By Greg Lewis
Daily Bruin Senior Staff
They’re back.
After a dismal, injury-laden 1999 season, the UCLA football team
announced their return to the national football scene in the
Bruins’ season-opener on Sept. 2.
They did it with a bold, 35-24 victory over reigning SEC champ
and then-No. 3 Alabama.
They did it by dominating the line of scrimmage on both sides of
the ball, something the Bruins have not accomplished since the 10-2
1997 season.
And they did it with their new horse, running back DeShaun
Foster.
“We wanted to get respect, and we earned some respect
now,” said Foster, who rushed for 187 yards on a school-tying
42 carries. “We knew that when everyone was back (from
injuries last season), we’d be a good team."
“People were counting us out, and we just wanted to play
hard and show them that the Bruins were back,” he said.
Foster’s 187 yards were half of his 375-yard total from
last year, when he missed part of the season due to a high ankle
sprain.
After the game, several Alabama players said they had never
heard of DeShaun Foster. They added that he was as tough and
physical as any back they had gone up against.
Foster, who was eager to prove that he is 100 percent healthy,
stiff-armed his way to three touchdowns and 216 total yards, 29
through the air. According to Bruin head coach Bob Toledo, 105 of
the 187 rush yards were made after the Alabama defenders had made
their initial contact.
“We might have to give him two scholarships,” Toledo
said of the 45 touches. “We were gonna give our horse the
ball and see what happened.”
The game started off in disaster for the Bruins (1-0). On the
very first play of the game, Bama defensive lineman Jarrett Johnson
put a late hit on starting quarterback Cory Paus, separating Paus’
right shoulder.
On the ensuing punt, Alabama’s Freddie Milons took the
ball 71 yards for a 7-0 Alabama lead with just over a minute gone
from the clock.
Backup quarterback Ryan McCann led the Bruins on an 18-play,
nine-minute drive, capped by Foster’s first touchdown.
After holding the Tide the first time their offense took the
field, UCLA marched down the field and scored on a “sky
pass.” The sky pass is a play where the tailback takes the
handoff, hands the ball to the flanker on a reverse, and the
flanker passes to the streaking split end.
The play worked to perfection as Freddie Mitchell threw his
third career touchdown pass, a 31-yard picture-perfect spiral to
Brian Poli-Dixon.
“I knew it was perfect when it left my hands," Mitchell
said.
“You want to look at a pretty pass, that was his," McCann
said. "I’ve got to take notes from that.”
The Bruins then went up 21-7 on a Foster one-yard touchdown.
Alabama, which crossed the 50-yard line only three times the
entire game, came back to score on an Ahmad Galloway one-yard
touchdown run. That drive featured a 56-yard reverse, one of only
two plays of more than 15 yards by the Tide.
The Tide added a 34-yard field goal to go into halftime down
21-17.
After Alabama turned the ball over on the opening drive of the
second half, UCLA drove inside the 20-yard line, where McCann made
his only serious mistake of the day. He attempted to force a ball
to Mitchell through triple coverage, but free safety Reggie Myles
stepped in front for the interception and raced 91 yards the other
way to put the Crimson Tide up 24-21.
The Bruins held on defense from there on, forcing two more
fumbles along the way.
UCLA went up for good after the interception return when McCann
hit a wide-open Mitchell for a 46-yard touchdown.
“McCann came and put his arm around me and said,
“˜Fred, you’re gonna have to do your thing," Mitchell said. "I
said, “˜Hey, just put the ball in the air and I’ll make it
happen.'”
The score was Mitchell’s first touchdown since his very
first game as a Bruin.
“I got mad. Everyone was talking about Freddie Milons.
Freddie this and Freddie that. I can play this game, too,”
said Mitchell, who joins Milons and Poli-Dixon on the Biletnikoff
Award semi-finalist list. “I work out three times a day. I
mean, nobody works harder than I do.”
Mitchell finished the day with four catches for 91 yards, as
well as several crushing blocks on DeShaun Foster runs.
Foster scored UCLA’s final touchdown, breaking two tackles
and scoring from eight yards out.
Foster joined cornerback Rickey Manning, who had an interception
and a touchdown saving tackle on the 56-yard reverse, as the player
of the game.
The key to the victory, according to Toledo, was ball control
and the physical style the Bruins played. “This was the most
physical game we’ve played since I’ve been here, with
the exception of the two games in “˜97 against Washington and
Arizona,” he said.
The Bruins owned the time of possession statistic, holding on to
the ball for more than 37 minutes, compared to Alabama’s
having it for 22 minutes.
Toledo added that this was one of the all-time great Bruin
victories, and possibly the most important since he has been the
coach.
Never before has an unranked Bruin team defeated a team ranked
as high as No. 3.
In the AP poll released on Sept. 3, the previously unranked
Bruins shot up to No. 16, while Alabama, formerly No. 3, dropped to
No. 13.