UCLA Bruins defeat Washington State Cougars 48-24. The final score made it look like it was an easy enough win for the Bruins, but it was anything but. The Bruins fell asleep allowing Wazzu to take a 28-20 lead in the third quarter. The offense finally woke up midway through the third quarter going on a 67-yard touchdown drive that took up four minutes and got the two-point conversion to tie the game.
After Wazzu drove down to the one-yard line with four chances to punch the ball in for a touchdown and were denied by the Bruin defense, the game was essentially over.
“Down eight points after having turned it over and giving up two touchdown drives in the opening moments of the second half and being behind to an opponent that everyone said all week long that it would be no contest, to respond and to come back as spirited as we did to finish the game, I'm pleased,” Bruins’ head coach Rick Neuheisel said.
Cougars’ head coach Paul Wulff didn’t have any regrets going for it on fourth down.
“We had the ball on the one-foot line,” Wulff said. “I figured the worst case scenario if we didn't get it, that they would have to go 99 yards.”
They did thanks to a 73-yard carry by Derrick Coleman that took the Bruins out of the shadow of their own end zone and onto the Cougars’ 18-yard line. The defense shut out the Cougars for the rest of the game with a big assist to a missed 45-yard field goal by Cougars’ place kicker Andrew Furney.
With Kevin Prince out of the game thanks to a knee injury suffered during their game against the Texas Longhorns, the Bruins started Richard Brehaut to trigger their pistol. All Brehaut did was go 12-for-23 for 128 yards and no interceptions while guiding the Bruins towards 565 yards of offense, 437 yards on the ground. Johnathan Franklin rushed for a career-high of 216 yards, and Coleman rushed for a career-high of 185 yards becoming the first duo in Bruins history to rush for at least 180 yards in a game.
“There are some things that will tell me that we got better as a team that can run the football,” Neuheisel said. “The numbers were such that we were able to control the game on the ground. We made some silly mistakes in the first half that made touchdown drives field goal drives.”
But the UCLA defense that held the Longhorns down looked absolutely porous in the secondary giving up 311 passing yards to the Cougars.
“Certainly we are not better on defense and we are going to look at ourselves in the mirror,” Neuheisel said. “I'm excited about the way we responded when we were pressed, but that many yards and that many drives is not indicative of how we play defense.”
Washington Huskies defeat #18 USC Trojans 32-31. For the second consecutive year the Huskies beat the Trojans, however this season the offense wasn’t the culprit.
While Matt Barkley was all right going 14-for-19 with 179 yards, the real story was Allen Bradford who once again exploded out of the backfield with 21 carries for 222 yards and two touchdowns. Marc Tyler had 15 carries for only 59 yards but also had two scores.
The real story was the Trojan defense which looked awful giving up 314 yards in the air and 229 yards on the ground. 78% of those yards were accounted for by Huskies’ quarterback Jake Locker who went 24-for-39 for 313 yards and a touchdown while rushing 12 times for 111 yards including a 50-yard run in the second quarter that ended with him fumbling in the end zone.
The Trojans were actually down 17-7 in the second quarter after Jake Locker hooked up with Devin Aguilar on a 44-yard pass play in the open play of their drive for a touchdown. But the Trojans would wind up with a halftime lead of 21-20 thanks to Marc Tyler’s four-yard and six-yard touchdown carries.
Going back-and-forth in the second half, the Trojans led 31-29 and marched down to Washington’s 23-yard line with under three minutes left in the game when Joe Houston missed a 40-yard field goal that could have forced the Huskies to score a touchdown to win.
Instead with 2:34 left in the game, the Huskies marched down the field to USC’s 15-yard line letting Erik Folk kick the 32-yard field goal for the win despite having a full arsenal of timeouts.
Texas Rangers defeat LA Angels 6-2. Torii Hunter’s and Howie Kendrick’s RBI singles in the first inning gave starter Ervin Santana the quick 2-0 lead. But a Michael Young sacrifice fly and Josh Hamilton two-run homer gave the Rangers the one-run advantage in the fifth inning. Hamilton added a sacrifice fly, Vladimir Guerrero an RBI single and Matt Treanor had an RBI walk in the seventh inning for the 6-2 lead. Santana with the loss ends the season with a 17-10 record and a 3.92 ERA.
LA Dodgers defeat Arizona Diamondbacks 3-2. Read my recap of the game.
TONIGHT’S ACTION
Arizona Diamondbacks (65-96) at LA Dodgers (79-82). Rodrigo Lopez (7-15, 5.03 ERA) vs. Ted Lilly (9-12, 3.71 ERA). 1:10 pm FS Prime Ticket, AM 790 KABC.
LA Angels (79-82) at Texas Rangers (90-71). Dan Haren (4-4, 2.86 ERA) vs. Colby Lewis (12-13, 3.72 ERA). 12:05 pm FSWest, AM 830 KLAA.
LA Galaxy (50 pts., 14-4-9) at Chivas USA (25 pts., 7-14-4). 5:00 pm ESPN2, ESPN Deportes, AM 690 W Radio (Chivas radio en español), AM 1330 KWKW (Galaxy radio en español).
NFL Schedule
10:00 am
Baltimore Ravens at Pittsburgh Steelers. CBS.
Carolina Panthers at New Orleans Saints. Fox.
Cincinnati Bengals at Cleveland Browns. AM 570 KLAC.
1:00 pm
Washington Redskins at Philadelphia Eagles. Fox.
Arizona Cardinals at San Diego Chargers. AM 570 KLAC.
Houston Texans at Oakland Raiders. AM 710 KSPN.
5:30 pm
Chicago Bears at New York Giants. NBC, AM 570 KLAC.
