Wednesday, November 4, 1998
Fan support key to Stanford defeat
FOOTBALL: Hardcore crowd foils Cardinal"s plans, fuels Bruin
win
By Rocky Salmon
Daily Bruin Senior Staff
The UCLA football team has finally found a 12th Bruin.
The 12th player showed up in full force to UCLA"s game on
Saturday night and proved crucial. So crucial, in fact, that head
coach Bob Toledo would issue the fans the game ball.
"We finally have a home field advantage. It was great to see the
12th Bruin towels waving," Toledo said. "People finally come to see
us and not the opponents. I was pleased to see the great enthusiasm
and support they gave us."
For the Halloween game against Stanford, 64,820 Bruins came out
and got the stadium rocking with towels and Cade McNown Heisman
paddles.
In a season of Rose Bowl sellouts, the Stanford game did not
appear to be a hot ticket because of their 1-6 record, but the
Bruin faithful still came out in droves.
The crowd started off slow like the Bruin offense and at times
was even quiet, but it soon proved its confidence in the team.
"Even though we were messing up, I looked up and saw that all
the fans were still sitting and not going anywhere," Bruin
linebacker Trevor Turner said. "That gave us some adrenaline to
know that they were behind us."
The crowd would eventually get into the game, and they sounded
like they had stored their enthusiasm in a megaphone after a boring
first half. As the offense came to life so did the Bruin fans.
"The crowd is like us; when we get close they started cheering
louder. They started off quiet but picked it up when it counted,"
quarterback Cade McNown said. "The noise caused trouble because
(Stanford) couldn"t call audibles quick enough."
The crowd has become a vital part of UCLA"s 17-game winning
streak, and this factor was evident in the Stanford game during the
fourth quarter.
With 13:48 to go in the game, the UCLA defense and Bruin fans
would combine to rattle the Stanford offense and change the face of
the game.
"The defense, when we hear that crowd fired up, we start to
swarm," cornerback Marques Anderson said.
And swarm they did.
With the crowd buzzing and hyping the defense up, Stanford had
trouble audibilizing at the line and had to call three timeouts in
a little over two minutes.
Those three timeouts could have changed the outcome of the game,
as Stanford was unable to score at the end because they were out of
timeouts.
"We have an offense where we go to the line and see what the
defense is giving us," Stanford wide receiver Troy Walters said.
"So we check off. We were getting out of the huddle slow so Husak
had to use the timeouts."
So Toledo handed over the game ball to the fans — the noisiest
bunch Toledo said he has seen since UCLA battled Washington in the
Rose Bowl, and the loudest crowds he has seen since he began
coaching for UCLA.
A total of 280,467 fans  an average of 70,117 a game
 have ventured into Pasadena to cheer on the Bruins this
season. Their average is second in the Pac-10 to Washington, which
stands at 71,149. The Rose Bowl has finally become a real home
field advantage for UCLA as the team has gone 22-8 under
Toledo.
In the midst of the race to the Fiesta Bowl the Bruins have one
extra weapon: their fans. With only one game remaining at the Rose
Bowl  the USC game  UCLA stands to have the best crowds
in Bruin history.
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