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UCLA Football: The Season of Frustration

By Mike Regalado

Nov 3, 2016; Boulder, CO, USA; UCLA Bruins head coach Jim Mora before the game against the Colorado Buffaloes at Folsom Field. Mandatory Credit: Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports
Nov 3, 2016; Boulder, CO, USA; UCLA Bruins head coach Jim Mora before the game against the Colorado Buffaloes at Folsom Field. Mandatory Credit: Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports /
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The UCLA Football team is 3-6 in a season where they keep losing in the most frustrating ways.

The UCLA Football team almost beat Texas A&M. They almost beat Stanford. They almost beat Arizona State. They almost beat Washignton State. They almost beat Utah.

They were winning at halftime against Colorado. Then the Buffaloes shut out the Bruins in the second half. UCLA was not close to winning this.

In a season that has been nothing short of frustrating, Bruin fans kept hanging their hats on the positives of this UCLA Football team. But then the Bruins have a performance that turns those positives into negatives and even more frustration sets in.

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I have been guilty of this myself.

I look at the things that are working and hope that it will click the next week. Sometimes it does and sometimes it regresses.

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This 2016 season has been one big, undeniable regression and that is on Head Coach Jim Mora.

The only part of this team that seems to have improved, at least from last season, is the defense. Defensive Coordinator Tom Bradley and his guys started the season slow but really picked it up once they got to the conference play. It is just unfortunate that the offense has not held up their end of the bargain.

I am generally perplexed at this offense. In their last game against Utah, they put up 45 points with back up quarterback Mike Fafaul breaking passing records and threw for 510 yards.

Against Colorado, Fafaul had trouble marching the team down the field at times and could not score in the red zone. On top of that, the Bruins missed two field goals after J.J. Molson initially hit a 48-yarder.

Speaking of special teams, they did not do the Bruins any favors by letting a 68-yard punt return go back for a touchdown. That was the score that sealed the deal for Colorado.

This UCLA Football team is exhausting. They build you up and then take the rug out from underneath you.

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The worst of all is the fact that UCLA has some very good players on this team, but they have no identity. And no offense. And apparently no special teams. That’s not gonna get you a lot of wins  and not going to get you a lot of conference championships. It is, in a word, frustrating.