Foster Farms Bowl — Sports Commentary

By Art Spander

SANTA CLARA, Calif. — This is the way to win a football game, the old-fashioned way, the effective way. You get the ball and run it through the other team’s defense. You gain yards, you score points and, perhaps most importantly, you never give the opponent the ball. Or a chance.

Stanford plays that style of football. USC plays that style. And as we — and UCLA — learned on a chilly night-after-Christmas, Nebraska plays that style. Crunch, smash, dash, flash. And now and then, throw a pass.

Nebraska had a 5-7 record but made it to the Foster Farms Bowl because of academic progress. UCLA was 8-4 and had a freshman sensation quarterback. But the Bruins couldn’t stop Stanford. Or USC. And on Saturday night, with a defensive line far too light and coaching decisions far too incorrect, they couldn’t stop Nebraska, which won the Foster Farms Bowl, 37-29.

You know the adage. There are lies, damned lies and statistics. But Saturday night at Levi’s Stadium, where the announced crowd was 33,527, these stats were all too truthful. The Cornhuskers rushed for 326 yards. The Cornhuskers had the ball just over 38 minutes out of the total 60.

“We’ve got to get bigger and stronger,” said UCLA coach Jim Mora, stating the obvious. “So we can be competitive against teams like this or Stanford or USC. But it’s a bit of a catch-22 in our (Pac-12) conference, because so many teams play spread.”

UCLA, ending the year with consecutive defeats, was merely spread out. They got bulled and trapped and, every now and then, tricked. “We knew the team we could be,” said Mike Riley, in his first year at Nebraska after a 12-year run as head coach at Oregon State. “This game gave us a chance to prove it.”

The Huskers proved it solidly and demonstratively, if somewhat slowly. After a fumble deep in UCLA territory and a couple of Josh Rosen touchdown passes, Nebraska trailed 21-7 roughly halfway through the second quarter. But then the domination began.

Nebraska, in order, got a touchdown, a touchdown — and it was 21-21 at halftime — a touchdown (with a blocked PAT), a field goal and a touchdown. The Huskers, down by 14, suddenly led by 16, 37-21. As they love to say on TV, 30 unanswered points. Wow. Or for UCLA, woe.

Rosen was harassed. He had gone a stretch of 245 passes without an interception in the middle of the season. He was picked off twice by USC in the Bruins’ one-sided loss to the Trojans and then twice more Saturday night.

“We didn’t do enough on offense,” said Rosen, “to keep our defense off the field. Nebraska ran 81 plays.” To UCLA’s 57.

Rosen is a drop-back quarterback. Nebraska’s Tommy Armstrong Jr. drops through you. He’ll hand off. He’ll carry (10 times for 97 yards) and, when needed, he’ll pass (12 of 19 for 174 yards and a touchdown). He’s mobile and agile. And getting blocks from a two-tight-end formation that flummoxed the Bruins when it didn’t overwhelm them, he became the offensive player of the game.

Rosen was 26 of 42 for 319 yards and three touchdowns.

A few days ago, Mora warned what Armstrong was capable of doing, and the UCLA head coach proved an all-too-accurate prophet.

UCLA, as it did in other games this season, made critical penalties, two unsportsmanlike calls that kept Nebraska drives alive. If you are unable to keep a team from pounding you, the worst thing to do is to respond by hitting someone out of bounds.

Yet, the Bruins did have ball and two chances to score late, but Ka’imi Fairbairn, who kicked a 60-yard field goal against Cal, missed a 46-yarder and at the end Rosen was intercepted in the end zone.

“It’s a disappointing loss,” said Mora. “We struggled against the run. We are light on defense, and they took advantage. They did a nice job.

“We fought our butts off, but (Nebraska is) a really good front out there to go up against. It starts with us as a staff, taking a hard look at ourselves, how we teach, the structure of our offense and defense, our drills, our strength and conditioning.

“I have a lot of respect for Nebraska. They beat Michigan State. They are a good football team.”

For sure, they are better than UCLA.