Away game leaves fans, players at loss

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Freddie Mitchell’s response after the game told the story.
Actually, it was his lack of a response.

“I don’t know what to say,” he said.
“It’s probably the first time I don’t know what
to say.”

And if Mitchell can’t put the game into words, it
can’t be an easy task. Basically, as many of the locals here
would say, it was “hella crazy.”

There were 162 plays for 713 yards in 228 wild minutes, and
every play was the biggest play ““ until the next one.

But the question that was so difficult to answer in the locker
room remains: What went wrong for the Bruins in a game they were
supposed to easily win?

For starters, the team continued two trends which have plagued
them for so long.

“We tried to get two monkeys off our back. One was to
start fast and score right off the bat and the second thing was to
win on the road,” coach Bob Toledo said.

“Those were two of our goals, and we didn’t reach
our goals.”

Just as in UCLA’s first five games, the Bruins fell behind
early and were forced to play catch up. They’ve given up the
first touchdown in every game this year and have spotted teams a
combined 58 points before getting on the scoreboard.

And Saturday’s game was no different. Down 7-0 and later
21-7, UCLA’s backs were against the wall throughout.

“As I told the team, you can only go to the well so many
times,” Toledo said, “or eventually it’s going to
catch up with you.”

UCLA did catch up initially with a stunning fourth-quarter
comeback to tie the game. And at that point, the Bruins looked
destined to win.

“I thought we were going to win. I thought the game was
ours,” Mitchell said.

But the well was already drained. Cory Paus tried to explain
UCLA’s slow starts, but couldn’t. And Mitchell was on
that same path.

“I don’t know. I don’t know. But (we’ve)
got to change it up.”

Jermaine Lewis agreed, stressing the importance of putting
together four solid quarters of football.

Toledo recently joked that his team should scrimmage for 30
minutes prior to the start of each game, so they can get their slow
starts out of the way.

That doesn’t seem too far-fetched anymore.

Because if the Bruins don’t change soon, their bad starts
will result in a bad ending come November.

The other monkey on UCLA’s back is a gorilla, and
it’s only getting bigger.

The last time UCLA won a game outside the Rose Bowl, Cade McNown
was their quarterback.

They’ve gone down in eight consecutive road games,
allowing thousands of fans to run around on opposing fields
throughout the West.

And if UCLA can’t take care of struggling Cal on the road,
its streak could certainly extend into 2001. UCLA’s remaining
away games are at 5-1 Arizona and 5-1 Washington.

“Any time you have a team of this caliber, you’ve
got to win on the road,” said safety Marques Anderson.
“We’re kind of in between a rock and a hard
place.”

The road to success goes through the road, and if the Bruins
want to be legitimate contenders, they must right the ship
quick.