Bo Knows: Despite unrealistic expectations, UCLA football season still a success
Redshirt senior inside linebacker Eric Kendrics established himself as one of the nation’s best defensive players, winning the Butkus Award for the top collegiate linebacker. (Katie Meyers/Daily Bruin senior staff)
By Kevin Bowman
Jan. 6, 2015 12:34 a.m.
The expectations could hardly have been higher.
Coming into the season, UCLA was the hot choice for college football playoff predictions. Three out of seven Sports Illustrated experts picked the Bruins to reach the playoffs and another three picked them to at least play in a New Year’s Six bowl game. Among the 23 ESPN analysts, nine chose UCLA to make the playoffs and 12 thought it would win the Pac-12. Grantland’s preseason predictions featured four of its 10 experts thinking the Bruins would be playoff-bound.
The Bruins, though they claimed not to listen to the media’s prediction about their season, indicated they set the bar just as high for their internal goals and expectations.
Too high, it seems.
UCLA’s loss to Stanford in its final regular season game ensured the Bruins would miss out on the Pac-12 title and the playoffs, instead earning a trip to the Alamo Bowl.
Even in the afterglow of their 40-35 Alamo Bowl win over Kansas State, not every Bruin was entirely thrilled with the result of their season.
“We had to watch the national championship bracket teams win and we were hoping to be there, so it was kind of bittersweet,” said redshirt junior receiver Devin Lucien after the game.
It wasn’t what was hoped for, but calling UCLA’s 2014 season anything other than a success would be a mistake.
The expectations the Bruins were saddled with were unfair and unrealistically high. UCLA was coming off a 2013 season in which it finished No. 16, had to replace defensive coordinator Lou Spanos who left for the NFL and lost five key players – outside linebacker Anthony Barr, inside linebacker Jordan Zumwalt, defensive end Cassius Marsh, wide receiver Shaquelle Evans and offensive lineman guard Xavier Su’a-Filo.
UCLA added very little to offset its losses, signing just 19 recruits. Still, the national media expected the Bruins to improve drastically and become a top-four team, seemingly basing that entirely on the hype surrounding redshirt junior quarterback Brett Hundley and sophomore outside linebacker Myles Jack.
After Jack’s breakout freshman season and Hundley’s decision to skip the NFL draft and return to school, national pundits seemed to anticipate meteoric growth from both of them, often citing the two players as examples of why UCLA would be dominant on both sides of the ball.
What these experts seemed to ignore is that football, maybe more than any sport, is a team game that requires all 11 players to do their jobs in order to succeed. As a result, the Bruins were forced to deal with an unrealistic amount of hype, despite the fact they lost more important pieces than they gained.
That’s not to say the rest of the team couldn’t live up to Hundley and Jack’s standards. In fact, part of what makes this season such a success for the Bruins is how much everyone improved and stepped up throughout the season.
Redshirt senior inside linebacker Eric Kendricks firmly established himself as one of the nation’s elite defensive players and finally earned some recognition for it. Redshirt sophomore running back Paul Perkins grew from a backup for much of last season to the Pac-12’s leading rusher this year. Junior wide receiver Jordan Payton quickly made the loss of Evans easier with his consistent high level of play.
Beyond just the individual players, entire units got better as the year went on.
After a disastrous start to the year, surrendering an obscene number of sacks in the first few weeks, the offensive line became one of UCLA’s best position groups by the year’s end. The Bruins seem to have found their left tackle of the future in redshirt sophomore Conor McDermott and the offensive line for years to come.
The defense as a whole also became a bright spot by the end of the season. As new defensive coordinator Jeff Ulbrich adapted his scheme, the defense began applying more pressure and put together several dominant performances in the second half of the season.
All the progress made on both sides of the ball this year is made even better by the fact that the Bruins will return all but four starters next season.
UCLA’s season made its future brighter, but its present shines just as bright.
Arguably playing the nation’s most challenging schedule, the Bruins still managed to go 10-3, and had they hit the field goal at the end of the Utah game, could even have improved upon that mark. With that win, the Bruins would have reached the Pac-12 title game and likely earned a berth to a New Year’s Six bowl, putting them right around where they were predicted to finish.
Even though the Bruins didn’t reach a higher-profile bowl game, 10 wins is not an achievement to take lightly. After this season, UCLA is in the best position it has been in since the 1980s under coach Terry Donahue. The Bruins have two consecutive 10-win seasons for the first time in 16 seasons, they reached the 10-win mark for just the ninth time in school history and they won nine or more games for three straight years for the first time in UCLA history.
UCLA is a program on the rise – that’s what this season proved. The expectations were too lofty for them to reach this year, but they may not be out of reach for long.
