I’m not too much of a gambling man, although I do believe
Texas Hold ‘Em is a true sport because it’s televised
on ESPN. I would have said that Karl Dorrell’s emotionless
glare for most of the season made him the greatest bluffer in the
world.

Screw moral victories.
UCLA won this one.
By virtue of showing a national audience how far a little heart
and hard work will go, by virtue of UCLA coach Karl Dorrell showing
what he and his program are all about, by virtue of pushing USC to
the limits in its national championship run, if nothing else, the
Bruins have finally brought a little respect back to Westwood.

What is sports?
To be sure it is a broad question, easily answered by going to a
dictionary, but Merriam-Webster doesn’t have the answer
I’m looking for.

In preparation for this week’s football game, I went out
and rented “The Mighty Ducks.”
I came out of that movie pumped up and ready to kick the
feathers off the Hawks (the very good team that loses to a bunch of
underdogs in the movie).

The Red Sox had their curse reversed.
The Patriots had their streak stopped.
Heck, even George Dubya won, despite the fact that the
Washington Redskins won the previous Sunday ““ an incumbent
has not won the White House when the Redskins lost the Sunday
before Election Day since 1933.

Revenge is a dish best served cold, and if memory serves me
correctly, it was almost exactly a year ago when last year’s
downward spin started with a shocking loss at the hands of
Stanford.

So UCLA lost to that OPU (other public university ““
abbreviation is pronounced as o-poop) up in the Bay Area, and by
looking at the final score, 45-28, it would seem that the Bruins
were outmatched in every way.

A quick review of the Pac-10 preseason poll shows you how poor
prognosticators we media folk are about football. Sure, we got the
top two teams right, with USC No.

Coach Karl Dorrell calls this the “meat of our Pac-10
schedule.”
Well, while we’ll agree that it’s important,
I’m looking at it as more of an appetizer.

It’d be easy to overlook San Diego State. After all, the
Aztecs don’t have the athletes that UCLA has.
But the last time the Bruins played a California state school,
it was Fresno State in last year’s Silicon Valley Classic.