Gary A. Vasquez-US PRESSWIRE
UCLA took care of business against Nebraska, just as we figured they would. It was a close, back-and-forth, gut-em-out battle, but we came out victorious.
It just so happens that those Nebraska Cornhuskers were also ranked 16th in the nation by the AP. Huh. That’s weird.
We know, we know. UCLA has beaten ranked out-of-conference opponents at the Rose Bowl before.
But this is different, and the media knows it. After UCLA put on a stunning display against Rice, they followed it up with an even better offensive performance against a top-25 team with a legitimate top-25 defense, with 650 yards of total offense, and with Brett Hundley looking 1000 times better than he did in Houston, all while Franklin proved himself to be worthy of Heisman discussion.
And they managed to shut down a Nebraska offense that had hung 24 points on these Bruins, allowing a measly field goal the rest of the game.
Meanwhile, Jim Mora was all:
(OK, he actually said “finish this motherf**ker” on the sidelines to his defense, but this video is better… wait, what?)
The point is, UCLA is consistent, finally, even if it’s just been for two weeks these days. UCLA did what it was supposed to do in the manner that it was supposed to do it against Rice. Then, they defended home-field advantage and beat Nebraska in a thriller that saw half-time adjustments dominate rather than fluky play from the Cornhuskers.
Basically, UCLA is a damn good team now, and deserves to be treated as such.
And because Nebraska is top-25, and because UCLA is so consistent, we’re asking you, AP voter that’s not reading this at all, to put our Bruins in your top-25. To put a team that’s hung 1300 yards of total offense on just two teams, a team that has held its opponents to three points in the second half of games.
We’re asking you to do the right thing, and make us officially nationally relevant.
GO BRUINS!!!