First of all, I wanted to share a few things I heard about the Bruins that amused me. Last week, UCLA's student newspaper, the Daily Bruin, sent a writer to Boulder to cover the game. His name was Matt and he shacked up with me for a night and naturally we chatted it up about the game and both teams.
The subject turned to UCLA quarterback Mike Fafaul. As I'm sure you all are well aware, starter Josh Rosen is out for the year. But from what Matt told me, head coach Jim Mora was in no way making information regarding Rosen's status clear to the Bruins' media members.
Apparently on two separate occasions, without even being prompted whatsoever, he revealed information on Rosen to the press. The first time he said roughly "Josh is in pretty rough shape right now." The second instance, it was "All I know is that Josh got surgery a few days ago."
Needless to say, Mora was beyond fuming when he got wind of Fafaul!
I also heard a rumor that in the locker room after the game at Folsom, a fight broke out in the Bruins' spaces and some walls were damaged. I have not heard anything to confirm this rumor, but I'd be interested to see if there's any truth to that.
Matt had said that Mora's hardass persona is starting to take its toll on the players, athletic department and fan base. I think the phrase "hot seat" is a fair one to associate Mora with.
But moving on, I want to talk now about the sloppiness of that game. I'm of the thinking that the refs were a bit liberal at times with those flags. The Jimmie Gilbert play was not a good call. N.J. Falo's roughing the passer call I guess was warranted. But Ryan Moeller's personal foul call was bad.
It went both ways. But still, these recent wins against Stanford and UCLA have not been clean and well-executed. Not going to fly against Washington State and Utah. This week at Arizona needs to be a major tune up.
The offensive line needs to buckle down, Sefo Liufau needs to be electric and the Buffs need to win big. A third sloppy game in a row heading into a home matchup against a ranked, potentially undefeated in conference play team would worry me.
"When you're getting up to the better teams here at the stretch, the kinds of mistakes we made [Thursday] are going to get us beat:" Phil Lindsay
On the penalties, in particular some personal foul calls, Bryce Bobo had this to say after the game: "It's always the second person who gets caught...and I think that's what happened with us. We have to work on not retaliating to getting hit or any late hit that happens." This is the type of game that starts a rivalry.
That may be the best part of this resurgence. I wonder what the future holds in terms of teams within the Pac-12 that we develop bitter rivalries with. I guess we'll find out.
Notes:
Obvious but important: Colorado has now forced a turnover in a nation-leading 22 straight games. Bama is right behind us with 20 straight.
CU held UCLA to 210 yards, the fourth time this year they've held an opponent to under 250 total yards; matches a season-high set by the '98 Buffaloes.
That game was the 35 start of Liufau's career, tying Darian Hagan's record that he set from 1989-1991.
Lindsay is the first tailback at CU to score 10 touchdowns in a season since Rodney Stewart did it in 2010.
UCLA's offense averaged 9.6 yards to go on third downs in the game.
The subject turned to UCLA quarterback Mike Fafaul. As I'm sure you all are well aware, starter Josh Rosen is out for the year. But from what Matt told me, head coach Jim Mora was in no way making information regarding Rosen's status clear to the Bruins' media members.
Apparently on two separate occasions, without even being prompted whatsoever, he revealed information on Rosen to the press. The first time he said roughly "Josh is in pretty rough shape right now." The second instance, it was "All I know is that Josh got surgery a few days ago."
Needless to say, Mora was beyond fuming when he got wind of Fafaul!
I also heard a rumor that in the locker room after the game at Folsom, a fight broke out in the Bruins' spaces and some walls were damaged. I have not heard anything to confirm this rumor, but I'd be interested to see if there's any truth to that.
Matt had said that Mora's hardass persona is starting to take its toll on the players, athletic department and fan base. I think the phrase "hot seat" is a fair one to associate Mora with.
But moving on, I want to talk now about the sloppiness of that game. I'm of the thinking that the refs were a bit liberal at times with those flags. The Jimmie Gilbert play was not a good call. N.J. Falo's roughing the passer call I guess was warranted. But Ryan Moeller's personal foul call was bad.
It went both ways. But still, these recent wins against Stanford and UCLA have not been clean and well-executed. Not going to fly against Washington State and Utah. This week at Arizona needs to be a major tune up.
The offensive line needs to buckle down, Sefo Liufau needs to be electric and the Buffs need to win big. A third sloppy game in a row heading into a home matchup against a ranked, potentially undefeated in conference play team would worry me.
"When you're getting up to the better teams here at the stretch, the kinds of mistakes we made [Thursday] are going to get us beat:" Phil Lindsay
On the penalties, in particular some personal foul calls, Bryce Bobo had this to say after the game: "It's always the second person who gets caught...and I think that's what happened with us. We have to work on not retaliating to getting hit or any late hit that happens." This is the type of game that starts a rivalry.
That may be the best part of this resurgence. I wonder what the future holds in terms of teams within the Pac-12 that we develop bitter rivalries with. I guess we'll find out.
Notes:
Obvious but important: Colorado has now forced a turnover in a nation-leading 22 straight games. Bama is right behind us with 20 straight.
CU held UCLA to 210 yards, the fourth time this year they've held an opponent to under 250 total yards; matches a season-high set by the '98 Buffaloes.
That game was the 35 start of Liufau's career, tying Darian Hagan's record that he set from 1989-1991.
Lindsay is the first tailback at CU to score 10 touchdowns in a season since Rodney Stewart did it in 2010.
UCLA's offense averaged 9.6 yards to go on third downs in the game.