walker, rest assured he will also keep his little staff of assistant coach supporters, which is food for more problems down the line.

Last week, there was a lot of talk about an inane idea of making Norm Chow the head coach, and Walker the defensive coordinator; with Chow doing the technical stuff, and Walker dealing with the players, since Chow is not a people person. This "combo" idea is pathetic; but you would be amazed at how many people thought it was a great idea. It is bad from many aspects; first, that you can't mix and match coaches like food on a dinner platter. A football regime must have one head coach who absolutely runs the show; not a pair of co-coaches who attend to different things. Besides, how long do you think it would take Walker and his band to try to get rid of Chow, so he can have the job? Fortunately, it seems that Dan Guerrero is (so far) smarter than that, and really wants a head coach with experience, not another haphazard gamble.

And who might that coach be? Well, I guess everyone has heard the rumors, and read some of the articles. Apparently Steve Mariucci is a leading candidate. A very recent Times article indicates that Guerrero's first choice (good for you, Dan!) is actually Chris Petersen; and that Mariucci and Mike Leach are right up there. Well, I will say that I would love for Petersen and Mariucci to be the two finalists, because either brings strengths, and either is so far above our recent hires in football as to be a wonderful breath of fresh air for us. I agree with Nestor that while Mariucci's resume has some flaws in it, he is still a respected football man, very dynamic, who might well be a better college coach than a pro coach, like Pete Carroll. I would prefer Petersen, who I think has all the makings of a star coach; but I know it won't be easy to pry him away from Boise. The guy I personally do not want is Leach, who to me is a more unpleasant version of Bob Toledo; who will throw the ball 70 times a game, which I actually find boring, and is not conducive to winning championships; and who rarely beats a good team, because most good defenses can stop his spread attack sufficiently, and move the ball at will on his defenses. And for those who might think, "Well, give him a good defensive coordinator, and we'll be fine," it is my strong opinion that this is not the right way to look at a regime. You do not try to hire a guy who is only good at one side of the ball and then prop him up with a coordinator on the other side. (Yes, I know; Bob Stoops won Steve Spurrier a championship; but there you are talking about two of the very best in the game, and it is a notable exception). Can anyone tell me the names of Jim Tressel's coordinators? I don't know them; and the reason is that Ohio State football is Jim Tressel. Similarly, if either of Urban Meyer's coordinators at Florida leave, do you think it will make a bit of difference in how well he does? UCLA always overrates the value of coordinators, precisely because they hire flawed coaches who cannot do the necessary job, so we always think we can bolster them through coordinators, which ultimately never works for more than a year or two. I will confess that I am afraid that Leach, who I know wants this job, will be willing to make a deal wherein Walker and Company get to stay, while Petersen and Mariucci might not. Please, Mr. Guerrero; you are doing a good job at the outset; do not blow this because of some misplaced loyalty to, or overestimation of, Walker.

So I am on the proverbial tenterhooks right now, because I know that this will be decided sooner rather than later. For me, it's no Leach, no Riley, no Brooks, and certainly no Walker or Chow. I am impressed that Guerrero has apparently shown the acumen to focus on Petersen and Mariucci; but I know that such things can fall through, and that UCLA has time and again been forced to settle for the drab backup choice in football. I actually do not think that I can go through tenure of a coach whom I do not like, and sense will not achieve what we all want here. And while it is undoubtedly true that any coach with the slightest degree of capability can do better than Dorrrell, we should not be fooled into then thinking that the new coach is really good, just because he does. I always knew that Jim Harrick, while surely better than his two immediate predecessors, was not the right coach for UCLA; and yet he would probably still be here were it not for his indiscretions. If we hire Leach, we are probably looking at 10-15 years of him, because coaches like that (particularly at win-starved UCLA) are not so easy to get rid of. A mistake now is actually worse than before, because we will have some measure of success whomever we hire. What we desperately need is to hire the right guy, the one who will make us proud of UCLA football again; someone who we can count on to match up with any opposing coach and to actually out coach many of them; someone who is the new face of UCLA football, and who can start something new and special here.

GO BRUINS.

- Bruin Blue