Bruleif

I stick with my original statement. UCLA has more good players this year at every position. On top of that all of the young players who started against Nebraska last year have a one more year of experience. Yes, we lost Fauria and Franklin but I think the newcomers who did not play last year will make up for the loss. There is more depth in the OL, the DL, the LB corps, and the WR corps. Most importantly, Hundley has a year of experience behind him. The two question marks at the start of this year were the running backs and the secondary. In the Nevada game both groups played well. I can't predict with certainty that they will do that again this Saturday - obviously Nevada is not Nebraska. But I do believe that UCLA has more talent than Nebraska. Especially more overall team speed. Whether that translates to a Bruin win I do not know. I certainly hope so. There is no way that UCLA is worse than last year.

No one who knows anything about UCLA would say that they are worse than last year. They have more quality depth at ALL positions.

I didn't mean to say that the starting time will have NO impact on the game. It will have some, but that "some" could be negligible. Also, think of the flip side of this "starting time" issue. Suppose for an moment that Nebraska expects the Bruins to start slowly and they start fast instead? Wouldn't that be a disadvantage for Nebraska? I still think that this will come down to turnovers, not starting time nor fan involvement. Whoever commits the fewest turnovers will win, IMHO.

What is the name, if any, of the Nebraska mascot that bounces around a lot. Is that this guy or another guy? And why does Nebraska have more than one mascot? The bouncing guy is really creepy. Every time I see him I fear that I have slipped into some alternate universe. Best Animal Mascot: Ralphie from Colorado. Any real animal mascot that has to be controlled by 10-12 guys gets my vote. Worst Animal Mascot: The overbred bulldog for Georgia that can barely breathe. I think he/she is called Uggie. Is there a worse one? I'd love it if the Bruins had a real brown bear ("bruin" is Dutch for "brown.") Of course that would probably last just one game and would end up with mutilated bodies left and right. I fear bears mightily. Anyone who heads into bear territoy without a healthy fear of them is nuts.

Talk about creepy! Sheeesh.

I agree. If the guy had just apologized right up front that would have been the end of it.

The offender was apparently a technician for the local NBC TV channel. That channel issued an apology later in the day.

Yes, you are right about Fauria, but don't you think that Jonathan Franklin was your worst matchup of 2012? Yes, Fauria hurt your team last year but I think it was Franklin that really did you guys in. He just had that very quick first step that enabled him to get up to speed very, very quickly.

What I like about him is that he seems to really be a great human being. He is really into his responsiblity of influencing young men. That's more important to me than wins and losses because the football team is such an influential representation of the university, rightly or wrongly. And, of course, there are so many things more important than sports in our lives. Thanks to all of the Nebraska fans for your wonderful thoughtfulness.

Make of this what you will. In the second video Mora mentions what Nebraska will be doing to remember Nick. Thanks, Nebraska. Mora walked out of the first presser for reasons you will see in the video and then completed it later in the day. I am glad that Jim Mora is our coach.

John Wooden always said he would take talent over experience any time. I agree.

Hundley is not really that fast. At least he does not looks that fast. It may be that he is so tall that he looks slower than he really is. He is definitely not as fast as Martinez is, IMHO. What makes Hundley dangerous is that it seems this year he has a better idea of when to run and when to pitch the ball out of bounds.

Yes, I am sure that Jim Mora will have the following telephone conversation Saturday morning: "Coach Mora, this is Bo Pellni. How come your team is not at the stadium? Mora: "What do you mean." Pelini: "Your game today with us. It starts in 15 minutes." Mora: "What! Dang, I wish I had known that. We just assumed the game started at 12:30 p.m. Darn! Ok, We will be right there. You can start without us. We will be there at the end of the first quarter." Pelini: "OK, See you then." Mora: "Room Service? Cancel the 85 orders of Eggs Benedict, caviar and Dom Perignon."

I am sure that the Bruin coaching staff is NOT saying "We need to win this week to aid recruiting in Nebraska." LOL.

Yes....we will see about that. And we will see a lot on Saturday in Lincoln too.

That remains to be seen. My point was that Nevada is not as bad as many of the creampuffs that the big schools played last weekend. IMHO Nevada would beat both of the teams that Nebraska has played.

The most important Hundley-related stat from the Nevada game was that UCLA never had to punt. And Nevada is not a bad team.

I think you are right on about the turnover margin being the key.

Yeah, but at least the two teams would be two damn good high school teams! John Wooden always said if he had to pick between talent and experience he would pick talent any time. Kareem's team and Walton's team both won the NC in basketball even with predominantly sophomore teams. The Bruin baseballers who won the NC this year were predominantly a sophomore-led team. So, we will see.

I think the game will be close and will be decided by turnovers. I am certain the Bruins will score more than 13 points. The Bruins are a very young team. They played 15 true or redshirt freshman in the Nevada game. And there are a lot of sophomores who start. It is predominantly a freshman-sophomore team. The feeling in Westwood is that this team has the talent to make a National Championship push next year. The strength of the team defensively is the linebacker corps. Plenty of speed. Everyone knows about Barr but Kendricks is just as solid and led the team in tackles last year. True freshman Myles Jack will be a star in the future. The DL now has plenty of depth with the addition of Vanderdoes, so the Bruins will be rotating the DLineman a lot to keep them fresh. Nebraska will be a good test for the DL. The secondary now has the talent it lacked last year but is still very green. The stength of the team offensively is obviously Hundley. He made some very good throws vs. Nevada. He seems to be calmer in the pocket. He also seemed more ready to chuck the ball out of bounds in order to avoid a sack. Most of the sacks last year were not the fault of the OL. Most were caused by Hundley either not making it back to the LOS while scrambling or by holding onto the ball too long. Per Mora there was a big emphasis to reduce the number of sacks during the offseason. The Bruins have a very good OL. Xavier Su'a Filo is the lynchpin. There is good depth at the OL but not a lot of ezperience. It's still too early to gauge the impact of Jonathan Franklin's departure but Jordan James had a very good game vs. Nevada. He had more than 100 yards in the first half and then rested most of the second. The receiving corps is solid. Shaq Evans is the No. 1 target. He can cover a lot of ground very quickly and is sure-handed. The two Devins - Fuller and Lucien - are Oregon fast. Special teams seem to be good. They blocked a punt for a touchdown. PK Kai'mi Fairbairn seems to be better but he still has to prove he can be more consistent from longer distances. Kickoff specialist Sean Covington hit the end zone consistently on kickoffs. The Achilles heel of the team is penalties. The Bruins led the country in penalties last year and they must have had close to 10 penalties against Nevada. With 15 true freshman playing in their first game the number of penalties can be understood. But the Bruins cannot hope to beat Nebraska if they have a lot of penalties. The other key to winning is the secondary. If they can grow up fast the Bruins will have a good chance to win. I think the DL, the OL , the LB corps, the QB, the running backs and the receivers will do wel As I said above I do not expect a blowout either way.

I have only been to Bruingold.com. Not as fancy architecturally as this forum but plenty of Bruin fans there.

UCLA used very little of the pass to the back out of the backfield in its first game. What that means I do not know.

I nominate this topic for Biggest Disappointment Between Topic Title and Actual Topic. I was hoping to see something about the game - not a rollcall on fan apparel choices. Sigh!

Praying? Really?

What really improved the Wisconsin uniform was the adoption of the "flying" W on the helmet. It gave the helmet some pizzazz and also added some depth with its shadowing. I think Wisconsin made that change early on in the Barry Alvarez years. I can't remember what their helmets looked like before the "flying" W was added but I think they were pretty boring. As far as the colors go, there are quite a few schools that have some variation of red and some variation of white. Standord, Utah, Indiana, Nebraska, Wisconsin, Oklahoma, North Carolina State and Alabama all come to mind. If you're not a fan of those schools I think its difficult to tell one form of red from another. The exception, for me at least, seems to be Oklahoma. Their red, which they call crimson, seems to be lot darker than the other reds in the BCS schools. Of course UCLA fans don't call it red. We call it "ketchup," as in the school across town that has "ketchup and mustard" as its colors and which is known for its athletic hot dogs. By extension I thnk Nebraska would therefore be "ketchup and mayonnaise," which, along with tomatoes and lettuce, is exactly what I like on my hamburger.