The 18th-ranked UCLA Bruins traveled up to Palo Alto, California to clash with 15th-ranked Stanford on "The Farm", which is how some people refer to Stanford Stadium. Stanford was predicted to win by 7, a touchdown. In the first quarter, after the Bruins forced Stanford to punt, Josh Rosen threw his sixth interception of the year, which resulted as a pick-6 (an interception returned all the way back to the end zone) by Stanford defender Alijah Holder. UCLA responded with a field goal on their following drive after consecutive penalties on defender Caleb Benenoch cost the touchdown. On the next kickoff, Stanford running back Christian McCaffrey caught and returned it 96 yards, all the way to UCLA's four-yard line. This set up a Stanford touchdown pass from Kevin Hogan to Austin Hooper. But once again, UCLA responded as Josh Rosen threw a 70-yard touchdown pass to Darren Andrews, making the score 14-10 Stanford.
This is when Stanford rocketed away. The Cardinal scored three more touchdowns to expand the lead to 35-10. First, there was a nine-yard touchdown pass from Hogan to Devon Cajuste. Then, there were two consecutive touchdown rushes by Christian McCaffrey. To close out the half, UCLA running back Paul Perkins ran the ball into Stanford's end zone to cut the score to 35-17.
The third quarter was no better. Stanford wide receiver Francis Owusu made the most godly reception ever, in my opinion. At first, the play just looked like some trick play, as Christian McCaffrey took the snap, handed it off to Stanford running back Bryce Love, who pitched it back to Kevin Hogan, and Hogan followed up with the touchdown pass, which is already going to be the best play of the college football season, like nobody can beat that play. While I was watching the game, I thought it was an interception by UCLA defender Jaleel Wadood. But I was wrong. If anyone remembers that one catch Kodi Whitfield made against the Bruins two years ago, how about this catch? If you want to see that beautiful catch, check out the link at the end of the post.
Anyways, back to the game, the score was now 42-17 Stanford. After a UCLA field goal, Christian McCaffrey ran for two more touchdowns to extend the lead to 56-20. One of these scores was off of Josh Rosen's seventh interception of the year. McCaffrey set a Stanford school record with the amount of rushing yards in a single game: 243 yards and four touchdowns. This was still in the third quarter. In total, McCaffrey had 369 all-purpose yards in this game. He currently leads the NCAA in all-purpose yards this season, with 1,518 yards on kickoff returns, receptions, and rushes combined, followed by San Jose State's Tyler Ervin (1,432 yards) and LSU's Leonard Fournette (1,258 yards). At the end of the game, Stanford crushed UCLA 56-35, ending the Bruins' NCAA-long road-game win streak and handing UCLA their second straight loss of the season.
The Bruins dropped out of the top 25 on Sunday morning while Stanford joined the top 10 for the first time since the postseason top 25 in 2013. UCLA is only three spots away from coming back into the top 25. They have an opportunity to come back as they will play against the 20th-ranked California Golden Bears at the Rose Bowl this Thursday at 6:00 P.M. As a big-time Bruins fan, I hope the Bruins come back after two very disappointing back-to-back losses and snap back by beating a top-20 team. This will be the fourth team ranked in the top 20 that UCLA will play against this season. The previous three were 19th-ranked BYU (UCLA won 24-23), 16th-ranked Arizona (UCLA also won 56-30), and 15th-ranked Stanford (which I talked about in this blog). Goooooooooooooo Bruins!!!!!!!
Link to the catch made by Francis Owusu:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vHinglqAAhY
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