UCLA Defense Holds #15 Huskies Long Enough to Win, 40-32
The Bruins flipped the Washington script for most of the game and the result was a big win for UCLA.
In our preview of the Washington defense, I wrote that the Husky defense had been so stingy through their first four games that they were holding opposing offenses to half the production of the Husky offense. Through three quarters tonight, UCLA flipped the script in front of 41,343 fans.
Not only was UCLA putting a beat down on Washington, the Bruin offense had doubled up what the Husky offense had done.
Until some time in the third quarter, UCLA was up 40-16 and the Bruins had put up twice as many yards as the Huskies.
While the Bruin offense deserves much credit for attacking the UW defense, the story of the game was really the previously unheralded UCLA defense.
It really wasn't until Washington's second to last drive that Michael Penix, Jr. became more effective against UCLA's defense.
In the first half, Penix was just 14 of 26 and the Bruins held him to just 133 yards passing. He also threw twice as many interceptions as touchdowns in the first half, one of which resulted in an eventual UCLA touchdown.
But the game didn’t start as great as it ended. With the Huskies receiving the opening kickoff, Penix drove them straight down the field for a quick touchdown.
When the Bruins marched downfield themselves, they turned the bowl over on downs deep in Washington territory, which seemed to make sense. If the game was going to be a shootout, UCLA needed touchdowns and not field goals.
But a bad exchange in the end zone put the ball on the ground and, while the Huskies recovered, the result was a safety for the Bruins.
When they got the ball back, UCLA marched down the field again and they would not be denied this time as Zach Charbonnet had his number called for the one-yard touchdown run.
The Huskies retook the lead soon thereafter on a 50-yard field goal by Peyton Henry.
The Bruin offense really took control of the game after that as UCLA scored 17 consecutive points to take a 33-10 lead on touchdown passes from Dorian Thompson-Robinson to Jake Bobo and Kam Brown.
Nicholas Barr-Mira added a 24-yard field goal for the last score of the first half.
If there was a questionable call from Chip Kelly in this one, it came at the end of the first half when he elected to go for it on fourth and one from the UW 16 instead of taking the three to end the half. That almost came back to bite the Bruins at the end of the game.
DTR finished off the opening drive of the second half by scampering in for a two-yard touchdown run.
Washington closed the gap to 33-16 on a 19-yard touchdown pass from Penix to Jalen McMillan.
But the Bruins bounced right back with a 39-yard TD pass from DTR to Bobo.
The Huskies made a valiant attempt to come back with two fourth quarter touchdowns, but it was too little, too late.
Rather than try an onside kick, Kalen DeBoer kicked the ball deep hoping his defense could get the ball back to give the Huskies a chance to tie.
It was a bad decision on DeBoer's part as the Bruins picked up enough first downs to run out the clock on Washington and send the fans home happy with a 40-32 win.
Go Bruins!!!
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Happy that we no longer have Jerry Azzinaro as D Coordinator. We playex solid defense for most of the game even with our limitations.
The two areas that worry me the most with this team are the OL and the pass defense, and both played much better than expected yesterday. The run game is typically solid but DTR had a good number of clean pockets with his straight drops and he was slicing and dicing the defense with that sort of time. That kid has really come of age (yes, age at 22 is a funny term ;-) ) That OL really kept the offense clicking all night long and they were the difference when the Bruins needed to eat the last 4 minutes of the game for the W. Also, the pass defense was very good after the first drive until the early 4th when I think the calls got pretty conservative. But they did more than enough in that time with pressures, 2 sacks, and 2 picks to cause a lot of Penix performance issues and let the Bruins get out to a big lead which they were able to milk in the end. DTR and Zach and Bobo deserve lots of praise, but this was really a great team performance by everyone.