UCLA Football: How Far Can Jim Mora Take the Bruins?

With Jim Mora being locked up as the head coach of the UCLA Football team through 2021, Go Joe Bruin asks, “how far can he take the Bruins?”

UCLA Football coach Jim Mora just added a 2-year extension to his contract giving him time to operate with the Bruins for the next five years.

After getting hired, Mora took a 6-8 Bruin team and turned them into potential Pac-12 Champs. In his four years with the Bruins, he has become one of the most successful coaches in UCLA Football history.

Since Mora got to Westwood, UCLA has been breaking records, his players have been winning awards, he has had players selected in the NFL Draft and most importantly, he brought a winning culture to UCLA. The next step in the process is to now back up all of his hard work with some hardware.

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After every season, Mora has tried to improve on his team’s efforts from the season before. After UCLA’s less than stellar 8-5 season in 2015, Mora once again looked for ways to make upgrades to his team, which included his staff and his game plan.

Things were not horrible with former Offensive Coordinator Noel Mazzone, they were just stale and it was clear that through the end of the 2015 season, his offense was becoming less effective (that happens when you only have five plays).

So when the opportunity arose for Mazzone to take over the same position at Texas A&M, Mora did not necessarily coerce him to stay. Instead, he promoted RB coach Kennedy Polamalu to OC.

With the promotion of Polamalu, UCLA will now start working in some power into the offense, including the use of fullbacks, tight ends and power-based formations.

On defense, Tom Bradley is looking to bring balance to that side of the ball (and hopefully have less injuries). The first thing he needed to do was shore up the run defense and he is doing that by implementing a 4-3 defense (as opposed to the 3-4).

With both sides of the ball making tweaks to improve the team, UCLA could be seeing an evolution in their Bruin Revolution.

So let us go back to our original question… how far can Mora take the Bruins? We asked the good folks on Twitter to give their opinion.

With Jim Mora's extension keeping him at #UCLA through 2021, what is the most he will achieve in that time?
— Go Joe Bruin (@GoJoeBruinUCLA) June 8, 2016

At first, I was a little shocked. If you were to tell me Mora would get UCLA a national title within the next five years, I would seriously question it, but I would not be in total disbelief.

Mora has not won anything more significant than the Alamo Bowl, so to say he can get an NC within the next five years seems a little out of reach right now. Though I do believe the Bruins can improve, convincing me that UCLA would win the conference is more of a realistic projection.

If they take the Pac-12, that will prepare them for the next step… getting invited to a top tier bowl. After that, then they can focus on targeting a National Championship.

Next: UCLA Football Post Spring Practice 2-Deep Depth Chart

As for my humble opinion, in the next five years, I can see UCLA not only winning the Pac-12, but also winning a New Year’s Six bowl. Fingers crossed.