Bruins swing their sixth win

Monday, October 27, 1997

Bruins swing their sixth win

RECAP: Cal unable to bypass UCLA offense as ‘swinging gate’
strategy leads to victory

By Jared Hummel

Daily Bruin Contributor

The California Golden Bears’ game plan was to run the ball, over
and over, to speed the game up – they did. They hoped that by
controlling the clock they could keep the wrecking ball that is the
UCLA offense off the field – they did. They thought this strategy
might enable them to spoil UCLA’s homecoming by putting an end to
the Bruins’ five game winning streak – they didn’t.

Instead, UCLA extended their win streak to six as they took down
a beleaguered Cal football team 35-17 before a crowd of 52,858 at
the Rose Bowl Saturday afternoon.

It didn’t take the Bruins long to set the tempo for the game. At
the end of the Golden Bears’ second drive of the contest, UCLA
special teams player Tod McBride rifled around his defender to
block Nick Harris’ punt. The ball caromed off McBride’s body and
into the hands of junior DuVal Hicks, who proceeded to march 18
yards for the touchdown.

The Bruins never looked back.

Cal head coach Tom Holmoe decided to establish the run right out
of the starting gates. The plan was to maintain a ball-control type
offense so they could run as much time off the clock as possible,
thereby limiting the number of opportunities UCLA had to score.

"Offensively, we didn’t get it going early and one of the
reasons is that we didn’t have the ball much – they kept it away
from us," UCLA Head Coach Bob Toledo said. "They kept the score
down and kept it very close. It was a good plan on their part."

"I thought we ran the ball well," Holmoe said. "Sometimes you
have to be stubborn with (running the ball)."

And stubborn they were.

In fact, Cal ran the ball on their first 12 plays from scrimmage
and 16 out of their first 18.

Despite all the running nobody from the California offensive
backfield managed to find the end zone in the first half. UCLA’s
stingy defense, led by senior linebacker Brian Willmer’s 12
tackles, allowed only three points on 112 total yards before the
break.

On the offensive side for UCLA, Toledo showed the Bruin faithful
that this season’s success has not caused him to abandon his
sometimes unorthodox play-calling. Four minutes and 17 seconds into
the second quarter, shortly after a Skip Hicks 1 yard touchdown run
made it 14-3, Toledo pulled a play out of his old bag of
tricks.

The Bruin offense lined up on the far left side of the field
before a confused Cal defense and flanker Jim McElroy took a direct
snap from the center and exploded through the left side and into
the end zone for a 23 yard score on a play titled "the swinging
gate".

"(The swinging gate) is something I’ve done for years … we
practiced it over the course of the week and it worked to
perfection today – it’s kind of fun," Toledo said.

This touchdown run was just the start for McElroy, who finished
the game with three touchdowns and 150 all-purpose yards. He had
three catches for the day, averaging 42.3 yards per grab, and was
the recipient of the long-awaited pass which put Bruin quarterback
Cade McNown at the top of UCLA’s list for career passing yards (the
old record was 6,168).

It was only fitting that the pass would turn out to be his most
impressive play of the season. In what has become McNown’s
trademark big-yardage play, the roll-out and pass, he took the snap
from center, rolled to his left and with a defender right in his
face, threw a 58-yard strike, across his body, to a well-covered
McElroy for a touchdown.

Despite the early 21-3 setback, the Golden Bears were not ready
to close up shop and head home.

Although relatively quiet up to this point, with just under
three minutes having expired in the third quarter, Cal showed some
signs of life when they gang-tackled Bruin tailback Skip Hicks and
forced a fumble, only the ninth turnover all year for the Bruin
offense.

Toledo pulled Hicks out for the remainder of the third quarter,
but returned him to action in the fourth quarter – Hicks finished
the day with 23 carries for 113 yards.

Saturday was the first full game Hicks has played in the last
four weeks, as he sat out the second half of the blowout against
Houston on Oct. 4 and was hampered by a bruised knee in Oregon two
weeks ago.

Holmoe and his staff decided to alter their game plan for the
second half, having had only modest success with the ground game.
They elected to put the ball in the air more often in hopes of
chipping away at that 18 point lead more quickly.

Cal all-time receptions and yardage leader, Bobby Shaw, seemed
to be the Bears’ only pass catcher for most of the game as he
showcased his speed and agility by running numerous slants and fade
routes. He finished the day with 9 catches for 122 yards but failed
to score a touchdown.

Shaw caught a pass from Cal quarterback Justin Vedder, netting
30 yards late in the third quarter which landed his team in UCLA
territory where they later scored, cutting the Bruin lead to 28-17.
But that is as close as they would get. The Bruins went on to score
one more touchdown to extend the lead to 18 for good at 35-17.

The Bruins now stand at 6-2 overall, 4-1 in Pac-10 play. Their
Rose Bowl chances are still alive although they need a little help
from their enemies – in fact, a lot of help.

In addition to the necessity of winning their last three games,
the Bruins must hope that currently undefeated Washington State
loses two of their last three games.

Rose Bowl or no Rose Bowl, the Bruins have established
themselves as the hottest team in the nation.

"We’re on a roll," senior Jim McElroy said. "Once you get a
snowball going it goes downhill and begins gathering and getting up
speed and soon you have a big old snowball and maybe an avalanche –
I think that right now this team is an avalanche and we’re just
waiting to come down on some people."

Let’s hope that the Bruins’ snow doesn’t melt away in the
Southern California sun over the course of the next three contests
versus Stanford, Washington, and USC. They need all the momentum
they can get, in order to give them an opportunity to win a
possible Rose Bowl berth.