Editor's Note:  BruinBlue at BruinsNation.com wrote this great piece below on the current coaching search.  We thought we'd bring it to you in whole as it describes the situation Guerrero finds himself in, whether he created it or not.

We are all still hoping that Dan Guerrero ends this extensive coaching search with a winning hire . And that might well still happen.  But I think it would be pollyannish to believe that the ultimate choice is going to be someone who is met with consensus approval, or whose name immediately gains us much-sought national respect for both the process and the hire.  It is tempting to simply hope that the man who brought in Ben Howland will do it again; but it is equally easy to believe that this search has been mishandled and compromised to such an extent that however it ends up, there are going to be some very unhappy people, and some immediate problems to deal with.

As I said the other day, no one is certain as to read more

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Editors Note: We will be accepting guest blogger posts this season so feel free to write something up when you feel like it and submit it to us. We can't promise we will put it on the front page but hey if you have something to say go ahead and say it. Here is Jake's take on the Scrimmage. We edited for formatting and subject headings.

I attended the Breakfast with the Burins event and then the scrimmage at Drake Stadium today, and I wanted to give you guys my impressions. read more

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Editor: There are many great notes on the petition to Dump Dorrell signature page made from passionate and loyal Bruin fans and alums. There is one that stands out that we’d like to print here (with minor editing) before we send the petition to Dan Guerrero tomorrow (please sign the petition if you haven’t already). Thank you Howard A. Grey, Ph.D., we could not have put it better.

As a life-long Bruin, alumnus (all 3 degrees), and former instructor, UCLA has been my “second home”. I have hesitated to express these views, thinking last year marked a turnaround in the football program. But read more

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Now we at DD don’t want to tip off any NFL team that Karl Dorrell is not NFL coaching material. Obviously we want to help them make the right choice in selecting KD as their head coach, or even coordinator. So generally, as a policy, we are going to stay away from linking to fansites of teams considering Karl, although it’s easy to find us if they want to obviously. Today, however, we are going to go against our policy to bring you the brilliant analysis of read more

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Vegas is picking up!! Strange that the Vegas Bowl invited BYU … what Mormons are going to come to Sin City and gamble?? Not many is the answer. We have seen many Oregon Duck fans but few Cougar fans. We have answers to our questions to Florida State blogger ChantRant in part 2 of our Q&A. Great info from inside Seminole Nation. Big thanks to the folks at ChantRant!

1. Under Bowden, FSU has had one of the greatest runs in college football history, as you all well know. The obvious first question for us at UCLA and DumpDorrell (that we will try to mask) is, now that boosters have gotten rid of his son, does Bobby have any scapegoats if next year is disappointing?

No scapegoats. Especially read more

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Florida State Blogger ChantRant invited us to do a Q&A with them for the Emerald Bowl. Here are our answers to their questions. We will have their answers to our questions soon.

1. We hear the Bruins are practicing hard. Why is Dorrell taking this game so seriously?

Dorrell and the team are practicing hard. The reason is read more

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Editor's note: We are bumping Scott's post from the comment section because it deserves attention. We ask Scott and all loyal but frustrated Bruin fans to give Dan Guerrero until the end of the season to act before you lose faith in his ability to change the football program for the better. I have been a Bruin fan for most of my life. I have been disgusted for going on 2 decades now. This program has shown a commitment to mediocrity when it comes to football. Simply making a bowl game just does not cut it in the BCS world. If your conference raises the bar by helping to create a monster such as the BCS, you are forced by the nature of your environment to raise the bar as well. UCLA football has not done this. I remember when Terry Donahue was our coach, and the talk every year was about read more

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Today we have a Q&A with guest Brandon Johnson, sportsblogger for the Arizona Daily Star, on the upcoming game against Arizona.  Thanks Brandon for joining us on DD today.  Let’s get to it:

• Arizona is off to a 2-3 start, and 0-2 in the Pac-10.  Was this expected? Do you think you still have a shot at a bowl game?

When the season started, most Arizona fans looked at the schedule and felt like the ‘Cats could win the necessary six games to make a bowl.  The consensus  was that Arizona would need to beat BYU, Stephen F. Austin, Washington, Stanford, Oregon St., and Washington St.  Odds are one of those games would be lost and possibly one gained elsewhere still yielding the necessary six wins to reach a bowl game.  Now that Arizona has lost to Washington and Wazzu looks better than expected, the Wildcats may have to find two victories they weren’t expecting if they still want to make a bowl game.  The good news is ASU looks horrible and it’s a home game this year.  That leaves the team needing to beat UCLA, Cal, or Oregon.  Realistically Arizona needs a win against UCLA or they can forget about a bowl game.

• Your offense is near dead last in the country with barely 250 yards per game.  Why is Arizona having problems offensively?

The offensive problems begin and end with our young, inexperienced offensive line.  Three freshmen are starting and the two returners aren’t much to write home about.  On top of this, the jury is still out as to whether or not any of the linemen are really good enough to start for a winning Pac-10 team.  This has created a total inability to run the football. If you take out the game against I-AA Stephen F. Austin when Arizona had over 200 yards on the ground and factor in all the sacks they’ve given up, their rushing total for the season is 76 yards (by my calculation).  Obviously this puts tremendous pressure on the passing game and thus far, it has failed to step up to the challenge. 

• You hammered us last year on the ground, 300+ yards rushing, and on the board with 50+ points.  No one thinks that will happen again, but if you are productive offensively, how will it happen?

The offensive line will have to grow up in one week’s time.  Since this is unlikely, I don’t see any reason to believe that Arizona should put up anywhere near the numbers they did last year.  They may not have had a great offensive line last November, but they were experienced.

• Your defense has average numbers as well.  Are your stats misleading because of the teams you have played, or is your defense as average as the numbers suggest?

This is one area where the numbers don’t tell the whole story.  The mere fact that the defense is out on the field so much has led to their average stats.  However, they have played pretty well for most of the season and kept Arizona in games longer then they should have been.  In a lot of ways they’ve had a “bend but don’t break” mentality.  An inability to rush the quarterback has helped teams move the ball but when it comes to time for opponents to score, the defense seems to come through.  If it hadn’t been for a muffed punt on their own 10 yard line with under five minutes to go in the 4th quarter, Arizona would have held USC to 13 points.  As I’m sure your aware, the Trojans have scored 20+ points in 56 straight games.

• Stoops looked like he was turning your program around, is that still the case?  What are the faithful thinking about the direction of the program under Stoops?

The intelligent and faithful Wildcat fan will still tell you that Stoops is turning the program around because he is.  The fair weather fans (who are now leaving for the year) are predictably calling for Stoops to go.  His contract runs through 2010 so that’s not going to happen any time soon.  I think the fact that the school gave him a 7 year contract to begin with was an acknowledgment of just how bad things were in Tucson.  No coach in Arizona history has ever inherited the situation that Stoops did when he came to Tucson.  While Stoops is safe at season’s end, it remains to be seen if offensive coordinator Mike Canales will be back after the season.  His contract is up next summer and I don’t think anyone really knows what Mike Stoops and AD Jim Livengood will do at that time.  Stoops has thus far managed to steer criticism away from Canales and point to the inexperience of the offensive line.  We’ll see if that’s still the case should Arizona finish the season near the bottom of the NCAA in offense (which it looks like they will).

• What does UCLA have to do to win Saturday?

UCLA needs to do two things on Saturday to win this game. The first is avoid turnovers in their own territory.  Arizona’s offense hasn’t shown the ability to take a turnover 75 yards for a score but a turnover on the UCLA 35 puts them in at least field goal range from the start.  The second thing UCLA must do is put pressure on quarterback Willie Tuitama.  He has yet to find his timing and a lot of that has to do with the o-line problems.  If UCLA can get to him they’ve got nothing to worry about in this game.  He’s not very mobile, has already been banged up this year, and lacks a real “go to” receiver when he’s hurried.

• Your prediction.

I haven’t seen much of UCLA this year.  I saw five minutes of the Rice game and I watched the first half of the Stanford game on a re-run.  Obviously UCLA didn’t get it’s offense going until the second half of that game.  That said, Arizona has yet to show an ability to move the ball.  Until they do, it will take very little to beat this team.  Do I think Arizona has the potential to win this game?  Yes.  Do I think they will? No

UCLA 27  Arizona 10

Excellent comments! Check out Brandon Johnson’s article on Arizona lacking a winning attitude on the Arizona Daily Star website.  As we have suggested, and Nestor at Bruinsnation documented well, UCLA should have no problem beating Arizona Saturday.  More on Arizona later …

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